Melissa Westemeier

It's RASPBERRY SEASON! When I was growing up my grandma had a raspberry patch behind her garage and I thought the coolest thing was picking and eating my fill back there in the summertime. I couldn't wait to start my own patch, and my sweet neighbors Jim and Janet, donated my first canes from their abundant garden. After we built our shed in in 2013, I transplanted those canes and added more to this strip between the building and the sidewalk. It's an ideal location because t

After a slow, cold, wet spring, Wisconsin finally got a blast of proper balmy weather! I spent last weekend outside making some sweet discoveries. A year ago my favorite nature preserve underwent extensive logging. I felt sad to see the trees go, but many were dead from disease and compromised the health of other trees. Naturally, losing so much canopy meant many new grasses and plants took over the ground below and I worried I'd seen the end of the trillium. Trillium are the