As is typical in Missouri, April began with chilly temperatures in the morning, pleasant sunny afternoons, and chilly again in the evenings. It didn’t take long to warm up though. But the last weekend in April was chilly again, dipping below 50 degrees in the morning and evenings. Not to mention all the rain. I’m sure May will warm up.

We finished watching The O.A. on Netflix on April 1st and started the 3rd season of Santa Clarita Diet with Drew Barrymore. The new season of Sabrina also became available on the 5th. We’d wrapped up both of those before the second week of April ended.

We enjoyed the two season of Sabrina so much that we decided to start watching Riverdale. I’d probably enjoy it more if I was a horny teen. The writing is terrible at times and besides the names and looks, the characters are nothing like the Archie characters they are based on. But it’s actually been a good, guilty watch. I’m hooked!

On April 1st, I started reading Occasional Magic, a book of short stories told live on the NPR on The Moth Radio Hour. I’d love to be able to tell a live story on a Moth stage some day. I finished it by the start of week 3 and loved it. It really inspired me to want to start writing down more memoir-like stories, so that might be a project I start soon.

Speaking of memoirs, Roseanne Cash, one of my favorite singers, had a short story in the Moth book and I learned she wrote a memoir called Composed. I was able to land a free copy, which turned out to be a signed copy too, so I started reading it the third week of April and finished it up the last Sunday of the month.

On April 2nd, Austin Kleon’s new book, Keep Going, was released and it only took me a day or two to get through it. Another excellent, inspiring work by a writer/artist that I admire. Check out all three of his books if you are in need of inspiration!

The weather was so nice we spent the first weekend of April outside. I felt like a bear emerging from a long hibernation, but was exhausted again by the end and ready for a nap. We had a trellis that had rusted out and needed to be taken down in the backyard garden. This required digging up and moving the honeysuckle that was growing on it. But before we started this task, we moved twenty large boulders from our back yard to the front to create a new natural garden bed.

The second weekend in April wasn’t as enjoyable. We had a cold spell again with lots of rain. We bought a few more boulders to complete the garden bed, and we bought three new plants for it that had to be kept inside all weekend due to the low temps. Finally got the plants in the ground just a few days later though, and we spent a little time through the week transplanting some ground covering from the back yard to the new bed in front.

The third weekend was spent transplanting more ground covering to the new front bed and cleaning out the fish pond. The fourth weekend didn’t give us much time out in the yard due to rain on Saturday, but we cut back some of the ornamental grasses. And on the last Sunday of the month our first iris bloomed. Always an indicator of spring for me!

In April, we also had one triumphant tulip to bloom. It was planted years ago along with several others that I bought on clearance at Wal-Mart after Mother’s Day that year. They never bloomed again. This one always put leaves up every year since, but never once bloomed until now.

I wrote every day in April and the work in progress is about to hit 40K in words. I’m hoping to finish the first draft by the end of June. I’m taking some field trips and reading some texts in May as research for it.

Poetry suffered a bit this month. I only completed three poems, but started several drafts. I also read poetry every day except 3 days. Not bad.

My father’s birthday was the 16th. He would have been 78. I turned 43 on the 20th. It was actually a nice birthday thanks to John, probably one of the most specials I’ve had with him since we’ve been together.

And that was April. In May, I’m on vacation the second week and plan to do a lot of writing and gardening. I’ll also be going home to Tennessee to visit family, and like I said, take a few field trips to gather inspiration for the novel.

Hope you had a good April, and that May is even better. See you later!