And the weather changes to gorgeous

 I have more pictures of the gorgeous skies today than my garden. It clouded over and looked ominous last night in the late afternoon and got very windy and cold. I thought 'oh goody another rain storm' but it just slid past us and hit others around the area. I smelled the air and for whatever reason I mentally said 'it smells like rain and snow'. I've never been anywhere that was actively snowing for a long period of time. I've played in snow once when I was about 7 years old. And yet, that was an instant image in my mind of what it smelled like. Very odd.

This was the sky yesterday morning. Still beautiful spring skies with different clouds in all directions. 

I was out to the garden just before 11 am and that south bed is still getting a ton of shade. I know it's getting maybe an hour or so in the early morning but only the front of the bed. Everything else is enjoying the rainy then sunny weather absolutely. Speaking of weather, on to today's skies.

So many beautiful sky angles today, like I said, more pictures of the sky than my garden. I'm glad I got out when I did because now the high hazy layer is moving in.

Everything plugging along and despite how dry it looks, the soil in the beds is mostly good. The west bed I did have to water as the mostly bare soil at the bottom of the picture was very dry. The raised bed was fine about a half inch down.

Lettuces are coming along nicely and as much as  I want to pull the carrots, they are not ready yet. I keep pulling ones that are small or too close to larger ones though. That potato is just being shredded by the bugs and slugs and snails. There's likely a few potatoes big enough to use but want to leave that plant in as long as possible for more yield.

Tiny carrot and (not pictured) smaller radish I tossed in the compost bucket. I also chanced on a coffee pot from someone that I suspect the machine broke so they just put that small four cup pot out. SNAG! Just big enough for watering small plants like the cups. Works perfect, as you can see it's almost the same height as the four inch rose pot.

I decided to take the 'supply' bucket and jam it on top of the open compost bucket as a makeshift cover. Banged them together a few times to scatter the flies as much as possible then just crushed the compost down. My wonderful sweetie is trying to help and put full eggshells into the scrap container. I didn't have the energy or heart to tell him not to so those got a crushing also but I know it'll be years before they break down. And the aloe is blooming! Almost missed it because the plant blends into the wall so well, I was on my way out of the garden then turned to look at something else and saw the flowers. Yay! Will have to remember to water it next time.

Oh! I saw the first Monarch of the season this morning as well! Saw the shadow of a butterfly as I was walking Rocky and looked around, expecting to see anything but a Monarch. It flitted through the trees and disappeared as it should this early in the season.

I used a cup and a half of chopped cilantro for today's meal. Cilantro lime chicken and cilantro lime rice and black beans. They were both excellent and I used a LOT of cilantro, the rice called for a cup of chopped cilantro. Now if I can only get a lime tree, I used up the entire small container of lime juice and the three limes I bought for the zest and juice. Good thing I got that extra juice because the limes were rather dry. The chives I cut the other day I used as garnish on another meal we had yesterday so yay for garden goodies! 

Wish the radishes and carrots would hurry up.