On Thursday my ever-helpful husband found a recipe for muffins that intrigued him, and I agreed they looked promising. So on Friday morning I set about to produce them in our kitchen, using my own interpretation of how I would prefer them to be, and thus substituting some of the ingredients to suit what I had on hand and my preferences.

Here's the recipe as it was originally published, for Rhubarb Streusel Muffins.

1-1/4 cups brown sugar
1/2 cup cooking oil
1 egg
2 tsp.vanilla
1 cup buttermilk
Zest of one orange
2-2/3 cups rhubarb, chopped into 1/2 inch pieces
3/4 cup pecans, coarsely chopped
2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
Streusel topping:
1/3 cup raw or white sugar
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tbsp. melted butter.
Method:

• In a large bowl beat brown sugar, oil, egg, vanilla, buttermilk and orange zest together.
• Stir rhubarb and pecans into mixture.
• Sift flour, baking soda, baking powder & salt together; add to liquid mixture, stirring just to combine.
• Preheat oven to 400 F. 
• Make topping combining sugar, cinnamon, melted butter.
• Scoop batter into muffin tins (I lined mine with paper cupcake shapes)
• Sprinkle streusel mixture on top of muffins, pressing lightly.
• Bake for 20 to 25 minutes or until they're golden brown, and the tops spring back when gently pressed.
• Serve warm

I chose to substitute Becel-brand margarine for the oil, and plain yoghurt for the buttermilk. Instead of rhubarb I used what I had on hand; frozen raspberries brought to room temperature, reducing the volume by one-third.
And, rather than use a streusel topping I chose to make a light, cream-cheese-based icing to smooth over top.

And we declared last evening's dessert a marked success; light, moist and delicious. Verrrry raspberry!

It is a readily observable fact that crows do not enjoy a very wholesome reputation among the bird-watching public. The public at large, in fact, holds a dim and rather bigoted view of crows. They're large, they're a public nuisance, goes the claim, and there is nothing attractive about them. Farmers and anyone else who grew a kitchen garden, would be concerned about the welfare of their crops, pirated by crows.

Crows have never decided they would sign a covenant with humans not to raid food that humans grow specifically for their own advantage. Crows hold the view that they are as much of the world community as those strange creatures who tend to attempt to rival Mother Nature. They don't mind the threats and the epithets hurled at them as thieves. They feel they have as much a right to the bounty of the land as any other species. Their survival imperative is just as strong as any other living organisms'.

We've always liked crows. We've seen those events where in the fall crows throng together, named by, one imagines, ornithologists, a "murder of crows". Their presence in such numbers really is impressive. As is the chorus of caws they emit. They do sound murderous in intent when they circle an owl, for example, taking exception to that predator's intentions. As they do when there is a hawk that comes clumsily into their midst. They no more appreciate threats to their well-being than does any other species.

On a daily ramble; Riley foreground, two crows, background.

They are also exceedingly vigilant and clever. We see that ourselves in the manner in which area crows have habituated themselves to our presence in their midst, taking especial note of our activities when we stroll our nearby urban forest. One crow seems always to be on lookout duty, to warn others when we're about to embark on a daily circuit. They have a particular affection for us, recognize us and what we're about, and have been very adept in spotting the numerous cache places where we leave peanuts for the squirrels in the ravine close by our house.

They, like some of the squirrels who recognize us, will accost us in the hopes of being noticed and rewarded. There are, we have seen, crows who will do just as the squirrels do; await our tossing a specially retained three-chamber peanut their way, and then pursue it as it tumbles along the trail. They fly ahead of us and patiently roost on a tree branch just above a regular-circuit deposit area.

They never choose to oppose squirrels over the bounty; should a squirrel appear to take possession, the crows will simply fly off and await their next opportunity.

False Solomon's seal

This spring started off slow and cool. Winter just balked at fully retiring, despite that it was due to; it had been a too-long, too-cold winter. Spring had more than the usual amount of rain; we had rain events that seemed too prolonged, and far heavier in volume than seemed usual.

Pink-flowering honeysuckle

The result of that has been an early crop of mosquitoes and their voluminous presence too is unusual. Nothing carefree this spring about embarking on our daily traipses around the ravine. Because we prefer not to use insect repellent if we can get away without it, we've had to cover up arms and legs more carefully than we would have, otherwise. And to select light-coloured coverups, since mosquitoes notoriously are attracted to dark colours.

White-flowering honeysuckle

On the other hand, spring has caught up to its obligations to give show-and-tell (grow-and-swell) opportunities to the flora in the ravine. We've a large number of Bass seedlings coming along as well as Hackberry which my botanist brother informs us is not meant to grow in the Ottawa Valley.

Dogwood shrubs in flower

The dogwood shrubs are now beginning to bloom, and so are the ground dogwood (bunchberry).

Flowering bunchberry (dogwood)

The honeysuckle are now in full bloom, and what seems odd to us is that where there is a white honeysuckle bush, a pink one will be growing right beside it, not as robust as the white, but very present nonetheless. For the first time we can recall we've now seen viper's bugloss, growing on the slope of the creek bank, difficult to access because the soil is so friable there, tending to fall away.

Viper's bugloss

The False Solomon's Seal is blooming and it will be dangling its fruit in late summer. Fascinating forms of fungi are appearing at the base of dead trees presenting another form of aesthetic attraction. Roaming through the ravine is never boring.

Mornings never pass without their drama in the gardens. When I came down to prepare breakfast this morning, first glancing out the front door, my eye caught a black squirrel taking a ride on the bird feeder, daintily selecting tidbits to suit his own breakfast fancy.

Later, a small grey squirrel was seen scrubbing about below, not quite as acrobatically adventurous as his black counterpart, but taking advantage of all the seeds the previous actor-on-the-scene had scattered below.

After breakfast we did a turn in the garden ourselves, appreciating the alacrity with which our many clematis vines have begun their climb to seasonal maturity, anticipating their generosity in setting out buds and blossoms for our viewing pleasure. The climbing hydrangea has begun to set its floral display and the roses won't be long in putting out their buds for June flowering.

The bearded Irises have been holding their promises aloft with ever increasing speed and the more delicate-appearing Siberian Irises have been keeping pace very nicely, soon to present us with their bright array. The Mountain Bluet have also budded nicely, and so are the peonies, including our two twenty-year-old tree peonies which appeared to have suffered overwinter this year, but are now coming along nicely, after we cut back the old woody stalks.

The tiny roses are in full colourful bloom. The Datura I planted yesterday looks as though the transplantation shock, gentle as I was, troubled it; one of its more mature budding blooms looks fairly dismal, but it will recover and grow to a good height and profusion of blooms whose scent will pleasure the night-time atmosphere in the garden. We don't intend to nibble at any portion of this plant.

We couldn't resist a new type of Heuchera, and though its price was steep, considered it an investment in the garden's future; for they, like Plantain Lilies (Hostas), take readily to division. We also, for the first time, bought a Hellebore, and it too represents a future investment, as it comes to maturity and pleases us with its fine aesthetic presentations of lovely blooms early in spring, and perhaps on toward succeeding bloom months.

Just as well we tend to recall to mind the carefree days of spring and summer. Forgotten are the voracious predators that feast on our tender flesh. As soon as the weather turns decently warm and the ground has received spring rain, leaving puddles about because the ground is already saturated with the winter runoff of melted snow and ice, out come those mosquito larvae, and before we know it, they've progressed to maturity and hungrily search us out.

Oh, not just us, of course. There's little doubt that the creatures of the forest represent fair game for those bloodsuckers, as well as the humans who enter the forested confines in search of pleasure and leisure activity. Just imagine, if we shudder at the thought of hundreds of mosquitoes alighting on our skin, how much worse it is for other warm-blooded creatures like birds and small mammals. They must suffer exquisitely. We can cover ourselves to protect as much as possible from those stings, and we can, if we wish, use mosquito repellent; they have no such protection.

The mosquitoes come in flushes throughout the months. We usually get big clumsy ones early in the season, slow-movers we can quickly dispatch if we become aware of their wicked presence on our skin; usually we are aware once the mosquito has done its work and is prepared to withdraw its proboscis. Later in the season the mosquitoes that are bred appear to be an entirely different strain; tinier, black rather than dark brown, and swifter to extricate themselves from harm's way; more sneaky about sucking our blood, and succeeding.

But it isn't only the mosquitoes; perhaps somewhat even more sinister and painful are the black flies that actually take a bite out of the epidermis in their blood-frenzy. Those tiny black flies flit about in a cloud of menacing intent; repellent works if it's slathered on and has plenty of the active ingredient DEET, but who wants that stuff on their skin, even for such an avoidance?

In July come the deer flies and later yet the hornets. We love seeing bees in the garden, flitting from flower to flower, doing their serious business. Their pollinating prowess we hugely esteem. Without their skills we would be in a parlous state since they are responsible for bringing much of what we eat in fruits, grains, vegetables to the dinner table. We would miss their presence. Not so deer flies and hornets though entomologists no doubt would have no trouble earnestly explaining to us that all creatures have a defined and definite purpose in the chain of existence.

Nature, as though with a sudden tardy realization that her reputation for reliable efficiency has suffered of late, appears to have ordered the season to accelerate its usual processes and presentations. She clearly has her favourites. Either that, or she's quite given up on urging grumpy old man Winter to depart when he should. Turning instead to meekly sensitive Spring to make up the difference, encouraging her to become at least a little robustly self-confident.

We know this, from the swift transitions that take place on our neighbourhood woodlands. The briefly-flowering trout lilies have had their day in the sun; the emerging foliage of the forest has now made certain that the sunrays which coaxed those trumpet-yellow blooms can no longer make their way through the green screen.

And the trilliums, emblematic of the province itself in their gay spring proliferation have dimmed, their floral tributes to spring now wan. Others have, of course, taken their place. The Jack-in-the-Pulpits are turning up everywhere, where in earlier years the merest glimpse of one of those extraordinary flowers would send us into a tizzy of delight.

Now the foamflower, which look amazingly akin to our nursery-cultured Heuchera, are in full bloom. In the ravine, but also in our garden where years ago we transplanted a sole little foamflower which has now naturalized itself into a carpet of form and texture under the shade of some evergreens, along with trilliums and a later-developed clump of Jacks all of which took enthusiastically to joining our garden residents.

The ravine dogwood shrubs are putting out their early, not-yet-quite-developed floral sprays, as are the cherry trees and the apple trees, sending a veil of fragrance lingering on the breeze as we pass on the trails. The wild honeysuckle, both pink and white, are now beginning to bloom.

Spring turning over its succession of floral offerings in compensation of a long, hard winter.

I was in a tizzy of anxious anticipation yesterday afternoon. So much so that I did something quite unreasonable. Which is to say, in my anxiety I fidgeted and worried and finally committed an absolute absurdity.

We had been out and about doing a little bit of shopping. Just to pick up lone items that we wouldn't ordinarily be concerned with, but which, in a household, occasionally run out. We had made a few stops, and then my husband decided to stop at the Great Canadian Superstore. It's one of his favourite food haunts, and my least favourite.

So I decided to remain in the car with Riley, while my husband burst into the store to pick up a single item. Be back in a minute, he said, and I nodded. Had I foreseen this little event, I would have brought along something to read while I waited. Waiting in the car seemed far preferable, even without something to amuse myself with, than accompanying my husband into that vast consumer-experience interior.

After almost sixty years of marriage how could it slip my mind what 'back in a minute' turns out to be with my husband? Time went by and I watched people return from shopping, load up their vehicles and drive off, while just as many pulled into the parking places they had vacated intending to do precisely the same.

Nice, but nothing to keep one's mind actively engaged. On the other hand, what was happening overhead, high, high above, as in the sky ... was a matter to concentrate the mind. The day that had started out so beautifully with a mostly clear sky and ample sun to cheer both us and our gardens, had finally given over to a cloud-filled sky. In and of itself, a bit of a relief from the burning sun. But these were no ordinary clouds, they were brutally bruised black-and-blue and there were definite thunderheads among them.

We'd noted, as we drove along to the parking lot adjacent the store how we could see the results of some of those thunderheads in the far-off distance. The wind was picking up substantially, and if it did so at our level it obviously packed a wallop high above, given the momentum of the gliding, dark clouds. While I awaited my husband's return, my mood turned from unconcern to suspense.

When on earth would he be finished, flooded my mind continually as the minutes ticked by and a half-hour had approached. He does get carried away when he's shopping; food concentrates his mind and he invariably sees something intriguing that gives him further food for thought. As I waited, the atmosphere seemed muggier by the second, and certainly it became darker by the second. A sharp, devilishly loud thunderclap banged through the air, directly above. I looked up, up, up and it was dark and getting darker. No problem looking up since the sunroof was fully open, as were the car windows.

The car keys were with my husband, in the store, helping him shop. I envisioned a sudden downpour and the interior of the car becoming completely inundated; not a very bracing vision. When I could no longer stand the suspense, I finally shouted out what my mind had been muttering: "Irving, get yourself over here, now!"

Damned if he didn't appear directly the words were out of my mouth,  turning the corner of the supermarket, prepared to embark on the bit of a walk toward where he'd left us waiting. In the annals of not-a-moment-too-soon, this one ranks. As soon as he unloaded the single object he meant to purchase, along the bagful of other items, and the French baguettes held tenderly under his arm, he turned the ignition in the car, and I helpfully recommended that the sunroof be closed shut.

At that very moment, the great reservoir above burst its gates and a torrential rain assailed us. As we drove out of the parking lot onto the street, the rain was embellished with large, windshield-pinging (please don't crack it...I humbly begged the Titan above) iceballs. The short drive home was uneventful but for the difficulty of seeing through the thick curtain of rain and hail. A nice bit of which accumulated on the walkway to the porch, as evidence of the above.

No harm done.

Simply put, Nature with her immense creative capacity has equipped all her creatures, regardless of their generalized species characteristics, with individuality. Some dogs never quite outlive their puppyhood, retaining elements of youth well within their aged years. Whereas, some like our little Riley transition swiftly from the exuberance of youth to the sobering attitude of adulthood.

Button wasn't like that. There was an essential-to-her lightness of spirit that accompanied her all the days of her life. That spirit remained with her even when she became blind, deaf and psychologically addled. She was fiercely independent and amazingly perceptive. Her loss will remain with us always.

A rare and ephemeral lifting of rejection

Her absence leaves us to focus our attention on Riley, whom even as a tiny puppy Button avoided contact of any kind with. Whereas we thought, when we introduced him into our household, that he would be a companion for Button, nothing of the kind ensued. His puppyish manoeuvres to be friendly with her were rebuffed continually; she was simply disinterested and dismissed him entirely. So she never became a mentor for him, and he never learned, in an intimate setting, to become canine-socialized.

Hiking in New Hampshire

The result was a standoff in communication between the two, a yawning gulf of separateness that we always regretted. And which, we think, accounts for his instant hostility at the presence of dogs he doesn't know. That hostility always dissipates once he has encountered that 'strange' dog several times.

Riley, comfortable on the glider on our deck

Riley is never so comfortable as when he's cuddled with one of us, resting, after a long, hard day of ... relaxation, ambling in the woods, eating, scrutinizing the world go by at his front-door post. He's our little pal, the small creature with whom we have a very mutually satisfactory daily conversation.

Spring has gone into full robust stride in our neighbourhood ravine. The forest canopy has almost reached its full strength. A mere week ago we could still view through the understory but now that too has burst into life with bracken pushing up through the damp soil enriched by generations of fall detritus. Everywhere we look, the formerly timid-appearing green veil has become a green waterfall of new life.

The lowly dandelions are in their full blush of springtime glory, soon to become fluffy white ghosts of themselves. While they're in bloom the far less numerous, infinitely more shy coltsfoot pop up here and there, appearing like dandelions at a cursory glance, but definitely a flower distinguished by its own subtle characteristics.

The apple trees are ablaze with tender white-pink blossoms, certain to produce an abundance of mostly sour, small apples in the fall, but beautiful to behold in either season.

The Ontario black cherry trees are also in bloom with their delicate spray of white blooms.

Jack-in-the-Pulpits are more generously sprinkled within certain areas of the ravine than we can ever recall before, surprising us with their plentiful presence. Ferns have appeared everywhere, fresh and green and appealingly graceful.

Strawberry is everywhere ensconced and prettily blooming. The thimbleberry bushes are becoming robust and will soon send out their large pink blooms, and the emerging panicles of dogwood promise a plentiful show before long.

And violets, they're everywhere in sight, from tiny floral heads to more robust presentations.

Each day we wander the trails in the ravine presents a new surprise. We're awaiting the rare appearance of blue-eyed grass, knowing precisely where we've seen its ephemeral and too-short life appearing in the past, but not yet. The fresh shiny foliage of lilies-of-the-valley have not yet produced those tiny dangling flower-bells.

The most famous of Ontario's spring wildflowers and one that the province has taken for its symbol, is still in flower, albeit here in our clay-and-soil landscape, bright red, not the more traditional white.

We take our ravine adventures and the surprises contained therein day by day.

It was inevitable. Though we kept procrastinating, putting it off, reluctant to disappoint our constant visitors. The tourists just passing through on their reverse migration like the flocks of juncos and white-crowned sparrows have gone. The goldfinches, also returning, are here to stay. Our regulars, the redpolls, cardinals, chickadees don't really need us anymore, but we've decided to maintain the bird feeder regardless, through the summer months.

It's the squirrels that will be disappointed. In fact, we've already seen desolate little squirrels looking about with confusion, wondering where all the seeds and nuts have made off to; life can be so unfair at times, we know.

I felt more than a little forlorn myself, last night, when I watched as the big old raccoon that alternated with the younger, smaller one to show up intermittently for snacks, looked about for the treats they've found at our porch, only to discover none were to be had. He must have been at the backyard composter, where a new pail had been emptied early in the day, so he hadn't been entirely deprived.

We do feel badly about it, but it is time they foraged for themselves, as they most likely do in any event. Suffice it for the time being that we sprinkle a handful of peanuts in the shell at the side and front doors now.

The garden is coming along splendidly. The glory of the magnolia has been somewhat muted this year; a reflection I fear, of the very harsh winter just past. But it's blooming, and the petals have begun to litter the gardens below. Soon its large, glossy dark-green leaves will emerge to take the place of the flowers. The Japanese quince is in its full orange-glaze of tiny flowers, and above it the ornamental crabs are beginning to put out their lovely pink little flower buds. The bees are beside themselves with glee.

Yesterday, I divided a few of our older hostas that are getting crowded out by the proliferation of lilies, and re-distributed them to other parts of the garden. A day later, they look fresh and happy in their new residence.

The newly re-located Great Daibutsu facsimile that has spent the last twenty years in our backyard looks fine where my husband has now placed it, under the big pine at the front.

Just a short stroll from Byward Market is Sussex Street to its north, a street replete with one storefront after another boasting designer and formal haute couture representing the elite offerings of retail studios of some of the capital's well-known and extremely costly apparel designers. For the area's hoi-poloi, a glimpse at what the social and financial elite shop for. A leisurely stroll from there takes one in about ten minutes to the environs of Parliament Hill.

And there's a venue that's generally surfeit with tourists, with tourism buses crowding the sides of the street, a colourfully energetic landscape. There, in prime real estate, is located as well some architecturally-striking embassies. They provide quite the contrast to the neo-Gothic appearance of Canada's majestic parliament buildings.

At the Market itself, throngs gather to walk and to gawk, to park themselves at various venues like coffee houses, restaurants, and drinking establishments. There are shops selling everything from fresh sausages to work and leisure clothing, to organically-produced cosmetics. There, people push their infants in strollers, walk their dogs, ambulate in wheelchairs and come across the occasional panhandler, and a whole whack of buskers in performance mode.

The cafe patios that extend onto sidewalks clearly unable to cater to the numbers that congregate at their popular sites on spring and summer evenings and far more so on live-easy summer week-ends, have taken to developing their flat roofs to offer additional seating, dining and gawking space.

A domestic horse breeder that once had stables in the Byward Market has never left the area, but presents now in a different guise, taking advantage of the tourist- and local-popularity-venue, to offer horse-drawn cart perambulations through the Market, along Sussex Drive and elsewhere, along the Rideau Canal to entertain those interested in taking advantage of their services.

It is quite the place to come across, dazzling in its social-gathering opportunities, offering a bit of respite from the ordinary world we live in, of sameness and comfortable habit.

Long before we saw them yesterday, we could smell them. And we followed our noses until we came directly before the booth at Byward Market where the ramps were being sold. They were $.75 each bunch of six heads with their long bright-green spade-like greenery attached, or three bunches for $2.00. We took three bunches. One of which was destined to end up, neatly chopped, in my husband's anticipated omelette at dinnertime. I chose snipped fresh chives from our garden, instead. Along with heaps of fresh-grated cheese; Swiss for him, marble-Cheddar for me.

Many years ago when our children were young and the Gatineau Hills became our second home from season to season, we would be on the lookout for them in spring, watching for the appearance of the fresh green leaves around the trunks of trees in wilderness areas not seen by many, waiting to be plucked by us. Only later did we learn that it was illegal to pick them. We picked only enough to munch on while we hiked, fresh out of the ground. We knew them then, as wild garlic.

When we decided to hie ourselves off to Byward Market on Victoria Day yesterday, we knew we'd have trouble, once arrived there, finding a parking spot. At one juncture we despaired we would, and then we discovered one awaiting us, right beside Elizabeth Bruyere Health Centre. A wee bit of a walk to the Market from there, but nothing strenuous for us. We'd hiked a whole lot further earlier in the day, through the ravine on our daily ramble.

On the way, driving along the Airport Parkway, we saw more cyclists than usual; walkers, hikers, people strolling with their pets, pushing strollers, riding in wheelchairs, out to enjoy the wonderful weather and the holiday. The trees are filling out to full maturity and everything is green and fresh and alive. At the Market, right in the Market, it was so crowded it reminded me of forging our way through crowds in Shinjuku. There were buskers out everywhere, and even a traditionally kimono-clad young woman playing the koto.

For sheer atmosphere there is nothing like that venue.

And thousands agree with that estimation, throngs of people sitting in the outdoor patios of the many cafes that proliferate at the Market. Where we moseyed about, entering our favourite specialty cheese shop, and the magazine shop that has in its long narrow interior seemingly every newspaper and magazine published for a public involved in exploring the never-end sources of news analysis, literature, crafts, home interiors, world news and fashion, along with more obscure and fascinatingly exotic topics.

Finally the gardens are beginning to take on some semblance of shape and even heft. The peonies are coming up nicely as are the hostas. The peonies have already set some of their blossom buds in promise of a bright and colourful showing with the fragrance to accompany them. And speaking of fragrance, the lilies-of-the-valley alongside the house have produced their immature flowerheads that will soon burst into blissful fragrance as close to divine as possible.

The heuchera are up and columbine have begun their flowering ascent; lilies and irises are preparing to send out their flower heads. Our large magnolia at the front of the house is also beginning to bloom, sending neighbourhood bees into a tizzy of delight.

My husband had little option but to mow the grass in the back for the first time this season; it had grown so long. Birds are trilling from the trees, as ecstatic about the change in season as we most certainly are.

The snakehead fritillaria always one of the first of the seasonal flowers to entertain us in the rock garden are preparing to show their exotic heads. Forget-me-nots, scattered throughout the garden are present and accounted for, and the geraniums are sending up their large sprays of foliage preparatory to presenting with large bouquets of flowers. The Japanese quince has put out the buds of its lovely little bright orange flowers.

Chives and parsley are ready for picking. What more, at this juncture, could we possibly ask for?

Try as I might, I cannot recall a time when I walked up the stairs in our house. In any of our houses, in fact. It just isn't how I approach those stairs. Usually, and without giving it a thought I run up the stairs, unless my arms are heavily burdened with something I'm carrying upstairs. Then my pace is definitely more of a walk-upstairs affair. If I'm carrying easy-to-bear laundry, on the other hand, I'll still leap up the stairs.

Leap, as in whatever a 77-year-old in fairly good physical shape can muster. I've little doubt that over the years my 'leaping' and 'running' abilities have considerably diminished. I was never much of a runner to begin with. And I don't contemplate having to negotiate a long flight of stairs in a commercial building, for example, with great happy anticipation.

I can remember having to ascend and descend very long, winding staircases to approach some notable feature of nature, like a series of cascades, or a waterfall so popular that staircases were actually built to accommodate peoples' ability to witness them at close range. Even decades ago such an ascent and descent were arduous to me.

But the staircase in our home? No problem, none whatever. Usually, that is. There are occasions when I'll feel suddenly chastened by my body having run up and then down again in a hurry to accomplish something. Will I slow down? Not until and unless I have to.

I always seem to be in a hurry. There's always so much to be done. And if there's nothing that requires doing, there's pleasure in running the stairs, and I take advantage of it.

The kind of volatile weather we experience in the Ottawa Valley has no counterpart anywhere else. It is so changeable, so swiftly, the contrast leaves our heads spinning sometimes. On Thursday it was hot and muggily humid, the sun a fierce fireball. Friday began a cooling down and ongoing heavy rain meant the sun was shut out. Saturday the rain finally stopped dredging our world, the wind was cool and it became jacket weather again.

But I was able to complete the planting process, to get everything finally either in the ground or in the garden pots to my huge satisfaction. Everything looks fine and this marks the beginning of our daily morning gardening inspections to exclaim with pleasure over each and every new sight we see in our gardens of something coming up or maturing.

And then we set off for our ravine walk fully expecting what in fact greeted us there; soggy, mucky trails; what else could we expect after such torrential rainfall as we experienced yesterday when the woods were already soaked from previous heavy rains, after all?

Spring rains bring the inevitable fungal growth and some of it is an artist's delight.

We noted that the Jacks had matured immensely; overnight some of them gained double in size, and their flower heads had fully developed.

We came across one spread of woodland violets in bloom after another on the forest floor under the developing leaf cover of the trees. Among them were yellow and also mauve violets and between them the occasional strawberry in bloom.

False Solomon's seal has taken the opportunity to mature in just the space of a few days to the point where it has also begun developing its trailing flowers.

Red baneberry has bloomed, and the bright red balls that characterize it will develop from the fluffy seedhead.

There are areas in the ravine where it more resembles a wetland than a forested ravine.

We came across a pink trillium among all the bright carmine flowers.

We also came across Taz, the tiny Chihuahua with the energy of a Tasmanian Devil, chasing all the squirrels following in our peanut-peddling wake.