The Blush Of Spring

I have been blessed beyond measure to indulge in the beauty of my very favorite season of the year: Spring. It has been 11 years since I was able to do this. To be fair, I did see some of Spring '07 but I did not notice or remember it as I was going through the final months of chemo at the time.

Even as I type this I can hear my daily visitor, the cardinal, and I would love to post yet another picture of him but I'll save that for a later date when I plan to talk more about my feathered friends.
As we made a trip last week to the neighboring state of Tennessee it was quite interesting to notice the different stages of Spring. From the slightly green landscape and certain flowering trees of North Carolina...

to the higher altitudes of the Great Smokey Mountains where all was still mostly bare and gray...

 to the lovely lush and flowering Tennessee Valley which shouted "hey, it's already Springtime!"...

 and then back to North Carolina which had been painted green during our absence...

...I was overcome with the beautiful and creative power of our Creator. Here are a few more pics which show the blush of Spring over the past few weeks. Green, white and pink are definitely the dominant colors. Oh, but there are other colors, I'm just not showing them yet. ;)

(You might have to click on this to notice the green buds!)

For lo, the winter is past,

the rain is over and gone. 

The flowers appear on the earth;

the time of the singing of birds is come,

and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land.

(KJ21 Song of Solomon 2:11,12)

Patience!

I've been itching to write a new post these days but am not conveniently able to do so because we left our computer in a neighboring state, about 6 hours away. So we are patiently (ha!) waiting for it to arrive on our doorstep so that we can get on with our life. Don't laugh, I know you know what I mean. I'm using a daughter's computer to write this.

I'm going to pull an old photo off of my blog to go along with this so that it won't be totally uninteresting. So there you have it, if you'll be patient I'LL be patient! Deal?

Happiness Is...

                                                                   ...seeing this photo.

Everything about it is just so amazing. My humble opinion.

Family Blessings

Last weekend we were so blessed to have different events that brought our family together: the arrival of a daughter and her family from Brazil, meals together, a granddaughter's birthday and the baptism of our son and oldest grandson. Sunday was the first time the 7 of us have been together in 5 years. For this momma, it was cause for much joy! I praise the Lord Who enabled all of this to happen .

Pink Rose Beauties

As I look for spots of beauty in my days, these items have made me smile. One daughter gave me this lovely pink "rose" made from a conch shell and I must admit that I've never seen one like it! They brought it from Mexico.

 The twirl on the base was obviously cut off from the middle part. Very creative!

Looking down on it...

 ...with a close-up of the middle. What a Master Creator we have!

A view from the back of it.

Then a sister-in-law has been giving me a pink rose item or 2 almost every time I see her. What a generous and caring heart she has. Here are a few of those items.

Well OK, I put the shell rose in one of the items. Perfect, hey?

A lovely plate, a mug...wait, this is too pretty to be called a mug. Is it a porcelain coffee cup? Then there's the little candle holder. Love 'em!

Here are a couple of unusual items. On the left is a compact which belonged to my mother-in-law when she was young. A note inside says she was 17 which would mean that this is about 70 years old. Awesome. The other item is a ceramic "egg" made in Budapest, Hungary as you can see. I love little "pretties" like this, they make me smile for their beauty. Thank you, givers (and Giver) of beautiful things to me!

I've used this verse on other posts but it's so appropriate for this one, too:

"Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest,

 whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely,

whatsoever things are of good report;

 if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things." 

(Philippians 4:8)  

Saturday Bath

"Search me, O God, and know my heart:

 try me, and know my thoughts:

   And see if there be any wicked way in me,

 and lead me in the way everlasting."

(Psalm 139: 23,24)

Creatures In The Snow

Here's another post about the snow we had several days ago, this time of the various "creatures" and other things that I saw there.

I'll start off with the birds. They began flocking around pretty early, obviously looking for food. Poor babies, couldn't find much of it elsewhere, I guess, so I welcomed them with open arms...or maybe I should say open lens, heh.

I saw a flash of red in the trees, starkly contrasted against the white snow. The cardinal decorated the winter scenery so beautifully.

He flew to a tree that was a bit closer to me...

...and finally only a couple meters away. I guess he was hungry enough! Yes, that's birdseed that I scattered on top of the snow. 

Then there was the lovely robin, a bit more shy than her cardinal cousin. There's something about birds in the snow that looks picture-perfect, don't you think?

Well! It's obvious there's some sort of creature prowling around! Let's see if we can find it...

Aha, there he is. He looks a bit bewildered with the white stuff all around him, don't you think?

Here's Kitty, my daughter's cat next door. It took her several minutes to get adjusted to accepting her first snow. But she obviously liked it because she stayed out all day.

This little junco is all balled up, trying to keep warm while sitting in 2 inches of the cold, soft stuff. Or is she sitting ON it? I'm not sure!

What about this creature?! Looks like a rose but it's a camillia. She certainly contributed a lovely decoration to the scenery. I felt sorry for this beauty but she seemed to survive just fine.

Speaking of surviving, I've been amazed at my little pansy that I bought a month ago. It has survived at least 2 strong winds, 5 or 6 frosts and now this 2-inch snow. Look at the next photo to see how she's still as perky as ever...

I think its theme is: "Just keep on keepin' on"! A fantastic winter flower.

I shall end with this photo which might just be my favorite of all the ones I took of the snow. I've been calling it my little snow family. Aren't they the cutest?!

"Hast thou entered into the treasures of the snow...?" (Job 38:22)