Category: nature

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A soon-to-be daisy getting ready to unfurl its petals.

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I’m not much of a peony person, but the previous owners of our house (over 20 years ago!) left us with a pink peony plant and a white peony plant. We eventually moved the pink one to the backyard garden. The white one survives mostly because it is on the side of the house and we keep forgetting to do something about it. But—then I find beauty like this living in each bloom, only for a short time. Lucky me, I saw it at the right moment. I also took a photo of another bloom with a couple of ants crawling on it. It’s interesting, too, but I opted for the simple, gorgeous flower you see here.

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Oh, there are a lot of these darn things trying to start new families in our backyard. But they are beautiful and complex and intriguing up close.

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A close-up of a siberian iris petal—an example of the bouquet from our garden that we delivered to my mom this afternoon for Mother’s Day.

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I couldn’t resist another photo of spring beauties on this beautiful (and chilly and windy and sunny) Earth Day. So much loveliness. Thank your mother earth today and every day!

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Some 20-year-old tulips keep peeking out from under the boxwood and other shrub on either side of the front step every spring. We thought we had dug up all of them years ago, but now we have to admire their pluck and survival skills.

I grabbed this close-up shot of the pistil and stamens, appreciating the color and pattern of the tulip innards.

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This is such a beautiful time of the year. New green growth is dusting trees and bushes, and many are blooming in vivid magentas, pinks, whites, and more. And wildflowers are rampant in the yard, in the flower beds, in the woods—everywhere you look. Spring Beauties are one of my favorite wildflowers; my phone camera did such a nice job of focusing (it often is so finicky) that I had to share this singular spring beauty.

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More molting/fuzzing cattails along the river path.

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Also along the river trail were lots of cattails that were molting (incorrect technical term)—sloughing off their seed fuzz. I don’t remember ever seeing this up close before. I have another photo of a whole party of cattails together that I might post later (tomorrow?), but I like the close up for today.

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We hiked a trail near the river recently and this is a close-up of an old tree stump along the path with a twig cleverly placed (naturally, not by me) within the bark.