Day 136

Today, we woke up to a light coating of snow and drizzling rain. The snow quickly dissolved, as the rain continued. Snow isn't uncommon in March, in Richmond, VA (we've had heavy cabin fever inducing snow before), but of course no one recalls that when the snow comes in Spring. Granted having nice days followed by bitter cold isn't fun, but that is what Spring is like here. I'm expecting another 2 months of rain. March, April and May showers bring on the flowers here...so expect a lot of wet flower photos...or in this case wet and frozen.

This is a flower from a Dogwood tree in my front yard. I squeezed this one to see if the water was frozen or not. It wasn't, but that would have been neat. Since the flowers were facing up, they are like little cups when filled with rain.

This Rhododendron had ice melting off of it and rain drops on it.

Some of the Vinca had snow on it. All of it was wet.

The upturned petals of the hyacinth had rain glistening in them. This one is so shiny, you can see me a bit.

Since it was really cold outside, I went back in quickly, to warm up. This squirrel butt greeted me.

Later in the morning, we headed to the city to meet some friends for brunch. After brunch, I took some photos from the passenger side of the tree lined streets. Remember when I said, I wouldn't stick the new fancy camera out of the car window. Well, I lied. Really, I just rested it on the window sill and pointed it up.

As we crossed the main bridge to our house, John said I should take photos of the James River. He purposely drives in the far right lane, so I have a better chance of clear photos. This one has been cropped to exclude the guard rail.

These are the train tracks by our house. They are tricky to photograph, so my husband slowed down when we crossed them.

Day 130

I wanted to try out my new camera on some of my favorite subjects to photograph.

These Common Redpolls have been building nests in our area. They have been hanging out in my Holly tree for the past few weeks.

I was inside when one landed close enough for me to photograph. This is taken through the window.

I went out on the balcony to work and take photos. These birds weren't scared of me. This is a male (bird in front) and female (bird in back) Common Redpole. If you look closely, you will notice the female had nest building materials in her beak.

There was a squirrel lounging on this branch. I'm impressed with the clarity of the photo, at such a long distance.

On the way to meeting Alex at the bus stop, I noticed these flowers had bloomed in my neighbor's garden.

This hollow in the tree was filled with water and had an ivy vine growing from it.

I know I photographed this Hyacinth before, but I wanted to see the quality difference between the photos.

This photo was a huge improvement over the last. I love the clarity of this one. The details of the leaf bud on this vine, are really clear.

This is a Vinca bud. Vinca is a ground cover plant that grows in abundance in our yard.

There were large ants scurrying about by my neighbor's steps.