A New Spring, a New Garden

Yesterday was the opening of our community garden, and it was so wonderful to be back. I missed the people, the dirt, the ease with which the children run in and out of our work, the worms, the snails, the communal, pot-luck style lunch after a morning of digging and planting--all of it. As a "veteran" gardener, I feel so much more comfortable with taking on tasks than I did before, but I still have so much to learn.

Ninna gardened alongside me for much of the morning while Bojey, who up until very recently was glued to my side in these sorts of settings, comfortably played with the other kids for much longer than she ever has before.

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On the way home from the garden, out of the corner of my eye I saw something flutter to the ground from a tree. I assumed at first that it was a plastic bag; they seem to incessantly become caught in trees in Montreal in the winter, and this object flitted about so lightly, it seemed it couldn't be anything else.

But it was, in fact, something else. It was an old, used-up hornets' nest (if there are any entomologists in my readership, please correct me if I'm wrong!) This is the sort of find that is to me, beyond exciting. We brought it home and examined it, sharing it with our little neighbors. We'll be reading more about the nests next week as we have more time, and ultimately, I'd like to do something cool with it rather than just compost it. We'll see what absurd thing I can come up with.

The nest, with its papery shell pulled away:


This dark pod-like thing attached lightly to the surface, but has since fallen off:

Looking at these photos tonight, I can't help but think about my friend Heidi Lubin's sculptures, particularly her "Colony" series.

And now I'm off to frost some carrot cake cupcakes for Ninna to bring to preschool, put the diapers in the dryer, type out an invoice for some editing, and see what else I can squeeze in before I collapse.