Little Joyful Things

Abstract patterns in the season's first snow flurries:















The sound of a babbling brook on a cold, clear morning:















A birdhouse bursting with last spring's nest:



















Loads of dry firewood neatly stacked:















Ragweed, frozen at last!:



















What makes you feel joyful?

Itsy Bitsy

While going out to the car the other morning, I almost walked into this:















Yep, I shrieked. (A small one.) But then I got to studying this little guy's web. It was a masterful design. Delicate, strong, and catching lots of critters. He must have seen me too, because he scooted off to the side.















The web looks huge in the pictures, but it really wasn't all that big. I'm just glad I didn't walk into it face-first! (It was up high, attached on one side to a clematis trellis and on the other to the house gutter.)

Moonflowers

Have you ever seen these before? They are called Moonflowers. A friend gave me some seeds a few years ago and I planted them to see what would happen. What happened was they went crazy.

They bloom in the evening, and stay open until early morning. If you're patient, you can actually watch the petals unfold over the course of a few minutes. They have an exquisite smell, but are extremely poisonous. So don't eat them!



















I've let them grow wild along part of the fence by the road, where I have my sorely neglected "cottage garden." My futile attempt to make it so beautiful that cars would have to slow down. Ha, good luck, Jen! I'm not sure what will slow people down these days...

It's About Bloomin' Time

What happens when nature gets creative...

The Thing With Feathers

By this past Saturday I was feeling quite cooped up from my marathon-map-making-month and desperately needed to get out in the garden. (My garden was desperate for me, too, since I hadn't cleaned up from last fall...)

I was weeding and pruning away when I saw this Robin with a big fat worm in her mouth, perched on the fence:















Not so unusual for Connecticut in the springtime. But then I noticed where she was headed:















I'd been working less than 5 feet away from this Rhododendron and hadn't seen the nest. The mother Robin didn't squawk, or dive-bomb, or anything. I like to think she trusted me. And those babies sure were hungry:















Little things like this give me hope in this crazy world.