A beautiful morning in the garden. It's going to be 70 out today and I will be babysitting. Oh the itch to get out there and clean and clear...get ready for the new season of garden. Notice I didn't say gardening,but garden. It is my sanctuary, a place to go and be.

This bunny almost fooled me hiding in the dried flowers. He stood so still......what practice.

I will learn from him.

Oh, in case you don't know...this is Handsome....guardian of my yard...feral Cat- Local 26

Quick-get the camera!

Every year this pair walks through looking at my messy backyard for a place to nest. This morning he chased her around for about 10 minutes....literally chasing her. My husband was yelling at him to take charge! Finally they scooted away scared by you know who..Handsome! Last year this couple actually laid an egg.....but they abandoned it within a few days....too much traffic in my yard I guess. But who are the dummies back this year..looking for a condo!?!?

A walk in our Galena woods

In a silent walk through the woods
I stopped to take a break,sit a while
and just reflect on the stirring of the woodland floor
a spider dashed in front of me through the fallen leaves,
now dried versions of autumn's glory
But at my feet almost unnoticed
a pair of dull red feathers, from a cardinal
I almost bent to pick them up

But no, I left them... to return
to their creator like the rest
and walked on

Glory Glory

 The sky is such an important part of the garden
like a wonderfull set design
Where all the actors can be their best
or worst
But they are on stage,telling a story
...moving us
to feel
.....and leaving us always wanting to come back for more
I love theater
...curtain call last night!

The heavens declare the glory of God...

Looking up from the garden last night....what a master lighting guy!

BEGIN AGAIN A GARDEN JOURNAL

The garden journal

Yes, I used to keep those kind of journals too. But through the years I got busy with life and the journals were set aside....a sad mistake on my part. I have found a few hiding in that writing closet of mine and it thrills and saddens me all at the same time reading the entries of my past gardening life. I used to write down everything....including a list of birds and insects that I saw that day.....there used to be far more of them. Now I am lucky to see one warbler and a few walking sticks and praying mantis (although I sort of distain them..they ate my butterflies) and Oh yes, butterflies....their numbers and types have been dwindling too.
I wouldn't have these facts infront of me if not for these old journals. So I am resolved to keep a journal again. I will record weather,plants blooming and growing,birds visiting,insects-good and bad ones...soil concerns...weeds....and my thoughts while in my garden....my open bar of joy
 

steadfast crocus.....these little beauties can be missed if you don't take a walk outside and welcome them

Peonies....before I was a gardener I commited the hideous crime of pulling out a garden full...including some I have never seen the kind again.....I will spend the rest of my life repenting of this.....

          Pulmonaria....those magical changing colors and spotted leaves

Oh the joy of Bluebells!

 Death in the garden...

Sweeet woodruff and columbine....constants and blessings of the early spring garden

Aconites ...a wonderful welcomed flower of spring
I need to plant more

Bloodroot I rescued from a building site...the rest of them are all gone
forever

Johnny jump up
wanted to grow
all he needed was the sun
the rest was
within him

Even Autumn Joy sedum needs Spring.

A late afternoon stroll
through my muddy soaked garden
searching the ground for signs of awakening plants
I heard the Night Hawk, first time,
not yet spring
looked up to the sky...
and I was the one
awakened.

The tulip fence

This a rescued section of wrought iron from a very old Swedish Lutheran church in the City that was being converted into condos......my heart is still broken over this.
I was supposed to get the entire little fence,as promised to my son in law by the contractor, but in the night....thieves came and stole my fence....leaving only this section which they couldn't get out. It got damaged in the taking,but it has a home with me..in my Lutheran garden.........

The winter has made it
more beautiful to me
A crumbling piece of clay
on a bed of decaying leaves
a pine bow for its gravemarker

I, too, feel the warmth of this
morning's sunlight
want to stretch winter away
burst forth and bloom

Love is in the air

***
When you stop looking for something,
you see it right in front of you.

....Eleanor Coppola

***

Sunday Garden

HOLY SPIRIT

Holy Spirit,
giving life to all,
moving all creatures,
root of all things,
washing them clean,
wiping out their mistakes,
healing their wounds,
you are our true life,
luminous, wonderful,
awakening the heart
from its ancient sleep.

-Hildegard of Bingen

Last night ,I think the North retreated

Catch that shadow
in the brilliant light
of fading ice
winter is on the retreat

I shall miss its holy quietness
its fancy dressing of the trees
The beauty of its snowflakes
the only beauty
sometimes for weeks
I shall miss it
but not much

Hope is the thing with feathers---
that perches in the soul
-emily dickinson

It is not even spring
and I daydream of the wildness
of the late summer garden
when everything rushes
to show that last bloom
where I can go and understand it all
that feeling of the shortening days
I know the necessity of this
-before it is dark
and the night is frozen

Maybe that is why -

I am resurrected
in the blooming of the snowdrop
the tulip
the daffodils
the aconites
rising with the longer days of sun
on our way to another season
of growth

It is the first mild day of March
Each minute sweeter than before...
There is a blessing in the air....
-William Wordsworth


Ah,the poet knows my heart!
An infusion of energy is pumping thorough my body
time to prepare myself for spring clean up in my open bar of joy
...toiling I enjoy
a sort of zen experience
becoming one with the garden again
getting lost in her epiphanies

Life is but a day:
A fragile dewdrop
on its perilous way
From a tree's summit
...john keats

Soon soon we'll be back in the garden!

Speak to the earth,
and it shall teach thee

-Job 12:8