May arrivals and Great Blue Heron

After months of gray, the world around us has exploded with COLOR! We are blessed with a variety of blooming wildflowers in the woods around our house. Although my Grandma Ellen was a master in identifying wildflowers (and wild mushrooms!), I’m lucky if I recognize two or three of them. However, beautiful Trilliums, False Pennyroyal, Spring Blue-Eyed Mary, and Jack-in-the-Pulpits are familiar and provide beautiful early color below the canopy of trees.

It’s especially lovely to smell fresh dirt and see green again - with farmers in the fields and cows and calves, sheep and lambs, and even the local Clydesdale horses with their new foals returning to the pastures. For Mom’s Day, one of our daughters gave me the Goats of Anarchy book – and I agree with author, Leanne Lauricella: “Baby goats are just about the cutest things on the planet!”

And a wonderful variety of new songbirds appeared at our feeder this week, including: Indigo Buntings, Red-headed Woodpeckers, Baltimore Orioles, Rose-breasted Grosbeaks and Ruby-throated Hummingbirds.

This week’s painting features of one of the heralds of spring and a favorite summer bird in this area. My painting, Great Blue Heron, 7”x13” Watercolor (framed 15”x21”), was a commissioned artwork, and I’m hoping it looks lovely in its new home in North Carolina.

If you are interested in purchasing or commissioning a painting, send me an email for more details and pricing information.