>Spring means chores. Somehow, I don’t mind the extra work that comes with the melting of the snow and the warming of the temperatures. One of the first: I need to cut back or pull out the dead mint surrounding the tulips and other pretty spring blooms. Put simply, it’s time to get rid of the brown and make room for the green.

In the garden, the green onions are coming back. The parsley is returning; I didn’t even know parsley was a perennial. Is it? Maybe it reseeded itself. The chives are poking their slim green head above the ground, too. But the asparagus, the new plants I put in last year? Gone. No sign of them. Sigh. Maybe they didn’t have enough sun; maybe I bought a bad batch. I’ll try again in a new location and see what happens. It’s a bit discouraging when asparagus takes 2-3 years to develop. Losing a year in the process – well, there’s always the Farmers’ Market!