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My favorite outdoor destinations these days are our small gardens. My husband built two raised beds last summer, which are planted in tomatoes, peppers, herbs, and flowers. We also have three more small beds that we've filled with salvia, yarrow, butterfly bush, and santolina. Black Diamond crepe myrtles with bright crimson blooms tower over them all. In one of the raised beds, I cast a full, large packet of seeds called "butterfly mix," because I was hoping to attract butterflies to our yard. The mix included at least 20 species of flowers known to be either food or nectar sources for butterflies. It also included zinnias, which I have always loved because of their brilliant color and the fact that they remain lovely in cut arrangements for well more than a week. Unfortunately, the butterflies haven't materialized--at least not in appreciable numbers. We've seen an Eastern Swallowtail flit around the parsley, which is the preferred food source for their larvae and caterpillars, but there's no sign of caterpillars yet. Also, the milkweed apparently didn't germinate, so I don't expect any Monarchs to visit. I haven't given up, though. I continue to trek out to the gardens a couple of times each day: watering, weeding, examining the growing tomatoes, cutting flowers or snipping basil for pesto, and searching for caterpillars. It's amazing what an uplifting joy it is to look out my bedroom window and see the cacophony of color coming from the scene outside. It never fails to pull me out the back door. --Janice
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January 2022
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