Green Thumbs And Plastic Produce

It's raining.

Again.

I'm fairly certain that the grass is actually getting greener as I type this. Did I mention how much grass there is up here? We have a fantastic backyard that's all fenced in with more grass than I'm sure Noah could have ever conjured up in his own little imagination. And the front yard? Yep... more grass. We even have a little plot all ready and waiting for us to plant a garden. I think about it almost every day. I've never grown anything in a garden before. I'm fairly good at growing babies, but vegetables? This frightens me a little. My green thumb isn't nearly as green as our grass. I have a rough time keeping my poor little house plants alive.

Our neighbor that lives directly across the street from us is Russian. Rick said he overheard her talking, and it was later confirmed from another neighbor that she barely speaks a lick of English. She's this cute little old lady and she obviously believes that flowers should grow year round. She's got one of those cute little white picket fences that borders her entire front yard. And then along her walkway, she has planted (yes, I mean actually put in the dirt) dozens of little plastic flowers. I kid you not. It's a very colorful introduction to her front door. I'm told that once the weather is nice enough to grow real flowers, she will dig up the plastic ones and replace them with their living counterparts.

She is out there everyday tending to her yard. I'm not quite sure what kind of maintenance plastic flowers require, but it must be very demanding. She is quite devoted. And then I wonder if perhaps she has a little vegetable garden in her back yard. Maybe she could teach me a thing or two about keeping things alive. Or maybe I should go plant some plastic zucchini or tomatoes in my garden. This lady might really be on to something here. I might be able to keep plastic produce alive, after all. Hmmm...

Does anyone know how to say pumpkin in Russian?