Signs and Other Signs of Spring

The blue hand-painted sign alone makes me want to buy a bluebird house. 

Spring has arrived in Waterloo County! I can say that with certainty after experiencing the sunshine and warmth of the past few days. The growth and color in the world of nature has just popped. While on a drive through the countryside today, I reveled in the sights characteristic of this most delightful season. I'm happy to share some of those sights with you via this series of photos:  

A slow-moving vehicle sign isn't necessarily a sign of spring, but there were 

greenhouse plants on the floor of the buggy, so this scene counts. 

I bought the lovely fern plant from this little 

roadside house of green. 

New life towers over markers of death. 

Weeping willow green is one of my favorite spring colors.

This tiny picturesque church stood across the road from 

the previously pictured graveyard. 

Farm scenes like this one are abundant along the back roads in this region.

Glorious magnolia.

I guess church steeples, as well as farm scenes, took my eye today. 

I returned home from my drive to find spring beauty in "my own backyard".

The first blooms to show up in our orchard are on the Vista Bella apple trees.

My neighbor's sun-painted beauties. 

Maple leaves unfolding tender and fragile as a new baby.

O Spring, you are very welcome here!

If spring hasn't arrived in your area yet, I'm sure it will very soon. What's your favorite sign of its arrival?

Soul Training in Nature

At the invitation of a sister-in-heart to join her book study this past winter, I encountered "The Good and Beautiful God", written by James Bryan Smith. There were many wonderful truths I discovered during our walk through the book, in which the author invites readers to become more intimate with "the God that Jesus knows". I was also greatly impacted by the soul training exercises found at the end of each chapter. 

When we finished the book study in March, I felt like I had only skimmed the surface of the soul training aspect of the book. I decided to focus more fully on the suggested exercises throughout the remainder of this year. At that time, there were nine months left in 2021 and nine chapters in the book, with one soul training exercise for each chapter. I could concentrate on one exercise per month, I thought. How handy is that! 

I also asked my co-book-studier to hold me accountable to my intention by checking in with me at the end of each month, finding out what I learned and what impressed me about that month's particular soul training exercise. My friend readily agreed to be my accountability partner. How dandy is that!

For the month of May, at the end of the chapter on the goodness of God, there were actually two soul training exercises: Silence and Awareness of Creation. These two disciplines, the author wrote, would "help us begin to experience the goodness of God" by "slowing down, becoming quiet, and learning to be present in the present moment" and by "paying attention to the beauty that surrounds us." 

I found that the Awareness of Creation aspect of the exercises could not have been more fitting for the month of May.

When May began to fade into June, I considered how I might answer my accountability friend's usual end-of-the-month question about Soul Training, I thought perhaps I could do it in writing. I decided I would share my impressions with her by listing some things I observed in nature during times of silence and becoming more aware of God's goodness in Creation. While I do that for her here, I guess you all get to listen in. 

I learned more of the goodness of God as I observed:

~ spring breezes setting aspen leaves to shimmering like so many cascading sequins in sunlight

~ a bird on the lawn contemplating a piece of last year's ornamental grass, trying it on for size in its beak, and finally flying off nestward, trailing the very long dried stalk behind itself like a banner

~ a great blue heron overhead, streamlined as a weapon complete with bayonet beak, making numerous journeys on its invisible flight track above our orchard

~ thick slabs of woodland fungi, big as dinner plates, shelved against a tree trunk

~ elegant, lacy-fronded fern chalices cupping dew and sunlight in their mysterious green depths

~ sprigs of delicate white baby's breath whispering I love you echoes in Mother's Day bouquet

~ a seemingly very new swallowtail butterfly, trapped and flapping in the orchard grasses until I gently released it to float daintily above the apple treetops

~ a swarm of bees forsaking their hive and going rogue in finding a new dwelling place, but protecting their old queen (keeping her cool and safe) the whole time

~ Red Delicious rows by the garden outdoing themselves in this spring's apple blossom production

~ a yellow bird, not a goldfinch but maybe a warbler, flit-flying just ahead of me and my bike, darting from the bushes on one side of the rail trail to the other

~ the springtime bouquets of garden flowers, such as lilacs and peonies, that fill the room with scent so heady it could bowl you over

~ slender, crisp and crimson stalks of rhubarb, at once drawing your mouth together with its tanginess and drawing you in with its deliciousness when coupled with sweetness of pastry or batter

~ a rich and slow rain falling steadily on the thirsty earth, so welcome one can hardly keep from going out and dancing in it 

~ trunk of a yellow birch tree, looking for all the world like it's had a bad hair day

~ diminutive green-suited clergyman named Jack, preaching for days on end from his striped umbrellaed pulpit

~ clouds as poetry in the sky - clumped and humped, bright and sprite, swept and crept, scattered and tattered, fluffy and scruffy, thick and quick - new lines of verse every day

~ an oriole outside a basement window, infatuated with its handsome orange and black self image in the glass

~ back at the cabin in the woods, a most cunning and spring-loaded gray squirrel that bypassed baffles (and other squirrel deterrents) and reached the silo birdfeeder containing peanuts by leaping up into the air 4 or 5 feet from a fallen log on the forest floor

~ crinkled variegation sprinkled pink and scarlet in ivy geranium hanging basket

"God, I worship you, and praise you for your goodness that you revealed to me during the month of May. During my times of Awareness of Creation, I saw your creativity, your provision, your beauty, your timeliness, your faithfulness, your power, your generosity, your kindness, and your extravagance. Truly you are a God of goodness."

Potpourri with Apple Blossom Petals

I know now why bloggers sometimes post catch-up entries on their blogs, possibly with cryptic titles such as A Bit of Ketchup, and Roundup on the Ranch, or straightforward titles such as Blog Catch Up. It is because life happenings such as The Month of May come upon them.

They probably have on their computers or in their brains, as I do, the beginnings of several different blog posts. These posts are bubbling in large stockpots on the back burner of the stove, and there they (at least, mine) will stay while we peer into the potpourri burner at the front of the stove and sniff its delightful simmering contents that are the happenings of May.

                        Photo cred: Ken Martin

I felt so rich on the Sunday that was Mother's Day. A young mom at church surprised and blessed me and my girls, as well as all the other ladies and young girls from Oasis, with a gerbera daisy and a hug after morning church dismissal. Then my KnK daughters made a delicious and fancy meal - brunch food at lunch time - for us4athome.

At a bridal shower for my niece Holly, my sisters-in-law designed this amazing and tasty spread as

part of the refreshments. I could have titled my blog post Charcuterie Board, but I don't think it would've quite done justice to this stunning display.

While in Hayward, Wisconsin (my home and native land) for the wedding of my niece Mary Jo (Bro Tim & Margie's daughter), I got to be with some of my Skrivseth cousins for a supper and some pleasant catch-up visiting at my brother Todd & Sharon's house. We didn't get all of the world's problems solved in our discussion that evening, but it sure was fun trying. 😃

The three pics above are to do with my niece's wedding. The couple in the first pic is my parents in a just-before-the-wedding pose. They hosted Ken and me over that weekend, and we had such a lovely time with the 5-star hosts, aka Dad and Mom-Ruthie, as we talked and laughed and ate. The second pic shows the new Mr. and Mrs. Terrill Byler thanking all the wedding guests. I think the cute couple just "takes the cake".

At yet another relatives' gathering on the wedding weekend, some of my nephews had a jolly time with a four-wheeler and a little trailer. The fellow on the far left there sprouted his dapper mustache only minutes after opening the gift bag he got as a thank you for being gift receiver at the wedding.

And then, finally, Spring started happening. Yay! Creatures and flowers awoke. Yay! And yes, call me crazy, but I even take pictures of the common and pesky weeds - dandelions - because I think they are pretty in certain stages and places.

One might think a taste of Spring is the color orange. In the case of the tulips by the miniature windmill on the Martin's Farm hill, and the pepper kebabs on the grill, it most definitely is!

I wish I could take you on a walk through the orchard right now. Since that is impossible, I guess this line of pictures will have to do. Thing is, you don't get the heady aroma or the buzzin' of the bees that way. So you are welcome to come to the farm in person and to see, smell, and hear for yourself!

And now we see through a glass, wetly. I have not touched my garden yet. This is how it looks through a window in our house on a rainy day. Any glimpses of green in that brown patch are weeds and clumps of grass. If I were a more persistent or aggressive gardener, I would have probably found a way to at least plant the early things, but as it is, I say that the Spring has just been too wet. Ask me mid-June, not as you would the quite contrary Mary, but as you would a lazy Daisy, "How does your garden plant?"

This Post's Quotable:

After seeing an abandoned duck nest, I made up this riddle: What two-word phrase could a mother mallard use both for telling someone what she lined her nest with and for yelling at her younguns to get out of harm's way?

This Post's Childhood Memory:

Here's a recipe for one of my comfort foods from childhood: 

Cinnamon Toast 

Open the bread drawer and take a slice of white Wonder-type bread from the loaf that likely was purchased, among many others of its kind, the day Mom and Dad went to Rice Lake and stocked up on discounted baked goods at the Holsum Bakery Outlet. Note: You may have to dig under the loaf of pumpernickel bread to get to the real bread. Avoid the dry, dark, and caraway seed-y bread for best results in this recipe. Put the piece of white bread into the 4-slice toaster, into one of the two slots on the functioning side of the toaster, and push down the little front lever that starts the toasting. With any luck, after a minute or so your piece of bread will pop up gracefully (and not get stuck on the way up and stall, the alarmed toaster loudly stuttering its protest) in the perfect toasted state, neither pale and "barely scared" as Dad would label it, nor so very darkened as to call for taking a table knife and scraping the top layer of burnt off and into the trashcan. Lay your beautiful piece of toast on the counter and while it is still warm, spread a nice layer of butter (hopefully the butter is soft enough to spread well, and if it is your mom's homemade butter, I hope it is from a batch made after she learned how to pasteurize the cream so the butter doesn't go rancid from merely a day of sitting in the cupboard) on it, right out to the edges. Licking the knife when you're done is up to you. When the butter is yet upon the toast in that soft, melty sort of way, it is the right time to sprinkle on some cinnamon and sugar. If some kind and provisionary family member has already mixed up a shakerful of sugar and cinnamon together for the taking, consider yourself blessed. Go ahead and sprinkle a thick layer of the aromatic sweetness on top of the butter layer. Alternatively, you can sprinkle on the sugar layer right from the sugar dispenser and then a thinner layer of cinnamon right from the spice container, or you can shake both layers on by using a regular spoon, although it's a bit trickier that way, for the sugar seems to mound in places and the cinnamon tends to clump. At any rate, watch the sugar and cinnamon, if you have time and want to, dissolve into that melty butter so invitingly on your toast top. Then, when you're done admiring, eat that wonderful piece of toast. And be comforted.