![sugaring at BSG](https://i0.wp.com/www.commonweeder.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/sugaring-at-BSG.jpg?resize=575%2C431&ssl=1)
Some people count the beginning of spring when farmers start sugaring. Up here in Heath the Berkshire Sweet Gold folks have been hard at it for a couple of weeks, but the snow is still deep in the fields and in the woods. It hasn’t looked like spring. Hasn’t felt like spring.
![violas 3-16](https://i0.wp.com/www.commonweeder.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/violas-3-16.jpg?resize=575%2C431&ssl=1)
But today the temperatures rose into the 50s and the sun was bright. I stopped at the Greenfield Farmers Coop for some potting soil and admired the violas as they were being set out for sale.
My mother’s name was Viola. I never liked the name very much until I became a gardener. Now I see the first violas in the garden centers and in my garden as a first sign of spring. I see the happy blue blossoms and I think about a mother of three sons looking into the blue eyes of her first daughter, born as winter approaches, and seeing spring, seeing sunny days, and joy. Now I think Viola is a name as beautiful as the flower.
Goodness, they are just getting pansies out here. I must get some of these smiley faces.
Lisa – I can buy violas, but I can’t plant them. I still can’t see bare ground. It’s going to be even warmer today, though.
I LOVE the name viola. Someday you’ll be able to plant them, my dear…….