the first day

Another fresh new year is here . . .
Another year to live!
To banish worry, doubt, and fear,
To love and laugh and give!

This bright new year is given me
To live each day with zest . . .
To daily grow and try to be
My highest and my best!

I have the opportunity
Once more to right some wrongs,
To pray for peace, to plant a tree,
And sing more joyful songs!

-William Arthur Ward

the ice dancers

Have you ever heard the tale of the tiny ice dancers that come out at night and make patterns on your windowpane? Well, this morning I saw them! A tiny troupe of birds and butterflies, ballerinas, acrobats, jumping jesters, unicorns, bunny rabbits, and more!

They were quite shocked at first that I had caught them, but then they continued along on their merry journey; dancing the dawn away...

;o)

down the sky

"The night walked down the sky with the moon in her hand." -Frederic Lawrence Knowles

...

We have fallen into the place
where everything is music.

-Rumi, trans. by Coleman Barks

green

in miss mary's garden... ;o)

paths

"But your solitude will be a support and a home for you, even in the midst of very unfamiliar circumstances, and from it you will find all your paths." -Rainer Maria Rilke, trans. by Stephen Mitchell

blurry monday

bathtime

just smile

gently

tiny pools

fragile beauty

“Never say there is nothing beautiful in the world anymore. There is always something to make you wonder in the shape of a tree, the trembling of a leaf.” -Albert Schweitzer

fallen

the view from here

time

"I can't go back to yesterday - because I was a different person then." ~Lewis Carroll

moonflower

tiny flower

I found these tiny yellow flowers in our garden today...aren't they cute?

fall, je t'aime

ooooh I can feel it coming...and like a kid in a candy store, I can hardly contain myself!!

Maybe it's the crispness in the air, or the sweet smell of dried leaf piles. It could also be my fuzzy gray sweater (14-years-old and counting) finally coming out again after a long summer's nap, or the taste of fresh apples straight from the orchard.

This image was taken last year during our annual apple-picking extravaganza. There's nothing like that first sip of hot apple cider (or watching your mother-in-law climb trees) to get the season started! ;oD

sun flower

"The moment one gives close attention to any thing, even a blade of grass, it becomes a mysterious, awesome, indescribably magnificent world in itself." -Henry Miller