Signs of Spring

I suppose there are those who hate to see winter end, but I do not count myself among their number.  The signs grow more evident every day that we have seen the end of winter's frigid temperatures.  Yesterday it was 75 degrees (F) and typical for the season, windy. Here are a few of the things we saw...

Some baby bunnies in one of my barrel flower pots

Rembrandt Tulips on my back porch

Parrot Tulip-- only one is blooming as several of the bulbs heaved out of the dirt. :(

My "Fairy Garden" filled with miniature flowers.

Trays of seedlings under grow lights in my garden room...

More seedlings, or as Elizabeth calls them, "seedies." Ornery calls them "weedies."  :D

The front flower bed sporting all sorts of spring flowers; pansies, creeping phlox, daffodils, crocus, blue-grape hyacinths, violas and in a few days the scabiosa will be open! :)

And, late in the afternoon we had our first round of spring foul weather.  Tornado sirens were on and off for a couple of hours while a huge storm that went through threatened to drop tornadoes on us.  Nearby areas had softball sized hail, and parts of Tulsa had trees down. We don't have or watch TV so didn't see the extent of the storm or the aftermath, but Elizabeth said there were some big trees down near her part of town. Always sad to see that. She had golf-ball sized hail and high winds, but we just had a little bit of pea sized hail, some high straight winds and about 1/2 inch of rain. Ornery's sister said there were tornadoes in her area, and we did see some cloud rotation here, but it never dropped down. After the storm passed, the temperature sure did drop, though.  Brr!

You can sort of see the last of the blossoms on the Bradford Pear trees in our neighbors' yards. They didn't last long this year, maybe a week. All I'm lacking for the sure sign that spring is here are the flowers on the redbud trees--and the buds are nearly ready to open. THAT is spring in Oklahoma to me!