Again, I didn't get much done on the sock last night. The heat, unruly little boys, whiny little girl, a toddler who fell and busted open a lip.. you name it, I just didn't get much time to knit last night. And by the time the kids got in bed and I sat down to watch some tv and knit, Richard came into the much cooler living room to watch Pan's Labyrinth. I stuck around for the beginning, but the face bashing with a bottle did me in and I went to bed to read for a little bit.

Now, a little bit of a stroll around my yard..

Vinca Major. I'm honestly surprised its doing so well considering its zone is 7 through 9. We're right on the cusp of 5 and 6. Last year it was barely there, having found a few popping up through my myrtle.. this year its just gone wild, and flowered! The thing about our yard is that its such a surprise! Our neighbor who lives way up the hill from us, told me last spring that the woman who owned this house many years ago, had amazing gardens (I think I mentioned this in a post not long ago) After two years of clearing out the wild grape vines and removing brush and "other crap", things are starting to come back, and come back nice. I even found pachysandra earlier this spring on our upper hill while clearing out amazing amounts of old dead vine, brush and under that, an old picket fence that had fallen. Oddly enough.. I had been considering buying some pachysandra to plant on our front hill under the pine trees. Score!

Now, to the part where I need some help! This is also new this year. You can see it popping up through the myrtle, with a little bit of vinca major there too. Its so bright! I will likely pull this up and put it elsewhere. But before I do that, I need to know what it is so that I don't put it in the wrong part of the yard (sun/shade).

EDIT: Yay, thank you PumpkinMama! This is definitely euonymus/burning bush. Now I know what to do with it!

And this bush/tree... yet another "new growth" this year. I have absolutely no clue what it could be. Is it a weed of some type? I've let it go so far this year just to see what it turns into. The stems have thorns, and the oval leaves, earlier in the season resembled eucalyptus to me. This morning when I went to snap a picture of it.. flowers! Any ideas what it might be?

EDIT: And I did some more poking around the web, changed some of my search terms, and realized that this "bush" is a Black Locust tree. Cool! I have no idea how it ended up there (weird), but I think I'll let it stay! How cool is it that I figured out what this tree is by finding a Wisconsin DNR/Forestry .pdf. When I told Richard on the phone about it, he said I should have used the tree key at EEK!, (where he used to work) Hi Carrie! Hi Janet! Hi Brenda!

Around a year ago on this day..

• June 2006 - Torture Awareness Month - 2006
• ickies resurection - 2005