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On Monday, Sarah marched in the Memorial Day parade with her T-ball team. 

Down East Market Street they went.

Sarah also had a visit from her friend Emanuelle.  They both enjoyed the jungle gym.

Meanwhile, Jen made good progress on her garden.  The lettuces attracted some local attention.

There was plenty of action on the pond, including regulars such as red-wing blackbirds:

.. this as-yet unidentified speckled bird (maybe a brown thrasher? No: it is a female red-wing blackbird):

… and, of course, barn swallows, out looking for mosquitoes:

This visitor (a calico pennant) looks like it came from the Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome.

Our friend was back:

But the good news is that he is not, in fact, a beaver — rather he is a muskrat.  They do much less damage than beavers.  We are calling him Herman.

And, because it is spring, there were plenty of poppies and peonies in bloom.

Lots of flowers were in bloom this weekend.  Here is a rose from our garden.

And here’s a wild rose growing near the driveway.

In the front garden we had a very showy iris …

… and some pink peonies.

In the back we had roses …

… and irises.

All were yanked from their homes and put into a vase.

But not everything is idyllic.  There is trouble brewing on the pond.

On Saturday, Lew celebrated his 70th birthday with a bond indenture on the porch.  Jen managed to distract him for a little while.

Also this weekend:

• the Wonderland Florists faced Fraleigh & Rakow (insurance brokers, with surprisingly good hitting) in T-ball.  Sarah reached base in each at bat and also played a half inning at first base
• the swans living in the swamp seemed to have between five (Jen) and seven (Sarah) cygnets
• the turkeys deplored the state of our fencing

Sarah made three Mothers’ Day cards this year. 

On Wednesday morning, she pulled me aside in the kitchen and told me, “We’re in big trouble!”  When I asked why we were in big trouble, she said, “Sunday is Mothers’ Day.  We’ve got to start making something!” 

I said we had time to make something, but don’t tell Mommy.  Sarah: “I won’t tell Mommy what we’re making, but I already told her we’re in big trouble.”

On Saturday, because Mark Bittman told us to — and because we are good burghers — we made (mostly vegetarian) sushi.

These are leftover broiled salmon, red miso paste and sweet pea shoot rolls.

In bloom this weekend: anemones (Rhinebeck is the anemone capital of the world)

and these, which I guess are some kind of lily.  They were gone this morning, presumably having been munched by a deer.

Rhinebeck T-Ball league play is underway.  Sarah had her first outing on Saturday morning, and received the propitious uniform number 7.  She plays for the Wonderland Florists, which, on Saturday, squared off against Village Pizza.

Here she is at bat.

She made good contact and steamed into first with a single.

The first baseman did not seem very happy to see her, though.

The baseball field is very close to the Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome, so curiosities such as this occasionally fly overhead.

Back at the farm, the lilacs were in full bloom, and Jen and Sarah gathered big bouquets.

Here, also enjoying the lilacs, is an Eastern Tiger Swallowtail.

Many other flowers were blooming.  We had lots of pink and white honeysuckle, and some Columbine.

This phoebe has built a nest over our front door.  Every time we go in or out, it flies to the nearest tree.  We feel is if we are putting it out.

We had time for a good long walk.

And, on Saturday night, Sarah and Jen gave the sleeping porch a whirl.

Through the miracle of eBay, we got two Korean War surplus cots for the sleeping porch.

… and it is my lower back.  But Jen and I got this one back into shape this weekend.

Also getting into shape: Sarah, who in the past week has learned to skip rope:

and also has made an excellent start on riding the bicycle without training wheels.

Many flowers were in bloom.  Here are some hyacinths, blue and white.

We also had violets, which Sarah gathered and put into a vase.

Even the holly was blooming.  Who knew that it could?

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And, of course, the bleeding hearts, on which my mother once commented favorably.  Sarah took this picture herself.

Nature really does burst forth in the spring.  We returned to the farm after a two-week hiatus — a Saturday-to-Saturday visit to Sanibel Island, Florida — and found things much changed.  We had a spectacular weekend, with sunny skies and temperatures in the mid-seventies.  The lilacs are budding, and the daffodils have gotten an early start.

Here is the deer salad bar that is our small assortment of crocuses.

I believe these blue flowers to be wild hyacinths:

Here is an exotic and fortunate surviver of the predations of the deer: a greigii tulip that grew underneath an Adirondack chair in front of the cottage, getting just enough sun through the slats of the chair to survive.  I hope the deer are not reading; next year they’ll lift the chair.

Of course, they don’t all make it through the winter, and we do not grieve excessively.

We also had lots of returning birds.  This turkey wandered around Saturday afternoon.

Here’s a tufted titmouse.

And on the pond had we had a full complement of waterfowl: Canada geese (chased away and not pictured), a couple of mallards

and some scaups, greater or lesser:

Today was Easter — which meant an egg hunt for Sarah.  Not sure how the birds feel about this tradition.

Sarah wore an early-seventies vintage Easter frock of Jen’s.  She began at the swing:

Soon, after changing into tights, she began egg-hunting in earnest.

She first gathered the low hanging fruit.

But soon things got harder.

She was persistent, though.

The ball-catching game also was hard!

We returned after a weekend away to find that most of the snow had melted and the pond was more or less clear.  We saw lots of returning visitors, including the Ring-necked Ducks pictured above, a blue heron who flew above me just after I took this shot, looked down at the pond, and kept going, and plenty of Red-winged Blackbirds, one of which is pictured below.  We also spent some time cleaning up from this year’s 30-year ice storm.  Sarah gets her boots from the same place where we shopped when I was a child.

Sarah and Jen spent last weekend together.  Here’s Sarah’s picture of her mom.

This weekend, we surveyed the damage from the week’s snowstorms.