The rest of my early moring walk.

I will pick up at the pond from my last post, (cue the sound of geese).

I can see home in the distance so turning my back on the pond, I head for it. In a few weeks you will barely be able to see it from the main road (that is fine with us).
This picture is a close up of our big elm. It gets these lacy little buds before the leaves come in. How pretty is that? I think spring is saying, hang on, I'm coming.
There are what sounds like a couple hundred other birds flirting in the trees as I walk past. I could not even begin to guess how many kinds. They are apparently all camera shy this morning and will not let me get close enough to photograph. It reminds me of the mountain ladies from Morocco, I have several photos of their backs as they whirled away to keep me from taking their picture. These silly birds won't even let me take pictures of their backs.

Excuse me for just a minute, I need to put a lady bug outside.

O.K. where was I, oh yeah, by lunch time, the sky on one side was as blue as could be, on the other side, it looked like trouble coming. My Sweet Hubby and I decided to head out for our walk a little early. This picture was taken shortly after we left the house. I love the details in the clouds, see how they look like they are mirroring the shape of the frame?

More clouds, so many shades of blue. This looks like a meadow, it is a field of baby pine trees. This particular batch is a couple of years old and a few are nearly three feet high. I love watching the cycle of all of this, not just in seasons, but in years and hopefully, decades.

The clouds started to look a bit more threatening so at this point, I put away my camera and we headed back to the house.

Excuse me, I need to go put another lady bug outside.

Nope, that is not snow. My camera actually managed to catch the raindrops. They were coming down so hard! My Sweet Hubby and I timed it just right, we felt a drop or two as we got to the yard, but that was it. We have had so much rain lately, our yard is saturated.

OK, here is another one, I wonder what these guys got into that causes the white specks? Oh well, out he goes.

It is hard to justify complaining about the rain when it results in things like this. The tiny flowers in the center are on the biggest of my rosemary plants. This is the first time it has bloomed!

Camellias from the side porch, after the storm.

Remember the old rhyme:

March winds and Aprils Showers,

Bring forth Mays Flowers.

We are a little ahead of the game here. The best part is that even with all these signs of spring, it is still cool enough for a nice long snuggle in the morning.

What? Another Lady Bug?

Oh my, out he goes.

Cheers,

Kat

BRRRrrrrrrr!, but Cozy.

We have had some truly awsome sky's lately. I just can't stop taking pictures. I am not sure what I will do with them, any suggestions? This is one of the clearest. Perhaps I should do some scrapbook pages with sky and clouds. this one is on the way to Augusta.

Bit of a surprise this morning. My Sweet Hubby informed me when I woke up, that it was snowing. I didn't believe him at first (He likes to tease me). He wasn't teasing this time. I got dressed as fast as possible and ran outside with the camera.

I am glad I didn't have to
go to work this morning, it is so pretty. I don't worry about the drive, even in the worst of weather. My "Trusty Steed" will keep me safe (love that little pickup).

At one point the snow flakes were so big and fluffy I managed to catch a photo of them falling. Here they are against the Smoke house. There was a fat and fluffy little bird out next to the buiding also. As I approaced the building, I heard a rustling noise. I
came around the corner and it was sitting on the saw horse. Now usually I would have had the camera
ready for the shot, but, I had the lens cover slid shut to keep the lens dry. As you can guess, by the time I got the cover open and the camera aimed, my little birdy was no where to be seen.

I walked around to the front of the house. There were a couple of birds playing under the magnolia. They were too far away. As I walked around the tree, they hopped in the opposite direction. After circling for a few minutes, I gave up. I did take a couple of photos of a little bird next to my pickup.
They are also too far away. Guess they don't feel like having their picture taken.


The Gargoils didn't mind having their photo taken (they never object to anything). I have two, one on either side of the walkway. Both were wearing a light coat of snow this morning.

The thermometer on the porch reads just below freezing, but it doesn't feel that cold. It is January and here in South Carolina, this is the deepest of winter. I don't mind. I don't like the cold, but I love
to be cozy. We have plenty of wood cut for the
fireplace and my sweet Hubby makes a great Teddy Bear.

Just in case the cold depresses or winter seems like it will stay, Mother Nature has provided a promise.
Little shoots of Daffodils, there are hundreds of them under the old pecan tree. Some are just peeking through, some are almost ready to bloom and some are already making a corner of my living room a bit warmer.

January 2009, Where did it go? (photos from a walk in the woods)

How did it get to be 2009? I remember when I was a sophomore at Ben Lomond High School, we chanted the year we would graduate at the Pep Rallies. We yelled out 81 and thought we were the future. My Mom insisted that I take a typing class. That way I could always get a job as a Secretary (Mom was Secretary for the local Teamsters Union). When I was a senior, dear old Ben Lomond got it's first computer. Not for the students (why would students need a computer), but for the office. They only had one, why would they need more?

Before we got married, my Hubby and I were looking at Real Estate Catalogs. We saw a big old house on a few acres that was adjacent to a national forest. We agreed that it sounded like a dream home. When I enlisted in the Air Force, my recruiter talked me into signing up for 6 years instead of 4. My first military ID card had 1990 for an expiration date. That seemed such an amazing long time. I was only going to do one tour. After the 6 years was up, I was going to get out and get a job fixing radios and TVs.

The Air Force sent me to Mountain Home Idaho after Tech School. That just renewed my determination to get out as soon as I could. After 13 long months, I got orders to RAF Upper Heyford England. Life changed again.

We loved England. When we had time off, my sweet Hubby and I traveled all over the place. I knew my way around certain parts of London and even went to Birmingham on my own for a couple of conferences. We toured Britain from one end to the other. I have a wonderful photo my sweetheart took of me sitting on the "Bonny Bonny banks of Loch Lomond" (our High School

song was a corrupted version of that old standard).

We took the ferry to the coast of France several times and spent a week in Morocco. We visited Bruges, Paris, and Venice. When the time came
to get out, we were having way to much fun. We reenlisted for 4 more years. That changed the date on my ID card to 1994.
Before that enlistment ended, the AF sent us to Cannon Air Force Base New Mexico. Life changed again. We found a lovely house on some land and we went nuts with the garden. We would put down roots and make a home. In 1997 (wait a minute, 13 years? I was only going to stay for 6) we got orders to Charleston. The years flew by there too. As retirement got closer (2004, hey that's a whole nother century) we started looking for a place to settle. When my Sweetheart found
this place on the Internet, a lovely old house, a few acres and within walking distance from a national forest, it was just right.
All of today's photos were taken on a walk the other night. The two camellias are from a bush in my front yard. They have been blooming for about a week.

I asked where the time went, how it got to be 2009. It doesn't seem like a long time at all.
Maybe 2033 (our 50th wedding anniversary) isn't that far away after all.

May your road be smooth and your life full of beauty for the year 2009.

Kat