This is what I do while I listen to the repairmen installing a heater in my refrigerator

And yes, I said heater. Now, I know that doesn't make a lot of sense; refrigerators are for keeping things cold. But our refrigerator is making ice where it doesn't belong--like under the vegetable drawers. And the ice is blocking the drainage doohickey. And then the water puddles over and starts to spill onto the floor. And the rotting wooden floor is what precipitated 2007's kitchen re-do, and we don't want to endanger that, because we don't want to go through any unnecessary house renovations, do we?

So while those guys are banging around in my kitchen, I'm going to show you some garden porn. Mind you, there's not much to see around here yet; I've put in a bunch of new perennials, but right now the yard is at the awkward age. The bulbs are pretty much over, as are the lilacs, but the peonies and roses aren't blooming yet.

The window boxes out front, right after I filled them:



Shot from the porch windows, this is an impressive amount of plant material, right? But this is what you see from the street:



Guys? Grow, please. You're reminding me of my children's heads when they were one year old.

The side yard with new astilbe and hydrangeas, yay! But almost nothing in bloom,



except the bleeding hearts,



which proclaim my political beliefs to all and sundry.

One of the new trees--a pink dogwood:



Which IMO, isn't doing a good enough job of screening the view of my neighbors' trash cans.

We have about five of these Miss Kim dwarf lilacs:



Which are OK, but don't smell as amazing as regular lilacs. However, they're blooming right now, which means Miss Kim is Miss Right Now. And there's something to be said for that.

Finally, the hot mess on the far side of the honey locust tree is the largest perennial bed. Lots of stuff was already there: forsythia, peonies, daffodils, iris, ajuga, and I've added shrub roses, a climbing rose, some mock oranges, dwarf lilacs, and a crabapple tree--none of which can you see because I was walking around trying to get a sense of The Grand Sweep of Things with my crappy iPhone camera. And trying not to get rained on.



This cool, damp, rainy weather is good for reducing transplant shock, so I'm sure the new plants are happy, but frankly, I could use some vitamin D.

So can summer actually start? Or I'm going to have to ask the refrigerator guys to install a heater in my YARD.