a blog about the garden of life and life in the garden
I'm loving the tulips and blooming serviceberry tree & shrub in the backyard, I hope you enjoy the views as well.
The front beds are also showing spring color but our crabapple tree has yet to bloom. This year it is at least 2 weeks behind an average spring.
Have a great day!
I saw the Bay-breasted Warbler come to the rock for a quick drink and bath. He was FAST so these shots since they are slightly out of focus. 
in our beautiful daughter, Jayme, who was conferred with her Masters of Education graduate degree this week. It was an event filled with pomp and circumstance, honor, tradition, color and crazy sleeved robes.
Having a lot less education than she does, I was thankful for the program that explained the academic costume and mace :)
I now know that her blue velvet edging on her hood stands for education but what I wished I knew was "what was that guy thinking as he stared at her in the middle photo" :)
After downloading the photos, I really paid attention to a lot of the faces surrounding her in the photographs, since Scottie and I were featured about 2 seconds in a clip on news looking pretty bored in the audience. In our defense, I am pretty sure that clip was filmed during our long wait for the commencement to begin. I would never be bored as I beamed with pride watching her get her degree after all those long hours of studying and working full time at the same time!
Congratulations Jayme! Your dad & I, brother & sister-in-law and of course Scott are so very proud of you :)
Looks like the goldfinches are wondering how I get any work done! One of the pitfalls from working from home is distractions...really was amazing I got anything done yesterday with these scenes right outside my window. The orchard orioles have arrived and prefer fresh oranges...
over the jelly preferred by the baltimore orioles.
The rose-breasted grosbeaks are so fun to watch - I wish all of these stayed for the whole summer but most of them are just moving through. In the one shot there are 5 males and a female!
The hummingbirds are busy dive bombing each other while staking their feeder territories, I could watch them all day. Once my sister called me and asked what kind of hummingbird had a black neck - I told her none that lived around here as we only get ruby throated ones. Now I see that unless the light is perfect their ruby neck shows up as black :)
Some of these shots were taken this morning and it is so windy outside. You can see the ruffled feathers on several shots and I don't know how the hummingbird manages to fly and steady himself in the wind - amazing.
This morning I was happy to see so much color in my early spring garden. More and more tulips are opening every day and after last night's hail & wind, I was so happy to see them still standing!
While gazing at the tulips, I spotted my first hummingbird in the lower right of the photo below...he spent time at the oriole feeders so my next job today is to get the hummingbird feeders washed and filled. I saw at least two and this one is already staking his territory around the oriole feeders.
In fact I saw 4 red breasted grosbeaks and 5 orioles at one time so I have an abundance of all this beautiful color.
This rainy Mother's Day is a quiet one for me but I am still enjoying it, I spotted the first orioles of the season (lucky for them, I just put out the feeders yesterday) while enjoying a special breakfast of nutella filled chocolate ebelskivers with strawberries and whipped cream. The beautiful fresh flowers are a gift from Nathan & Tammy :)
This year as always I reminisce on all the past Mother's Days since I first became a mother. A picnic with a bucket of KFC was our family tradition when the kid's were little and many years were spent eating in the car in the rain but at least we were in a beautiful park. I am not a gal to go out to eat on one of the most crowded dining out days of the year - give me a picnic in a beautiful setting (sometimes my own patio) and I'm a happy mom :)
This year is extra special for Jayme as she looks forward to becoming a mom in October, some of you may have seen the countdown on my sidebar - we are pretty excited to be grandparents as well.
I'm finally seeing small bits of color in my early spring garden...Yeah! The above daffodils are one of my favorites - I love the orange centers...they look like sunshine. The goldfinches are taking on their spring colors as well.
I saw my first bumblebee today - it's too bad it was on a "weed", wild violets seem to have invaded the back of my garden.
The white & peach daffodils are gorgeous as well but are too covered in insects for a great photo.
The early red tulips are finished blooming and a few yellow ones have opened up.
This little guy isn't especially colorful but is a fun reminder of our vacation in southern Okalahoma :)
The Harris sparrows became brave enough to come to the feeders right outside my window.
Loving that the low morning sunshine lets you capture the light in the bird's eyes.
White-throated sparrow hanging out in the serviceberry bush which is full of flower buds.
I don't know what these small sparrows are...if they are a female version of one of the white's or one of the many other small brown sparrows. Just thankful it's not a house sparrow :)
A White-crowned sparrow also showed off the glint in his eye...
as well as a female downy woodpecker.
A northern flicker came up to the rock for a cool drink, but...
the best sighting of the morning was a Rose-breasted Grosbeak at the back feeder! 
I'm looking forward to spotting more spring migrants in the next few weeks as well as getting outside in warmer temps to take photos. Shooting through dirty window glass is hard to focus.
It has been COLD here the last few days (20 degrees below normal average temps) and we had a hard frost the last two nights. Looks like I won't be buying any bedding plants anytime soon.
