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Showing posts with label Bella. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bella. Show all posts

Tuesday, July 24, 2018

Visiting my Parents

Earlier in July, I visited my parents for a few days.  It was great to step away from my desk and enjoy a few days with limited thinking about work commitments.  I took the camera to record any interesting birds, bugs, or other beauty that I encountered.  Here's a round-up of my captures.

Some beautiful roses (my mother has a super green thumb!)  No doubt you will find the visiting bee.




The birds were happy to put on a good show for me during my visit.  There were hummingbirds and American goldfinches, not to mention a very accommodating song sparrow who allowed me to repeatedly photograph him.

The finches looked so pretty next to the William Baffin roses.






There were honey bees in full force...


...as well as bumble bees, both the common eastern bumble bee (Bombus impatiens)...

...and the two-spotted bumble bee (Bombus bimaculatus).

It may not be that exciting, but this common greenbottle fly has an amazing metallic green coat.

As always, I was happy to see their dog, Bella.

This tiny moth is the orange mint moth (Pyrausta orphisalis).  It's sitting on a begonia flower.  Probably it was visiting the monarda - which is one of its preferred food species.

Spending an afternoon in this gorgeous garden really is very restorative.

Sunday, August 27, 2017

Friday's Hunt v. 4.08

I had a lovely visit from my parents for the past 3 days, so I didn't get around to doing Friday's Hunt on Friday, as I prefer to do.  However, I'm still doing it before the deadline.  I have had a busy week and anticipate another busy one ahead, which has limited my ability to visit other blogs and to do my usual comments on other Friday's Hunt participant blogs.  I will try to catch up soon!

Today's prompts from Eden Hills are:  Starts with H, Simple and Green.

Starts with H
Marc found a shed snake skin on the pile of barn boards that he is using in his garage project.  I decided that the skin looks like a husk of a snake.  Husk usually only applies to the outer covering of fruits or seeds, but I am using a little poetic license and applying it to this outer snake covering! It is most likely from a garter snake - the only kind we usually see around here.

Simple
I think most of us could use a few more simple pleasures in life, and focus a little more on the things that really matter.  It is difficult for me not to get all wrapped up in my work and my other responsibilities and not take time to just be, and enjoy the moment.  This weekend I enjoyed many moments on my parents' visit - just experiencing the simple joy of their company.

We had a lovely walk in the local waterfowl park, and here is my mom smiling with delight as we went on a simple walk in the park with my parents' dog, Bella.  Bonus points - my mom is wearing a green sweater and Bella has a green collar!

Here's another simple delight - watching young ducklings (late in the season!) zooming around on the pond at high speed.  They looked like little motorboats - look at that wake!

Green
Although the leaves are just starting to turn colour around here, there is plenty of green still visible. On our walk in the park, I took this photograph of a sleeping duck surrounded by a whole cast of different shades of green, including the greens reflected in the water.

Finally, here is the pale green seedpod of the wild cucumber vine (Echinocystis lobata).