ANN'S 4TH OF JULY CARD PLUS...

A few things today but first of all I wanted to share and thank Ann for her lovely 4th of July card. It's beautiful. All the components go so well together, a lovely color and pattern combination. 

Thank you Ann! 

Whenever I think you can't send anything prettier than what you have sent before, you do! It's beautiful!

I enjoy Ann’s blog too. It’s called Ann’s Snap Edit Scrap and you can click here to visit. 

I also want to thank everyone who sent me a birthday card, family and friends, and to everyone for your birthday wishes. It was lovely getting all of them.You are all very special and kind.

Not only that, but many of you gave great advice on my birthday meal. I still can't quite believe that ever happened. Not even a cheerful countenance and pleasant conversation saved that dinner, and letting me know what you would have done, gave me a clearer mind about it all. But there you go, into every sunny day a little rain falls to remind us not to take these things for granted. The lady avatar above I put together a few days later just for fun, and the eye rolling gave me a smile. It was like looking in the mirror, wink, wink! 

I was given a lovely birthday gift, which I will share later when I have it set up. The gift I can show you now are these. A pair of dangly earrings that I saw the other day and were a birthday gift to myself. I couldn't resist them. They are just costume jewelry, nothing expensive but I was drawn to them. Just for fun I tucked them into a sunflower for the photo.

My birthday flowers from Gregg, son and daughter-in-law. Those put a smile on my face too. I have separated them into vases and placed them around the family room.

I am a little late answering your comments. Over the last few days I have felt slightly under the weather. I went out in the heat and think I overdid it, even though I took my container of water with me to stay hydrated and wore my sun hat. I should have known to turn back earlier but I can become laser focused when looking for those butterflies! I have been out a few times to get some exercise, but today I knew better and made it a very short one. 

We went over to Walney Visitor Center to see if we could see butterflies but didn't even see a Skipper. A few bees and... 

a couple of interesting insects. The one below looks like the kind Ginny identified the other day, a milkweed bug. There weren't many but I expect they will soon be abundant. It seemed to be very taken with the milkweed pods.

I saw a hummingbird but not close enough to take a photo. It was for the mind's eye only and what a treat. Everywhere there have been mushrooms. Must have been all that rain we've had!

That's it for now. Thank you again for your delightful 4th of July card Anne, and everyone else for my birthday cards, wishes and great advice. Thank you for helping me feel better after my birthday post. You are all the best!

Take good care of yourselves, don't stay too long out in that heat like I did. I wish you a wonderful rest of the week.

HAPPY SUNDAY EVERYONE - REVISITING A TRIP TO FLORIDA TAKEN IN JANUARY 2013

 We woke up this morning to wind chill warning as low as 10 below zero. Can cause hypothermia if you are out in this too long. Temperature is 12 degrees F.  People east of us have worst conditions than we do, and probably further north. Please stay safe out there. Gregg just sent me this from his cell phone. Neither of us remember experiencing this before.

Now back to my ‘warm weather’ post.

The information below was found years ago, so may not be up to date, though I have checked and fixed the links when needed for this redo post. They do over the years keep changing. What you read below was done in 2013.

Today I thought I would share some photos I took when we were on vacation in Florida a while back. It was a fun experience taking photos of birds we don’t get in our state, definitely a bird-lover’s paradise. Some of these were taken in the Everglades and others at a bird rehabilitation centre found while driving down to Key West.

We found this beautiful Green Heron when looking around a Marina.

The Stork was having fish for lunch under a pier in Sebastian. A fishing boat had just pulled in and one of the men from the boat tossed a bucket of leftover fish bait to the birds.

A Brown Pelican found also in Sebastian.

We found these pelicans at the Florida Keys Wild Bird Rehabilitation Center in Tavernier.

As we did the Great Egret.

I have included a couple of maps showing Florida in the first map, and the Keys in the second. You can see the location of the rehabilitation center. It's very much worth a visit.

I was surprised to see all the restaurants pinpointed too. If you travel down Rt. 1, you can see the sanctuary approximately two-thirds of the way down. You can enlarge any of the photos for better details by clicking on them. I sometimes forget to do that when I am visiting blogging friends.

But now we are in the Everglades where there were many, many photo opportunities to take photos of Cormorants close up without using a zoom. It was an incredible experience. They must be very used to visitors and they should be. The Everglades typically welcome 1 million visitors per year (I added this information on Sunday, 2/7/26)

I saw several with outspread wings, drying them in the warm sun after diving and swimming for fish.

This pretty little bird is a Palm Warbler. 

And now for the bugs we found on the palm trees. These are the Eastern Lubber Grasshopper, young nymph (Romalea microptera).

2-7-26: thank goodness for old photos when the well is running dry, so to speak. I have been trying to take photos of bird out back and am not very successful at capturing them. My reflexes are definitely slowing down and the camera with our zoom is getting heavier it seems. Still, I never give up, says I smiling.

Thanks for looking everyone.

Have a great day.

HAPPY SUNDAY EVERYONE - GREEN SPRING GARDENS - 9/18/25 - PART 1

Our obligatory photo of the old house that I always take a photo of and put on my blog. I must have taken a hundred of these. I wrote about its history in this post written in 2017.

Whenever we come here, we always have the most wonderful time at this garden. The weather was perfect for walking. Today though, was special for other reasons...

starting with the very nice couple above who saw us taking a selfie with the moon gate in the background, which now has a lovely brick walkway by the way. The lady started chatting about how great the weather was for walking, as always seems to be the way when exchanging pleasantries. Their pups may have come into the conversation also. I never miss an opportunity to talk about pups. They moved on but after they got about a hundred feet away, the lady turned around and asked if we would like for them to take a photo of the two of us. We thanked them and said yes please. The husband walked back. I could tell he knew what he was doing as he directed us out of the sun and then said perhaps it would be better from the other side. He took his time which we were very grateful for.

After they left, we walked a little further along and I see 'my' bench and sit down (my bench because no one else was sitting on it this time). It is in the shade of an old shade tree, which seems like 50 feet high, a great place to observe others having a good time. In the distance there was a gentleman coming towards us on the path, with three of the cutest Boston Terriers. 

When they neared the shade of the tree we were enjoying, as soon as she hit the shade, the one called it quits and lay on her back, wouldn't budge another inch. Her human spent quite some time trying to coax her. We chuckled and this gentleman looked up and said something. 

They were about 30 feet away. The two pups looked at first pup lying down and, as if they knew it could be a while, they decided what's good for the goose was good for the gander. Except that now, head came up and first pup stared at us. She must have heard me say hello as she walked right up to us. Her nice human said she wants a fuss but was concerned because she was a jumper and could give quite a head-butt. I can move fast when I am motivated I told him, and I was more than a little willing to take a chance on her. She could have been King Kong!

Meet Oreo, who is the mother of the two other dogs, Apple and Linguini. They were getting a bit jealous and wanted in on the action but were being held back on their leashes. I got to know Oreo for several minutes one-on-one. This is a shortened version of the video I took.

Furthest away is Apple, the middle one is Linguini (the children), and Oreo, the mother, is closest to us and in the video.

Here's Apple looking a bit tired like his mother. It was very warm that day but lovely, no humidity.

As you can see, we had a great time with these cute pups.

After a while they moved on. I have more photos from our time at the garden and will share them next Tuesday. I was surprised at how many beautiful flowers were still blooming.

Thanks for visiting and I hope you have a great Sunday, and an equally great week ahead.

WHEN NATURE HAS…

 

FAME IS...

"Fame is a bee, it has a sting - ah too it has a wing."

 by 

Emily Dickinson 

written in the mid-1860s.

Emily Elizabeth Dickinson (12-10-1830 - 5-15-1886) was an American poet. Little known during her life, she has since been regarded as one of the most important figures in American poetry. Dickinson was born in Amherst, Massachusetts, into a prominent family with strong ties to its community. You can read more if you click on her name above.

MORE OF THE WASP NEST AT WALNEY - 8-4-25

As I write this (8/6/25 at 3.52 p.m.) it is 77 degrees F. (25 degrees C). The cooler temperatures have been wonderful, with hardly any humidity. No doubt the temperatures will be rising again but we have been making the most of it.

 On the 4th we went to Walney Pond. Above you can see the wasp nest I added to my collage I shared here. Gregg spotted it first - I fondly call him 'eagle eyes' as he sees these things before I do. This nest was at least a foot in diameter and a foot-and-a-half long. Very active as we could see its residents going in and out of entrance holes. It is in a tricky area and is not even ten feet from where everyone walks and low, head-height. We worry about children playing in the area, and have envisioned someone running into it, perish the thought! We have already gotten in touch with the appropriate department at the local government center. Hopefully it will be taken care of soon and we will keep checking as we often pass by. I looked as we drove off. If you know where to look it can be seen quite clearly, but not immediately obvious when closer.

I took several photos using the zoom lens and found it fascinating to look at when on the larger screen of my laptop. Clever and amazing these nature's engineers. Not sure what kind of wasp or maybe a hornet? Any experts out there? I've looked online and seen similar, maybe the one at this link.

Last shot further along the pathway from the other side. It is also quite close to the edge of the pond.

A couple of more photos and that's it from this area.

Next we drove to the Visitor Center just up the road. 

Common milkweed were growing among all the Black-eyed susans, not only in the flower beds in front of the house...

but also in the separate round butterfly garden. 

First I wanted to share something else. I saw a flurry of movement on the steps of the house and if you look on the far right of that first step you will see...

a skink, possibly a five-lined skink which are the most common lizards in northern Virginia, according to what I found out at this website. Please let me know what you think if you check it out.

Another much smaller lizard crawled out of that larger crack on the right but wasn't as brave as its larger companion. It disappeared immediately.  

I saw a bug on this Black-eyed susan and couldn’t find a lot of information but identified it as an assassin bug. Once it forms full wings, its back will no longer be visible. Also found a clearer photo of it here.

Here's a closer look. I had a hard time focusing.

Onto the Black-eyed susans.

One last photo for today taken of the flower bed in front of the old house that is now the visitor center.

There will be more flowers soon.

Thanks for looking and enjoy your day.