Tag: Spring
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Friend or Foe: Dandelions
It’s that remarkable season of reawakening, spring, glorious springtime! And more than all of the other blooms that announce the season of unslumbering, Dandelions remind us that nature is nourishing and vibrant and brilliantly colorful. Routinely dismissed, even abhored, as an annoying weed, dandelions are for me a welcome harbinger of warming temperatures, greening environs,…
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Lily of the Valley Unfurling
Signs of springtime are abundant lately. It’s asparagus time. Also ramps, apple blossoms, dandelions, fiddleheads, tulips, nettles,… And lily of the valley unfurling dramatically. An entire army of terpsichorean twirlers synchronized, slowly unfurling, mesmerizing. Lily of the valley (Convallaria majalis)… is a woodland flowering plant with sweetly scented, pendent, bell-shaped white flowers borne in sprays…
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Spargelzeit: Asparagus Time!
Imagine for a moment enduring many, many months without fresh, homegrown produce. Tragic, right? Especially for a passionate gardener who loves to prepare and share garden-to-table fare for family and friends. Now you can stop imagining because this next part requires no imagination… It’s Spargelzeit! The word Spargel means asparagus and Zeit means time. The…
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Poetry of Earth
I missed my mark — Earth Day, April 22, 2023 — with this post extolling the poetry of earth. It was germinal then, and it remains germinal today (albeit marginally more mature?) Sometimes a seed germinates with exuberance, practically exploding into existence as if overcome with the glory of imminent bloom and fruit. Other times…
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Dock, Boat Lift & Friends, 2010
This morning my friend, Mark, sent me a photo snapped exactly thirteen years ago (where does the time go?!?!) after we launched the dock and boat lift for the start of the boating season. In addition to a timely hint that spring is starting to flirt with summer — a meta metronomic rhythm reminder, if…
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Crocus & Dwarf Iris
It must be spring! Sometimes affectionately cooed (by nobody ever) and sometimes disparagingly grumbled (almost always), “mud season” has rounded the proverbial corner. Dun and drab are giving way to brilliant white and violet and — as soon as the daffodils and dandelions bloom — vibrant yellow. ¡Hasta la vista, winter! Spring has sprung. Crocus…
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Synchronous Progress
It’s been a good week, and it’s not even over yet. Much gratitude is due the entire team as we move into a Friday with many moving parts and a growing balance sheet of synchronous progress in the icehouse, outside the icehouse, and throughout Rosslyn’s still muddy but increasingly springlike grounds. A photo essay (think…
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35° Morning Dip in Lake Champlain
Among many curious characteristics that distinguish the dazzling Amazon who stole my heart 22 years ago, Susan actually enjoys cold water. Swimming in cold water! She claims that it is Scandinavian heritage (on her maternal side). And so it should come as no surprise that a 35° polar plunge in Lake Champlain is my bride’s…
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Meditative March
Mornings offer me moments of introspection, mostly optimistic meditations catalyzed by the dawning of a new day. A fresh start. So much pent up potential swelling. And like morning, springtime fills me with enthusiasm for what is possible. A seasonal morning. And so I’m finding myself lately absorbed in this liminal zone of daily and…
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Paean for Pamuela
Sometimes we call her theair traffic controller —calibrating schedules,inventorying andcoordinating andunmuddling messes,managing myriadmicros and macros, andmultitasking Monday,Tuesday, heck, every day —also installing docks,feeding ducks and songbirds,soliciting bids andperhaps painting clapboardor pruning persimmons,brush hogging meadows, andwelcoming travel guests.In short she is all this —air traffic controller,conductor, ringleader,emcee and referee —but also cheerleader,advocate, confidant,colleague, and dear-dear friend.…
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Moonrise in March
Startled by the sightof lunar liftoffI slip-slide on ice,reel, rebalance, andthen I remember:a full moon risingtomorrow, tonightpenultimate nightof winter’s waxing.The March moon shimmerson unfrozen lake,saluting springtime’sassured/unassuredarrival two weeks —per the oracles,a frosty fortnightof whiplash weather —from this Monday eve.
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Ruffed Grouse
The male ruffed grouse in the photo above was documented on a Rosslyn wildlife camera about a year ago. Fancy fowl! And the two images below were recorded a few weeks ago. Rosslyn’s backlands are fortunately flush with ruffed grouse (Bonasa umbellus), a welcome reminder that wildlife gravitates — as if by some primal sense…