Spring reminds us that we will be reborn~
That thought makes me happy.

Walking the yard with camera in hand is the only way to capture the fleeting images to keep.

The full azaleas grace the split-rail fence line ~

Lazy morning or late afternoons are spent in the Amish built swing.

Our Garden Club Vice Chair reports to be a photographer with her work shown in our local Backyard Boutique.

Well....this is one little shop I try to avoid

as I want one of everything they have for birds and backyards.

I found myself drawn there to see Jeannie's photography ...

however...once in the door,

my feet took me right over to a new finch feeder. My old one is crowded this year...

and the newest style is the mesh wire to accommodate a crowd.

This morning...we see only 3 feeding, but later, the feeder will be covered.

I did check out the photography. Images of birds were beautiful, no doubt. Another artist has taken her photography of birds and digitally altered them and their surroundings.

Was a fun hour and I LOVE my newest finch feeder.

First Watermelon of the Season

Two unseasonable hot days together here in Northern Virginia, it just seemed only right to have cold watermelon to savor. I returned the grandchildren from a "spend the night" and dropped by the green grocer. There was a large table of seedless and seeded melons to make my choice.
I stood and remembered another time over a stack of watermelons when I learned a very interesting lesson.

Years ago, I stood be the melons testing each with a thump. A man came up to me and said, "You are from Alabama, aren't you?"

I reeled backwards as I had not lived in the Heart of Dixie for 40 years. Did I know this man?
I looked at him for a clue and he smiled. I acknowledged to him I was actually born in Alabama and then he told me something I REALLY didn't know, "Only people from Alabama thump a watermelon."

I was thunderstruck.... Isn't that how you test for ripeness?
He was tapping the melons as he talked. I laughed and he gave me a wink.

I walked away with a wonderful melon that he selected for me with three taps and a new awareness that the world shared the love of watermelons, no matter where you were born.
Some of us thump and others pat. It really doesn't matter, the melons respond with the same sound.