Spring Around Here

 While I have not been posting much of late, and still have not caught up visiting many blogging friends, you can see from this sketch that my nine year old granddaughter, Haley, has pictured me with pen in hand after she and I were working on reading together one day. [very kind of her to make me appear thinner than I am]

 Several weeks ago I was thrilled to see Mt.Hood from 307th Street near our home.  We are dashing about through many April showers so views of Mt. Hood are precious and few!

 One day between showers, my oldest daughter and her five daughters and I, hiked around our ponds to see what we could see.  Molly caught this beautiful little green frog who soon leaped down along his way.

 We admired the Holly trees still showing us their pretty red berries.

 Last year we could not find any Trillium in the woods, but this year we saw four!

 Johnson Creek is full and flowing along at a merry clip.

Thanks to Karen's post, I believe we saw a patch of Salmon Berries.

 These Pansies somehow survived our winter.

 Our neighbors across the drive had profuse blooms in their Camellia hedge.

 The Mallards are visiting us, and we hear geese cheering their way south in the skies over us.

 The Wild Cherry tree has gorgeous white blooms.

 Although, they were battered by an impressive hail storm recently.

However, after one such storm I looked up and saw this rainbow through the window to the right of the fireplace, then saw the other end of the rainbow through the window to the left of the fireplace.  By the time I aimed my camera through the left window the rainbow had faded and did not show up well in the photo, but seeing the rainbow that way is an exciting memory for me!

 Aren't these sweet heart coasters and hand painted card lovely?  My dear blogging friend, Pat, blessed me with them. Thank you again, Pat.

 Completing this crocheted pocket for my iPhone is my main crafting achievement since my last post...unless you count frogging many rows of a baby blanket as an achievement...sigh...

 While driving around our neighborhood I loved seeing this row of trees.

 The local nursery arboretum was coming alive with fresh colors.

 The Saturday before Easter my five granddaughters went hunting for eggs in the yard.

Sarah was pleased to find this one.

 Then on the way to church on Sunday while my youngest son in law was driving, this flock of sheep and our church sign came into view. Sheep not only remind me of my love of trying to tame fiber into yarn and fabric, but they also bring to mind numerous scripture verses that challenge and comfort me...chief among them, Isaiah 53:6 NKJV All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned everyone to his own way; Psalm 23 NKJV The Lord is my Shepherd...He restores my soul...I will fear no evil for You are with me...

Joy, my retired nurse, blogging friend from northeast England, sent me a wonderful hand-made card and note and a book mark for Easter, which I really appreciate and I thought some of you might like to see as well. Thank you again for your kindness and encouragement to me, Joy.

What season is around you there?  May you know comfort and joy in it!

xx
Gracie

Spring Perspective

Perspective.  It has special meaning to me at the moment.

Put aside the hot topics of money, politics, and religion. Focus on visual perspective.

You see, on Tuesday, my blog friend, Teresa, drove us to Canon Beach, Oregon for the afternoon. We had a yummy seafood lunch at the Wayfarer.  Then Teresa found the perfect spot for us to work on watercolor paintings of Haystack Rock.

Teresa is a wonderful, interesting friend from whom I feel I learn something new each time we are together...and I have a lot of fun in the process!

Tuesday afternoon we sat side by side to sketch and paint.  As in so many skills, Teresa is way ahead of me in knowing what she is doing.
Although we were looking at the same seascape, we each picked a different angle to sketch.

After two enjoyable hours, Teresa had a lively painting signed with a flourish and my painting still wasn't/isn't finished, but you can see what we painted by clicking here.

In order to finish my painting, among other things I need to adjust the perspective of the horizon I sketched...otherwise I have the Tillamook Rock Light floating on thin air!  But I loved the process of sketching and experimenting with strokes of paint.  Very satisfying!

Here at home recently I enjoyed the perspective of a Trillium flower my oldest SIL snapped in a photo in our woods with his phone.  Then this morning I enjoyed a perspective next to our front yard hose,  of our little apple tree full of white blossoms.  Also, I enjoyed seeing flurries of white wild cherry blossoms which landed on our front yard flower gardens and our gravel driveway.

In the perspective I shared with you of the preemie blanket I am knitting, the blanket is folded in half.  I am making good progress on it and enjoying how the self-striping yarn is flowing from row to row.

What is your perspective?

Gracie xx