Eclipse on the Strawberry Moon
Posted: 06/15/2011 Filed under: Motherhood, Nature Leave a comment »
Wow! A full Strawberry Moon tonight, and a extra-long lunar eclipse, too, for those lucky enough to live in South America, Asia, Europe, Africa, and Australia! Plus, as an added bonus, tonight’s full moon will be very near its lowest possible position in the sky — see this article for details.
Happy moonwatching, everyone!
Of Red Mushrooms
Posted: 05/20/2011 Filed under: Motherhood, Nature, Photography, Watching | Tags: baby, bouncy chair, fungi, mushroom, red mushroom, video, Virginia 3 Comments »
After days of rain, fungi have begun popping up all around! This bright one pushed its way through the moss of our backyard overnight.
For quite a while, Bennett has been fixated on the red-capped mushroom on his activity bar (as this video taken a couple months ago attests). But the little guy above is his first glimpse of a real one!
A Day of Birds
Posted: 04/11/2011 Filed under: Motherhood, Nature, Photography 1 Comment »
Today, Bennett turned four months old. It was a day of birds! We saw:
- Our pals, the mute swans, tooling around the dock at breakfast
- A blue heron stalking the bank
- A yellow warbler hopping in the sand and moss
- A cardinal couple, the male bright red against spring green maple leaves
- A red-bellied woodpecker, flitting on an oak trunk
- An osprey, fish in its clutches, flying above us on our walk
- A bald eagle in the backyard at sunset — the crowning glory of the day!
It was a lucky day. Bennett is a lucky boy! (Photos of him on his four month birthday at Flickr.)
April Is Here!
Posted: 04/01/2011 Filed under: Motherhood, Nature, Poetry Leave a comment »It’s April — time for Walking in Season! But, here’s the thing. Although in his 3.5 months Bennett has managed to accumulate everything from piles of clothes to organic plush vegetable toys to a lambskin rug, he has not managed to procure a pair of shoes that fit. And it is “cold” today (in the 40s). And the last time we took him out walking at this temperature — even with multiple layers of socks on — his little feet were still chilled by the time we got home. And we, of course, felt the obligatory parental guilt.
So, Walking in Season will come to you tomorrow, when the high is in the 60s and Bennett can accompany us on the loop with toasty toes. Until then, enjoy the April poem from the children’s book A Child’s Calendar.
And now I’m off to go order a little pair of shoes…
April
It’s spring! Farewell
To chills and colds!
The blushing, girlish
World unfolds
Each flower, leaf,
And blade of turf –
Small love-notes sent
From air to earth.
The sky’s a herd
Of prancing sheep,
The birds and fields
Abandon sleep,
And jonquils, tulips,
Daffodils
Bloom bright upon
The wide-eyed hills.
All things renew.
All things begin.
At church, they bring
The lilies in.
- John Updike, A Child’s Calendar (1965)
Introduction to Spring
Posted: 03/25/2011 Filed under: Motherhood, Nature, Photography Leave a comment »
On a cloudy March morning this week, we walked our favorite trail. Spring was all around, and finally, Bennett was awake to see it! Well, much of it, anyway. We made a list of his first spring sights:
- Exuberant bursts of forsythia in Crayola-yellow
- Fleets of frilled daffodils
- Redbuds in full blush
- Cherry blossoms pinking the landscape
- Tulip trees aglow with spring green leaves
- Pink magnolia petals, so thick and alluring
- Dogwoods like towering white croquembouche
- Catkins dangling
- Bell snowdrops nodding in garden beds
- Mailbox planters purple with petunias
- A very sweet snail paused on the path
- Ospreys circling, calling, guarding snag-top nests, and gathering twigs for their homes
- A bushful of male and female red-winged blackbirds
- A pileated woodpecker making his tree-trunk rounds
- Flickers in black and white
- A hawk diving in for a meal
This winter baby has enjoyed his introduction to this gentler, warmer, more colorful season!
Vernal Equinox
Posted: 03/20/2011 Filed under: Motherhood, Nature, Photography Leave a comment »
Bennett, skeptical of daffodils
Today, it’s official: Spring is here!
Last year on the equinox, I wrote a poem and held hope for a child in my heart.
This year, I hold a happy, healthy baby in my arms, and thanks in my heart!
I hope the turning of the seasons brings you a happiness just as great!
Like this:
The Mud Smells Happy On Our Shoes
Posted: 03/09/2011 Filed under: Motherhood, Nature, Poetry 2 Comments »
When Bennett was born, friends of our family got his library off to a great start with a pile of wonderful books. This book, A Child’s Calendar by John Updike, with illustrations by Trina Shart Hyman, is one of our favorites!
The book contains twelve poems, one for each month of the year, and is sure to be a favorite of anyone who loves to keep an eye on the changing of the seasons.
I’m not usually a fan of rhyming poetry, but these poems are especially sweet: perfect for children, but with appeal for grown-ups, too.
Here is the poem for March, which we have learned by heart, and which we recite to Bennett as we look out the window or go on a walk, where, yes, we see crocuses, robins, and chickadees, and where, yes, the mud smells happy on our shoes!
March
The sun is nervous
As a kite
That can’t quite keep
Its own string tight.
Some days are fair,
And some are raw.
The timid earth
Decides to thaw.
Shy budlets peep
From twigs on trees,
And robins join
The chickadees.
Pale crocuses
Poke through the ground
Like noses come
To sniff around.
The mud smells happy
On our shoes.
We still wear mittens,
Which we lose.
- John Updike, A Child’s Calendar (1965, revised 1999)
Walking In Season – March 2011
Posted: 03/01/2011 Filed under: Motherhood, Nature, Photography, Walking in Season Leave a comment »March is here! Later this month, Spring officially arrives. For us, winter has gone by in a flash of baby snuggling, holding, feeding, changing, and admiring. In many ways, the stretch from December to the present feels like a dream to me — a wonderful dream. Not without its challenges, but wonderful nonetheless! And just as I am emerging from my wintry, motherly reverie, so, it seems, is the outside world.
All around, life is stirring. Crocuses blooming, daffodil leaves pushing up from the earth. Flowers popping like fireworks along the branches of maple trees. Algae greening the lagoon. Spring peepers peeping from the lakeside.
Oh, how I love that spring comes so early to Virginia.
As always, the entire set of monthly Walking In Season photos (January 2010-present) can be viewed here. If I were a cool kid with a Tumblr blog, I would whip up a little time-lapse-like Walking In Season slideshow for you all right quick. But since it’s a bit harder to do such things with WordPress, the world will have to wait for that creation just a little bit longer… But good things come to those who wait. =)
And for those clamoring for photos of our new little one, an entire album of them can be viewed here.
Stop 1. Buds are appearing on the tree branches.
Stop 1.5. Though you can’t see them here, the turtles are out, and the spring peepers are peeping.
Stop 2. Pretty in the late afternoon light.
Stop 3. Holly trees give the woods a splash of green year-round.
Stop 3.5. Already the lagoon is greening with algae.
Stop 4. Look! Flowers on the swamp maples already!
The Snow Moon
Posted: 02/18/2011 Filed under: Motherhood, Nature, Photography 2 Comments »
February’s full moon is often called the Snow Moon, but today in Williamsburg, the weather was anything but snowy: warm (mid-70s!) and sunny. Bennett and I took our longest walk yet, through the neighborhood to see the lake.
This little boy of ours loves to be outside. He turns his head from side to side as we walk along, taking in the trees (his favorite!) and the squirrels and the water and the sky. He sticks out his little tongue, as though tasting the air, which today carried woodsmoke and that pungent, springtime smell of earth warming to life after the cold of winter.
But, for now, anyway, Bennett’s curiosity about the world is no match for the soothing rhythm of his mama’s gait — the rock and sway so familiar from his time in utero. Within 15 minutes, he is always asleep! He missed the view of our lakeside destination today, but no matter. In the coming months, there will be time aplenty for him to take in the scene.
Enjoy tonight’s full moon, everyone!
Like this:
Wolf Moon
Posted: 01/19/2011 Filed under: Motherhood, Nature, Photography | Tags: full moon, January, Wolf Moon 4 Comments »
Bennett in his night cap
We’ve been seeing a lot of the moon in recent weeks. Well, lots of moonlight, at least, sifting in through the windows as we are up tending to the sweet little one.
Tonight’s full moon is the Wolf Moon, so-called, legend has it, because of wolf packs which once circled towns and encampments in the January cold, howling to make their winter hunger known.
No wolves to be found in these parts these days, but nonetheless, we’ll be glad to be safe and snug in our warm abode this evening.
Happy Full Moon to you!
