April showers bring... wait... that doesn't work here

I don't know where in the world April showers truly bring May flowers.  Maybe that happened when we lived in Salt Lake sometimes.  In Massachusetts it was more like March, April, May, and June torrential rains bring July jungles.  You might see May flowers if they didn't drown.  Here in NM, I have literally counted on one hand the number of times the ground has been wet since September!  No, we're in a major drought, even for the desert.  It rained once or twice in the fall for like 5 minutes, then, I think we got 3 snow "storms" over the winter.    This spring it has "rained" enough only to get my car dirty and spotty, but evaporated before hitting the ground.  My new favorite weather forecast is "rain that will evaporate before it gets anything wet."  Still, even as much as I LOVE being completely dry with no storms in sight, one does have to worry just a little about NO rain in the spring, right?  I will have a hard time giving up my super long showers if we have water restrictions.

This post though, is for my New England friends whom I love to torture with reports of fantastic weather.  It's not perfect here every single day.  Only 330 days a year.  We're actually having our worst season for weather right now.  Spring in NM sucks big time.  Or maybe I should say, it blows.  April winds bring... allergies?  Yesterday we had 40-50 mph sustained winds with gusts in the 70's.  Today it has calmed down to 20-30 mph.  When it blows from the north it is COLD too.  I remember this going on for endless weeks last year.  This year hasn't been so bad though, we've had 2-3 day breaks in between of, yes, incredibly gorgeous days.  But, this wind is really something.  It blows in tons of pollen and keeps it in the air.  My kids, who have never had allergies in their lives, got so sick with allergies this spring that I had to take them to the doctor for prescription meds and Grace probably should have stayed home from school a couple of days.  Spring in Albuquerque is definitely not our favorite, to say the least.

Now, I've discovered - you don't have to have ANY showers to bring spring flowers.   Well, maybe a you need a watering can once in a while.  I'm thoroughly enjoying my 2 small spots of colorful flowers in the front yard that are standing strong despite the harsh wind and very little water.  Things do bloom here - I can't wait until the cacti start blooming.  We've had the trees blossom (and then have the petals blown away by the wind.)  I've also had my bulbs come up!  For the record, I put these in the ground on December 15th.  It was a very nice warm day just before we got one of our 3 snow storms.  I actually worried that it might not get cold enough for them to stay dormant until spring, but we did have 2 weeks of super cold weather and several weeks of chilly, so it seemed to do the job nicely.

So that's it for gardening for me this spring.  One pot of pansies to stuff my face into on the way in the front door, and a little ring of bulbs around the single tree in our front yard.  I am really quite amazed at how awesome bulbs are.  They grow in nearly any climate and without any tending.  Any flower that will rise up in my yard without my attention is my best friend.  I am a very neglectful gardener.  If you want to survive at my house, you have to be able to tolerate (many) forgotten waterings, zero attention to soil conditions, and zero prep time before you go in the ground.  Oh, and you have to be able to survive our resident desert bunny named Lava Rock.  He likes our front yard because it's the only one on the street with anything green.  Everyone else just grows rocks, pebbles and gravel.  So far, Lava Rock has only made a couple of nibbles.