In deep deference

To the fluttering snow flakes,

The birds cheap softly

##

From "Haiku this Other World" by Richard Wright, p 198

Over Fathers Day, my mom and dad spent the weekend with us. Kevin and I had found the Greeley Freight Station Museum in one of our many mini road trips. We had almost convinced ourselves that we had taken my parents there. Luckily we asked them, and since neither of them had been we decided that we owed another visit.

Even if you are not a train buff, even if you have only the most remotest of interest in trains, I still highly recommend this museum. We spent a wondeful satisfying couple of hours.

There was so much to look at. Look out for the bald eagles, the skunk scaring the picknickers and , the occasional bear frightening a kayaker or two! The attention to detail is truly amazing!

We have been enjoying the Colorado summer. This year we decided to explore local events. We decided we had to go to the Tast of Fort Collins. We met up with some friends on a hot Sunday June 9th. We had no trouble finding parking, and followed advice we found on the web, that the north and west entrances had less crowds than the other entrances. Or, perhaps it was the heat that kept the crowds away?

One can't have a festival without a street performer...

We moved from one shady spot to another. We were envious of the water bubbles game...

 We then decided to sit under the trees and listen to the music.

The best part was the people watching.

For more about the Taste of Fort Collins, visit the site here.

Whenever I walk in a London street,
I'm ever so careful to watch my feet;
And I keep in the squares,
And the masses of bears,
Who wait at the corners all ready to eat
The sillies who tread on the lines of the street
Go back to their lairs,
And I say to them, "Bears,
Just look how I'm walking in all the squares!"

And the little bears growl to each other, "He's mine,
As soon as he's silly and steps on a line."
And some of the bigger bears try to pretend
That they came round the corner to look for a friend;
And they try to pretend that nobody cares
Whether you walk on the lines or squares.
But only the sillies believe their talk;
It's ever so portant how you walk.
And it's ever so jolly to call out, "Bears,
Just watch me walking in all the squares!"

##

I have this old battered blue book in my collection. I think it came from either my mom or my grandmother, I forget which. It's called, "When we were very young" by A A Milne, 47th edition, 1948. Paging through this book and begging either my mom or my grandmother to read to me is one of my most earliest memories of poetry.

In the kitchen, my mother hums so low

And clear her song and morning voice

Sound like a cello, bowed for tremolo.

Some parts of the house are still asleep, by choice.

It's Saturday and not much to be done.

There may be squirrel- hunting later in the day

Or leaves to rake in the afternoon sun.

But now the kitchen sounds of pots and trays.

My mother's song fades in and out of what

She does. It's clear she stops to concentrate.

One spoon of baking powder, flour cut

With shortening, then song again. A plate

Of bacon interrupts, then she returns

To humming. The house becomes her instrument

And we, like sluggish bees, get up in turn,

Charmed out of sleep by her sung disenchantment.

Some mothers sing to babies in the womb;

Others give their children weekly lessons.

We were reared with music in the playroom,

At meals, and going to sleep. Comparisons

Like this are hard to prove but each of us

Has learned, by listening, to speak the tongue

Of instruments: my brother joined a chorus;

One sister learned the harp when she was young;

The other plays piano and guitar.

So here we listen for the household sounds

Of home: ice water pouring from a jar,

Forks, knives, the flour sifter's rhythmic rounds.

Each tone recalls our childhood's symphony

Of clanks and bangs that softnened into notes

We later learned to read. The melody

Our mother hums this morning swells and floats

Across the room, and after breakfast, when

We go our different ways, she rests, then starts

Her kitchen-orchestrations all again

With movements we come home to learn by heart.

Your voice, with clear location of June days,

Called me- outside the window. You were there,

Light yet composed, as in the just soft stare

of uncontested summer all things raise

Plainly their seeming into seamless air.

Then your love looked as simple and entire

As that picked pear you tossed me, and your face

As legible as pearskin's fleck and trace,

Which promise always wine, by mottled fire

More fatal flashed than ever human grace.

And your gay gift - Oh when I saw it fall

Into my hands, through all that naive light,

It seemed as blessed with truth and new delight

As must have been the first great gift of all.

##

From Richard Wilbur, Collected Poems 1943 - 2004. I got this out of my local library.

I can hardly believe that it is the beginning of June. I love spring- early spring, mid spring, and late spring. I love seeing the trees green up, and watch birds nesting.  I love watching bulbs come up, and I love the listen to the birds singing. The days start to warm up, and the nights no longer drop below freezing.

This year we have had a fabulous wet spring. I have never seen it so green here in Colorado.

This photo was taken at St Vrain Park, Longmont. Note the snow on Longs Peak, and the very full lake in the foreground. The trees don't yet have their leaves.

 I am always excited to discover Greater Horned Owl nests. They are the earliest species that starts nesting, and it always is a great way to begin spring. We were lucky we found a number of good nesting sites in Ft Collins, and Loveland.

This nesting site in Fort Collins had three very healthy babies. This photo was taken at the end of April. Note how the babies have almost all lost their white fluff. They were soon off their nest.

In Colorado it always is a good idea to wait until AFTER mother's day to plant anything. The weather can be dicey and there is nothing worse than losing your carefully planted plants to a May frost! But when the weather is gorgeous I am always excited and impatient. But I forced myself to wait, and in due time, I went nursery shopping, spent far too much, and planted my outdoor containers. Each year I have a different color scheme. For the last 2 seasons I have chosen a white and yellow theme. This year I have chosen pink and green. I love to select herbs and plant them in a container or two. In that way I will have fresh herbs for the remainder of the summer (weather permitting.) 

 I have been meaning to do something with a bare patch in the front of the house. It must have at one time held a flower bed. But the plants have long since died, and all there is is a round area for weeds to grow.

This photo is taken from our front door, and you can see the bare patch located in the top right hand corner. We had just done a very successful moss rock purchase, and Kevin had managed to move the rocks from the car to the place where I wanted to put in a rock flower garden. I am calling it a "rock" garden because it has two rocks in it. No other reason. The area is very flat, and I thought adding some interesting rocks would create some interesting shapes and textures.

We bought the rocks from The Rock Garden in Fort Collins. I then rushed out and bought weed fabric (3 feet x 3.5 feet); some soil, some mulch and some plants.

The first order of business was to clear the area as best I could and then put down the weed barrier fabric.

It helps to measure the space, and then get exactly the amount of fabric that you need. Luckily we had landscape staples from a prior project, and so I laid out the fabric and stapled it in.

 I tried to cover the edges with the landscape rocks that were already there. I then wrestled the two moss rocks into place.

The next step was to add some old newspapers. Newspapers make a great additional weed barrier. I put down the newspaper, and then emptied the soil that I bought over the newspaper.

Once I had the soil in place I got the plants out and arranged them to see how they look. Once satisified with how they looked I planted them. Once they were planted I put mulch on the bed. I started with the edges first, and then put the mulch over the entire bed.

Once I was done with that I watered the bed (I had watered the plants prior to mulching, and then once after mulching to wet the mulch down so that it wouldn't blow away with our high winds.)

All in all, I had a very satisfying day, and I got a beautiful rock flower garden out of it.