Poppy love.

that post title is so cheezy, but I couldn't resist.

I've lusted after poppies for years.  Their fragile vibrance is just so very exciting to me. However, I live with my parents right now, and anything I buy, I have to plant in such a way that I can move it easily when I move out.  Finally, a couple of days ago, i broke down and bought a poppy.  It was too beautiful to resist.  Currently its flowers are a lovely soft peach, but each bloom can be different, ranging from shell pink through deep, deep salmon orange.

Yesterday, as I walked into the kitchen, where it's awaiting planting, the sun streamed through the window, making the petals glow while everything else was cast into shadow behind it.  So lovely.

Happy Easter!

Some beauty for you on this beautiful holiday!

Blowing...eggs.

It's late Good Friday, and my sister and I are preparing for Easter by dying eggs.  We've already blown about 2 dozen eggs for decorations, and are emptying another 2 dozen to make cascarones (best easter tradition EVER).  We'll also boil another dozen or so to put in people's easter baskets.

The thing about blowing eggs out is that you spend a lot of time staring at a container full of viscous uncooked egg.  After a while, the yolks and whites start swirling around, forming globular patterns like some sort of sunshine-yellow Rorschach test.

I couldn't decide whether I was grossed out, or deeply intrigued.  So of course I took a picture. or rather, several pictures.

See what I mean?

birth announcements, and a freebie!

I've been busy this past week with various projects.
The most fun project has been designing birth announcements for my niece and nephew.  They came together, pretty well, I think.

It was interesting looking through the pictures, and realizing a few things that aren't immediately obvious.
For example, the reason why Cate's feet look so completely wrinkly in her birth announcement is because, when I took the picture, they still had ink on them from getting her foot prints taken.  Also, there is only about one photo of Vincent with his little son, and about 43 bazillion of Sujeong with Communio, because Vincent is always the one taking the pictures.

I also thought I would include a freebie in this post.  A while back, I designed a print-out for "Baby Bingo."  I designed it for Sarah's baby shower, and then we never used it, because this game took too long.  So I refreshed it and made two other version, one for a baby shower for a little boy, and a unisex game board.

You can play Baby Bingo several ways, and this board should work for any of them.  I had no idea there were so many varieties of baby shower bingo, until I googled it to get a link for directions.
We play it where the guest fills in the squares with presents they think the mommy to-be will get.  When she opens a present that the guest has written down, the guest crosses it off.  When the guest has crossed off five presents in a row, they win.  You can keep playing so that there are multiple winners.  I usually plan on 1 winner per every 10 guests.

If you just download the picture, it should print at a good resolution.
Enjoy!

Lilac in bloom

Today, I created a spontaneous bouquet out of some redbud from the back yard, and lilacs near my sister's place.
The smell is heavenly in the darkened living room.

It's the first bouquet I've made this year that I thought was worth photographing.

Kissing Cate

Thursday evening, at the end of a glorious spring day, my tiny niece decided to enter the world.  She already has her father and her grandfather wrapped around her tiny finger.  Her mother is bespelled.  It's not surprising. She's an enchanting little thing.

Little Catherine Hope is a little doll-baby, quite literally.  Though completely healthy, she's about the size of an "American Girl" doll, or a little smaller.  Doll clothes would probably fit her.  All her newborn clothes swim a little on her. At 5 lbs, 14 oz birthweight, she has hardly any heft at all.  She's such an ephemeral, fragile looking little thing.  It's a wonder to realize she's a full human being, with all of the complex futures, a sense of humour waiting to be developed, everything that makes a person already built in and waiting to unfold.

Marie Aull, I Love You...

...because you created beauty, and then gave it away.

My friends, today I'm rather blissed-out on beauty and sunshine.  Remember that feeling after your mom let you spent an entire afternoon at the pool? Where you're tired, slightly sunburnt, and have enjoyed yourself to the point of exhaustion.  Well, that's me right now, and I owe it all to Marie Aull.

This afternoon, my aunt and I took a leisurely stroll around Aullwood Gardens.  We talked family history, green (or black) thumbs, and admired thousand upon thousands of specimens of ornamental plants. Of course, I had my camera with me. I took about 200 luscious photographs, but have picked only the top 20 or so to share with you.

Aullwood gardens was the personal passion of Marie Aull, wife, then widow, of a well-to-do local businessman.  Mrs. Aull designed the gardens so that each of the spaces and plant specimens harmonize with the natural beauty of the locale.  The borders of the garden naturally fade into native Ohio woodland.  The spaces flow one to the other.  Most of the plants are native to Ohio, and none are invasive.
It is a ridiculously peaceful spot of heaven.  It's as if time flows more gently there.
Every time I'm there, I just keep thinking of the word "sylvan." I bet Marie did too, everytime she looked out onto her garden from her house, perched on a central, small hill.

Back in the 70's, Marie decided to share her personal patch of ground with everyone else.  She donated the farm and grounds to the National Audubon Society.  The garden is now part of the county-wide parks service.  Even though she had donated her land, Marie still lived in her house, perched at the top of the hill, until her death last year.  She was 105.
What a wonderful legacy to leave behind you.

I took ever so many pictures of flowers, but my eye kept being drawn back to the algae in the ornamental creek (an artificially diverted off-shoot of the Stillwater River).  It's not usually like this, but something about this warm spring has caused every rock in the creek to grow a refulgent, vibrant green "beard" of algae.  It was both beautiful, and rather disgusting looking.

back to the pretty flowers.

Four Days Late...

Unlike her cousin, this little one is in no hurry to arrive.

My sister and her husband are remarkably chipper and content, though Sarah may not be quite so full of smiles if this keeps up for another week or more.

in other news, my goodness but it's beautiful out!!!
So, of course I have pictures to prove it.