Janet Brien's photos with the keyword: first flower of spring

(+6 insets!) This morning when I went out for my walk I couldn't help but look for signs of spring. They were there all around me but nothing was obvious except for the bursting green grass and sprouting plants everywhere. It's still too early--but how can that be? It's March already! I mentioned the other day that it's been cold enough this winter that spring has been delayed by as much as an entire month. On our property, we have a tiny little flower which announces to me that spring is just around the corner. I've been looking for Whitlow Grass buds for weeks now and I FINALLY found some yesterday! After I finished my walk I grabbed my camera and came out to get some proof that spring is officially on its way. Locating these flowers is both easy and difficult. Easy because they are all over the place…but difficult because Whitlow Grass blossoms are ridiculously tiny. The buds are no larger than a lowercase letter "o"! To see them, I must get my face right down at the ground and peer carefully at the tiny plants in front of me. Grass glistening with rows of droplets are everywhere to admire and distract. Tiny globes of water clinging to the ends of glowing green blades grab my attention. But I keep my eyes scanning for tiny white balls…and…THERE! Itty bitty buds, drizzled with dew, peek out shyly from the shadow of grass surrounding them. Then I can see more and more tiny buds…some opening, some tightly closed. I take many pictures at many apertures because I know how tough these little flowers are to photograph well. I cross my fingers for some useable pictures. Once I was satisfied, I stood up to return to the house when I realized that I should show you how tiny these flowers are! After all, it's one thing to explain how small something is. It's another thing to actually show how small it is. So I kneeled down and took a picture of a blossom which was a mere speck at that distance. Then I stood up and positioned the flower between my feet. I had to laugh…you can't even see a flower from my towering 5'4" height! At one point Steve and I were outside and I showed him some of the blossoms. He couldn't believe I'd ever found one to begin with! :) Along with my main image is another flower that has a friend on it! What a surprise…I had no idea it was there! And, as I'd promised, I'm including a couple of pictures of the inside of our trailer! They're not great photos but will give you an idea of what it looks like in there. Two bunk beds in the rear and a bathroom, a large bedroom area up at the front. Dinette, sofa, kitchen with sink, oven, stove, and microwave. The bathroom has a separate door outside so you don't have to track dirt through the coach to get to the bathroom. Outside there is a very nice awning over a small outside kitchen which will be great for barbequing. Oh yeah, this trailer has one "slide", which means the side slides out to create a larger space. The dinette and sofa are the area that slides out, and that's why it's so roomy in there! :) (If you've been in an RV without slides, you'll recognize how cramped they are in comparison. We would not consider a trailer without a slide!) Pam, since I photographed a tiny flower today, I did a search for "tiny" on your stream and came up with an itty bitty, teeny weeny bee that you photographed! So adorable and so very small!! Sending *HUGGGGGZZZZZZZ* from southern Oregon! Explored on 3/09/19, highest placement, #1.

Today I went outside and made a beeline for the granite valley, where I know the first flower of spring will appear. However, I didn't find any and figured I still had another week to wait. As it happened, I found a tiny spider web with droplets, and when the pictures didn't come out, I returned with my macro flash. After I got those pictures, I looked on top of the rock above the spider web, and look what I found!! THE FIRST FLOWER OF SPRING!!! HOORAY!!!! This is "Spring Whitlow Grass", which measures only 1/16"-1/8" in diameter! They are tiny little jewels and a great challenge to photograph well due to their size and white petals. Last year I went through countless pictures to get any that worked. I'm very happy to say that I had no trouble this time around! YAY for experience!!! :) (you can see last year's picture below!) William Blake (28 November 1757 – 12 August 1827) was an English poet, painter, and printmaker. Largely unrecognised during his lifetime, Blake is now considered a seminal figure in the history of the poetry and visual arts of the Romantic Age. His prophetic poetry has been said to form "what is in proportion to its merits the least read body of poetry in the English language". His visual artistry led one contemporary art critic to proclaim him "far and away the greatest artist Britain has ever produced". Although he lived in London for all but three years of his life, he produced a diverse and symbolically rich corpus, which embraced the imagination as "the body of God", or "Human existence itself". Wkipedia: William Blake