Hi Friends!
I was at my desk yesterday, and suddenly the trees outside called me to come out into the sunshine and go on a photo expedition! I grabbed my honey (who is always up for a fun adventure), my camera, and my smile and went skipping through the neighborhood looking for nature’s magic. Come along with us!
The first thing I saw was this frightful statue. I actually find its ugliness appealing. It has a lot of character. And to many spider families, this is what home looks like.
This statue belongs to my father-in-love. One day I was cleaning it when I saw lots of spiders running out from their homes. That was when I was beginning to pick up on emotions of insects and animals, and I could feel their alarm throughout my whole body. It was horrible. It’s hard to even write about and brings tears to my eyes. I felt so bad for destroying their homes and making them alarmed. That led me to thinking about how to keep things clean without killing insects. I thought of two ways. One is to keep cleaning outside things more often so they don’t even get time to build their homes where we don’t care for them to be. The second way I learned when I was cleaning the windows outside. I asked the spiders to move their homes somewhere else and told them I was going to be cleaning the window. Then, I gently touched their webs with my broom. They crawled on the broom, and then I let them walk off the broom and onto the ground. No spiders were killed in the cleaning of those windows! They were obviously inconvenienced by having to rebuild their webs, but it was a much more peaceful and loving process for all of us 🙂
Just a few steps further, I saw these beauties…
Azalea bushes are in bloom all over the neighborhood. They are so gorgeous! They have such beautiful, light, happy energy.
Love is all around 🙂 In people, in the air, and even in little acorns.
I just love this tree. Its crooked start didn’t hold it back from reaching up, out, and over. See the moss on top of the limbs? It’s gorgeous! It started as bright green fuzz, and each day it has grown thicker.
And speaking of cool trees…
We call this one the “fairy-house tree” because it looks like something that could only exist in a fairy tale. Who has ever seen a tree grow down to touch the ground and back up?
See the bright green leaves in the middle of the pic? There are brown spiky balls on the limbs as well, and it looks like the tree has black polka dots. They aren’t fun to step on (ouch!), but they are fun to look at.
And it wouldn’t be Florida without…
Orange trees! They are all over the neighborhood, and I really really want to pick them. There are also lemon and grapefruit trees.
And my owl friend! I was so excited to see him again! Doesn’t he look so serious and sophisticated?
And just last week, these beautiful white blossoms started popping out. They are breathtaking! They were out before the azaleas and other flowers, and it looked like a gray landscape with floating white flowers between the trees.
Speaking of breathtaking, a walk wouldn’t be a walk without my honey!
I love him so so so so muches. He’s wearing his favorite shirt. It says, “To err is human. To arrrrr is pirate.”
Thank you for joining me on my photo expedition!
You can have your own Art Walk by yourself or with some friends and family. Bring along whatever you love to work with – camera, colored pencils, markers, crayons, etc. You can also take cuttings of the beautiful plants you see to press in a journal. Once you get back home, you can have an exhibition showing your family/friends what you found.
Sometimes we have themed art walks – one day looking for cool shapes and patterns, another day looking for animal friends…but most of the time just enjoying seeing how everything looks different from one day to the next.
I hope you have a wonderful day!
Melanie Jade 🙂
