Vicki Lane's Blog, page 571

A Cow's Spring

                                                          No memory lingers                                                          Of mud's misery, of dry hay,
                                                          Nor of snow and ice.                                                           Warm in the Eternal Now,                                                           The cows graze, gorging on Spring.   
   And speaking of grazing . . . the Obamas, who are vacationing in Asheville...

The Bride's Book ~ Sepia Saturday

My maternal grandparents were married on October 20, 1915 in Troy, Alabama. I've posted about them before -- when they were courting and pictures of my grandmother with her sisters. 

I have, stored away in a chest, my grandmother's wedding dress. One of her wedding slippers is on display in a cabinet of family treasures.
And I have her Bride's Book -- a true treasure! From its pages I learn that Ruby and Huborn first met on November 23, 1912 and that they were engaged on June 25, 1914.
Of...

Walk a Mile in Her Shoes

Walk a Mile in Her Shoes   -- The International Men's March to Stop Rape, Sexual Assault and Gender Violence has come to the Asheville area. And while the intent is excellent, somehow the idea of men staggering along in high heels seems to me to send a mixed message.
What kind of fool would subject her feet to these things? I won't even mention the hairdo.

Cloudy, With Intermittent Green

This is one of my favorite color combinations -- purple-grey clouds and and yellow-green foliage.
And it's only in Spring that the trees display this particular tender, light-filled shade of green.
The sky was extra dramatic yesterday, after Tuesday's rain, tempting me to pull over and take pictures as I drove to Burnsville for my class.

Just as tempting was a mass of mayapples, growing on the bank of the road up to our house. . . 
and the tree peony's first bloom, greeting me as I got out...

Do Butterflies Have Knees?

Monday was a perfect day to get out in the garden as rain was forecast for Tuesday. I had a few more potatoes to plant as well as some broccoli and kale and parsley starts to put into my box beds. 

This row of beds above has benefited from the helpful biddies in the chicken tractor which was carefully constructed by John to fit the beds. The girls eat the weeds and weed seeds and bugs and leave behind a bit of high powered fertilizer.
The swallowtail butterflies were knee-deep in the thrift. ...

Always Take Your Camera to the Grocery Store

. . . because you just never know when you may need to take a picture.

Nature Laughs at Time-Pieces - Magpie Tales

                                Not for her, Man's silly watches, keeping                                Manufactured time, turning eternal                                Tracts of forever into infernal                                Seconds and minutes bounded by beeping.                                No, not for her, the minute hand creeping,                                Alarm clocks ticking order external,                                Making the rules for lives once diurnal 
...

Come for a Walk

The past week has been just spectacular with so many things coming into bloom.  I saw the first humming bird yesterday evening and though the tulips and daffodils are going, going, gone, there are buds showing on the roses and the iris. 
We had a wonderful visit with the cousins from Tampa -- I made one pound cake before they arrived and their daughter Fay liked it so much that she and I made a second one. Barb kindly helped me get my garden ready to do some more planting -- all of this is...

Lane Brothers Dairy ~ Sepia Saturday

The young man in the buggy is my paternal grandfather. The date is sometime in the early 1900's; the place, Buffalo Avenue, Tampa, Florida.  These are the Lane Brothers and this is their milk delivery wagon.

By the time I knew my grandfather, he was retired. The family dairy had been sold and absorbed into a larger dairy. There was no talk of cows in the family, my father having happily put behind him his days of drudgery at the dairy. Indeed, when we moved to NC and bought a milk cow, my...

A Brief Visit

Going . . . Going . . . Gone.