Spring has sprung?

Maybe. I'm still not 100% convinced. I'm sure New England weather will throw in plenty more cold days. It's usually June before I can quit wearing a jacket to the barn. I'll keep the flannel sheets on the bed a few more weeks just to be safe. But, any bit of spring will be warmly welcomed after the extremely insane winter we've had.

Here's my list of evidence that it might be spring now in New England:

*crocuses - Now, where I come from, crocuses come up in February/March and the tulips and daffodils are in full swing by March/April. Well, here it's at least a month later than that. My crocuses did finally pop this week with the melt of the last of the snow. (Velvet also found her favorite kong toy as that last snowbank melted! It's been missing all winter.) The crocuses are the ONLY flowering thing in the yard right now, so we love them to death. We're hoping the dreary rain hasn't ruined them today. I can just see the tops of the tulip leaves coming out of the ground too.
*bonfires - yep, here we don't recycle or throw out yard waste. We burn it! There's just so much tree debris, especially after a few winter ice storms, there's nothing else to be done with it. It was so bad this year, our town did set up an emergency "tree junk" drop off, but that requires having a truck to get it there. So, in the grand tradition of rural New England, we had our annual bonfire yesterday in the yard. Doesn't get better than roasting wienies and marshmallows in your own backyard. By the way, this is as close as I will come to camping in the East.

*peeper frogs! I know I've mentioned them on the blog before, but they are a perennial favorite of ours. Grace absolutely adores them and loves to open her window a bit while she falls asleep to hear them at night. The girls both spent quite a bit of time watching them from the side of the pond yesterday. They chatter with a sort of goose cackle all day and then chirp like little birds or crickets at night. We love our hundreds of "pet" frogs in our pond. The best part, is that we didn't put them there, we don't have to feed, or take care of them, and they come back every year. (we think the same thing about all our "pet" birds who frequent our bird feeders.)

*the opening of the local ice cream stand. Erikson's opened yesterday, but we were too busy with our bonfire to make it over there. It was probably way busy anyway so we'll go sometime this week.

*crocs - can you actually live in New England if you don't own a pair of crocs? We started wearing ours this week.

*rain - this is one of my least favorite parts of spring. I don't mind a little rain to water the flowers and keep things alive, but do we have to get soaked and have grey skies on such a regular basis?

*bugs - actually, we haven't seen any bugs yet, but we did start up the mosquito magnet and throw mosquito dunks in the pond. We're hoping to get a head start on them. The dogs also went in for their annual CHA CHING vet visit to see what damage had been done by ticks and mosquitoes last year (lyme tests, heartworm screenings, etc.) and to buy the summer supply of tick guard and heartworm treatment. Velvet tested positive for some tick-borne disease. She's already had lyme, I honestly can't remember the name of this one, but she's on a month treatment of antibiotics for it. Did I mention I hate the bugs????

So, like I said, I think, maybe, it might, be, SPRING!!!