A Christmas view of our yard from the house.

Broccoli shoots peek out of the snow cover.

Glass cloches protect young plants from the snow.

A plastic cloche covers lettuce, and a double window A-frame covers overwintering beets.

The beets are tiny and might handle this cold, but I should have put ends on this double-window cold frame for better protection.

A big water bottle protects a young cabbage.

Cold frames in the background protect greens, but lots of brassicas fend for themselves under the snow.

The big cold frame in the back and the smaller Triangle Tunnel in the front both contain salad greens. I won’t open them until our warmer weather returns, but the tender greens should be fine. Snow is a great insulator!

Dinosaur kale is tough!

A Christmas stew is going to contain fresh parsnips, pulled today from the snowy ground.

Calendula is still flowering, providing a cheery spot in the garden and in the salad bowl.

Mixed salad greens, including arugula, bok choi, tatsoi, lettuce and Asian mustards are flourishing in this bed, and getting mowed down regularly for salads.

Tatsoi.

Sparrows, black-capped chickadees and a rosy finch (obscured, center) gather for a meal of bugs on my Lacinato/palm tree kale.

Cabbages and broccoli, with one cabbage covered.

I’m experimenting with winter growth of a cabbage under cover inside this giant water bottle. There’s another one uncovered right next to it.

Cauliflower setting its head.

This DeCiccio broccoli might yet put on some side shoots.

A purple sprouting broccoli and some winter radishes grow in front of a fleece-covered tunnel containing spinach.

Lacinato/palm tree kale plants grow against a bamboo trellis which held up cherry tomato plants last summer.

Giant walking stick collards are ready to eat.

A pot of spinach covered in garden fleece sits in front of an espaliered Akane apple tree that still has its leaves.

Red Kitten spinach grows with seedlings of parlsey and flowers in a pot.

New hybrids of Brussels sprouts and kale promise a harvest of budding florets along the stem.

The first florets coming from the Brussels sprouts/kale hybrid.

The last of the fall carrot crop sits in front of a cold frame made of two window sashes, wired together. The easy cold frame holds overwintering turnips.

Cover crop of clover, vetch and rye helps build soil on this bed over the winter.

This cold frame is planted with bok choi (back) and tatsoi that I started indoors in January.

Corn salad (mache) growing wild in the mulch in front of my compost bin chopping block (which itself has been colonized quite nicely by volunteers).

Early Red Treviso radicchio overwintered in a cloche and is spicing up our spring salads while Viola tricolor (Johnny jump-up) kept it company.

Mustard greens, overwintered in a cloche, are exuberantly growing.

Buds on the pear tree promise sweet blossoms.

The fresh, silvery leaves of the globe artichoke cheer up a border bed.

This is probably a cabbage, sprouted up from a stray brassica seedling. I have no idea if it will make a head. if not, I’ll probably start eating the leaves.

This volunteer, clearly a Brassica but not clearly what type, popped up on the edge of a bed. Looks like a cross between collards and dinosaur kale. Also looks like good eating!

Red-veined garden sorrel sprouts back to life from a dense head.

Lettuce seedlings, begun indoors, gain strength under my Triangle Tunnel cloche.

The plant is healthy but our cool late winter weather has delayed the buds on the Purple Sprouting broccoli. But they are coming.

Lacinato (dinosaur) kale going to flower. It was planted too late last year to reach “full frame” before winter, but we’ll eat it soon and pull it up to make room for something new.

Garlic slices through the straw mulch behind a whimsical steel bike sculpture.

Massive square stones stacked into an imposing fountain, which is skirted by blooming daffodils, greet visitors to the show gardens.

These steel and wood sculptures pair nicely and seem about to take flight.

The “Good Times Great Food” garden features a varied patio landscaping with an assortment of stone pavers and groundcovers.

This bar-fountain-pool combination nicely edges a patio in a small garden.

An artistic water sculpture echoed by another shapely sculpture behind highlights one garden.

A stylish espaliered tree dresses up this shed wall.

Hydroponically grown lettuces nearly burst from their tubular homes.

Water coursed through plumbing pipe to hydroponically feed this lettuce crop.

A green-roofed shed faces a plastic-covered hoop house filled with hydroponic growing.

“Honey, We Shrunk the Farm” is the title of this edibles-focused garden, highlighted by a whimsical little free library, a low chicken house and a hydroponic growing system in the hoop house.

This tiny house contains lounging space, but the cutlery over the door signals edibles, with strawberries and wheatgrass in planter boxes and pots below bursting with mint.

The “Garden on Tap” featured a pub shed with a lit G and plenty of Mason bee houses to pollinate the fruit trees.

The shed promises tasty relaxation for the gardener.

“Hanami – Savoring Spring” by the Arboretum Foundation shows a rural Japanese scene of relaxation under the flowering cherry trees.

The front of a Japanese farmhouse in the Arboretum garden, expertly faux painted to show age and texture by my wife Susie Thorness and other volunteer painters.

A Japanese water hammer (aka “deer scarer) sits by the picnic area in the Arobertum’s garden.