September 22, 2024

Road trip to Texas – September 2024

September 22, 2024/ Gwen Morrison

I made a 2-day road trip to Texas to visit my father. It was the usual 7 hours on the road each direction. It was dark when I left my house. The moon was close to the horizon and looking very large. I should have stopped for a picture when a few clouds drifted over part of it – missed the opportunity. More clouds and fog blinked out the moon before I got to my first rest stop and gave the day an eerie start. I was more than halfway to Texas before the temperature was in the mid70s, but Dallas was in the 90s when I got to my dad’s assisted living home. We finished a puzzle and watered plants around the back patio, but it was too hot to take him for a walk around the block.

I had forgotten that there was a partial lunar eclipse…didn’t venture out of my hotel room. My husband sent a picture the next morning that he took from our front yard.

The next morning I visited my father right after breakfast…a great time for a walk. He is moving more slowly but walks often enough that other walkers in the neighborhood recognize him! There is a lot of home maintenance/improvement going on in the neighborhood. One family had enclosed more of their yard and made rock gardens in the parts that are too shady for much to grow; a small branch had fallen from the tree and was leaning on one of the larger rocks….photo-op.

There was an interesting leaf in the middle of the street…..not the usual fall foliage. It might have been from a Bradford Pear. My dad was so focused on walking that he didn’t seem interested in the leaf, but I took it back to his room as a memento to share with his next visitor.

Getting out of Dallas was a bit challenging. There seemed to be more-than-the-usual stalled cars/trucks (in traffic lanes on US 75 rather than off to the side) and there was some construction. I made a stop to relax a bit close to the border with Oklahoma…and am glad that the rest of the drive back to Missouri was uneventful.

July 22, 2024

Our Missouri Neighborhood – July 2024

July 22, 2024/ Gwen Morrison

There is always something to see in walks around the ponds in our neighborhood…bits of nature thriving even in an area dominated my manicured yards: a dandelion puff (hurray for some deep rooted plants in the turf), a fat robin (there must be plenty of worms here), clover in bloom (making nitrogen available to other plants), and magnolia flowers (the bee had just flown away).

There are always turtles in the pond. One on the bank looked like he was waving at me!

I stop at the bridge to look at the sheet of water flowing into the first pond – runoff from rain or sprinkler systems running too long. I look for ripples and collections of debris to photograph. The feather caught my attention first….then the leaves and green clippings…a background of algae.

The large redbud near the pond was damaged by a storm a year ago. There is new growth from the large branch that had to be removed. I like the way the new leaves start out reddish…turn a light green…they will get even deeper green as they age.

Most of the fish I see in the ponds are small and gray or brown…but there is at least one monster koi (about 2 feet). Hopefully if someone catches it, they will not return it to the pond!

Finally – a fresh feather on the path that had been sprinkled by a neighbor’s automatic sprinkler system!

July 04, 2024

Green Heron in the Neighborhood

July 04, 2024/ Gwen Morrison

The forecast said the day was going to be very hot and humid…so I was out taking my daily walk at 7 AM. As I neared the first pond – a bird flew out of the shallows and land at the other end of the pond. I managed to use the zoom on my camera to see what it was: a green heron. It was standing up tall making it a little easier to spot. It is surprising how well their coloring blends into the environment.

They are occasional visitors to our neighborhood ponds. There is not enough habitat here for them to be residents. This time the bird was looking for breakfast. It stalked down through the grass to the edge of the pond – eventually sitting at the edge of the water. The morning light was excellent for photography.

I was walking slowly closer to the heron…although across the pond from its location. The grackle startled it enough for it to move along the bank and then up into the grass again….before it flew away.

May 02, 2024

Springfield Botanical Gardens – April 2024

May 02, 2024/ Gwen Morrison

I made my second visit to the Springfield Botanical Gardens in late April when one of my sisters was visiting; my husband and I had gone to the Kite and Pinata Festival earlier in the month. The tulips had been in full bloom during the first visit. There were a few left in late April, but the irises and columbines were the big show. I noticed some native honeysuckle and clematis blooming as well. I made it a goal to make a walk around the gardens at least once a month until cold weather comes again next fall. There will always be something new to see.

My sister and I walked through the Mizumoto Japanese Stroll Garden after viewing the gardens close to the Botanical Center building. I used my Friends of the Garden membership in lieu of the admission fee. I made a small cairn on one of the posts near the rock garden…this time choosing the same type of stone for all three rocks.

The Japanese lanterns are always some of my favorite photographic subjects in the garden. I like the greenery around many of them. The pines are there all year round, but the grasses and yellow iris are only around during the warm months.

The yellow iris grow around the ponds – along with the bald cypress knees that always make the water’s edge look more interesting.

It was a good way to spend a couple of hours….enjoy the beautiful gardens and get in some steps for the day!

December 04, 2023

Walk in the Carrollton Neighborhood

December 04, 2023/ Gwen Morrison

Getting out for a walk in the neighborhood was a treat during the routine of being with my parent in the hospital for 24 hours and then catching up on everything else (including sleep) for 24 hours…repeating. Even though I was exhausted, being outdoors in the crisp air was exhilarating; as always, I had my camera in hand to document what I noticed.

I didn’t get away from the house before I noticed the mini-mums in the front flowerbed and the oak leaves on the ground but held upright by the groundcover.

There was a flowerbed near the sidewalk a few blocks away that was full of ceramic yard art tucked into the plantings. The frog was my favorite.

I noticed that the city of Carrollton (Texas) has marked the drains along the street…indicating that the drains go straight to waterways (i.e. not treatment for contaminates).

There was a confused pear tree along the way – blooming in late November rather than waiting until the spring!

Refreshed and feeling less stressed…I returned to my parents’ house for a nap.

October 17, 2022

London, Ontario: Thames River and Old Courthouse

October 17, 2022/ Gwen Morrison

On my first morning in London, Ontario, I waited until it warmed up enough then walked down to the Thames River Kensington Bridge.

There was a hiking/biking trail along the river. I took the branch that went under the bridge and discovered the markers for the floods in 1883 and 1937.

There is a sign (in English and French) from 2000 when the river was designated part of the Canadian Heritage Rivers System.

I enjoyed taking pictures of the fall plants along the river (since there were only Canada Geese and Mallards in the water and the lighting was not good for photography of the river itself).

I walked back uphill toward the downtown area noticing that there were young gingkoes planted as street trees.

The Old Court House is up the hill from the river. It was built in 1827 and is covered with vines – used today as an event space. There was not an event happening while I was there (and a lot of construction in the immediate area), so I got a good look of the outside. The vines were turning red with the cooler temperatures.

I walked up to the front of the building and took some macro photos of the way the vines attached to the stone…and discovered that the vines had small berries!

Overall - it was a good walk on a sunny fall day….and a good orientation for my plans to explore the downtown area of London, Ontario!

April 30, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/29/2020 - Zooming

April 30, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Walking the neighborhood. Yesterday was the best weather recently for a walk in our neighborhood. I set out at mid-morning when it was in the low 60s with a little breeze. I took a lot of pictures, but I’ll save most of them for later posts. There is a Virginia Creeper on our oak tree. In recent years there always seems to be one or two. This one has already lost its hold at the upper extremity. All the leaves are still new – shiny and reddish.

At the base of the oak tree was a small yellow flower…like the Virginia creeper, it is not a formal planting.

There was a gorgeous peony (I think) near one of my neighbor’s front porches. It made up (a little) for not going to Brookside Gardens this month.

Adding ground turkey to spaghetti sauce. My husband wanted more protein than the spaghetti sauce from the jar…so I browned some ground turkey with onions and lemon pepper….then poured in the spaghetti sauce and let it simmer for a bit. I had mine over broccoli and cauliflower with fried onions on top; he had his over spaghetti. We’ve only recently started using ground turkey. It cooks a little differently than ground beef…but is a change of pace that we’ve come to enjoy.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now for the monthly zooming post.

April 2020 is the first month where 100% of the images are from at my house or very nearby. As I am looking at them – they are skewed toward birds…but there are botanicals thrown in too. I am thankful every day for the scenes all around me – springtime in Maryland. My favorite picture is probably the dogwood flower taken in the forest. The original is in the slide show…and then a clipped version is at the bottom of this post. I like the curves and textures and the gentle colors – greens, creams, dusky red backed by gray. The clipped image makes those things easier to see.

April 09, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distance – 4/8/2020

April 09, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Hearing the phoebe first thing in the morning. I am hearing a phoebe outside my office window every morning as I begin my day. Maybe it’s in the sycamore. Maybe its nest is nearby. I know from the time that the sun has just come up this morning but the clouds are hiding it; it’s too dark too look for the bird and try to get a picture.

Cleaning off the covered deck furniture. With the temperature forecast to get into the 70s in the afternoon, I cleaned off the table and chairs on the covered deck in the morning so I could spend time there in the afternoon. Everything was very dusty since it hadn’t been used over the winter. The furniture is over 20 years old and had been on the covered deck since we got it. It is undercover but ‘outdoors’ and I noticed there are some bubbles in the paint on the metal parts. It probably needs to be sanded down, primed, and repainted…which I am not enthusiastic about attempting.

2020 04 IMG_8815 (1).jpg — **Walking the neighborhood.** The forecast here is for cooler/wetter/windier after today so I wanted to get out and enjoy the sunshine…look around the neighborhood. Things change fast in the spring. Our cherry tree lost most of its petals overnight when thunderstorms rolled through. Most of the petals were on the ground. At another house the driveway was polka dotted with petals.

2020 04 IMG_8815 (4).jpg — The azalea still just has buds (and the deer have browsed the bush so there are not very many buds left).

A neighbor has a deciduous magnolia in bloom and it held its flowers in the storm.

2020 04 IMG_8815 (7).jpg — There is another tree blooming nearby. A fruit tree?

I recognized the redbud. ‘Cauliflory’ is a recent vocabulary word I learned from a tree tutorial; it means that the flowers are on branches and trunk…not where the leaf buds are…and that is how redbuds bloom!