Turns out that there was good reason for us to work hard to get our little patch of dirt yard cleaned and sunny. the roses are in full bloom and we aren’t even at the end of May yet!

On a side note – there are tons of little bugs on roses – they don’t seem to be impeding the blooming, but look kind of icky up close. not sure what those are, and whether i will get around to getting rid of these.

Perhaps some companion plants?

Given that the roses did so well, we decided to try out tom tomatoes. Our friends gifted us the topsy-turvey tomato planter for our housewarming last year. So Sergey put up some brackets and up it went. So far so good. There are some flowers forming. hopefully tomatoes will follow.

A nice back yard is also pretty sweet, as it allows us to host some kick ass parties.Like American BBQ.

because I just became an American. True story, and Sonia Sotomayor was my speaker!