Be Still My Spring Heart

My gardener's heart is full this weekend. The first daffodils have bloomed in our backyard. This one is in Chloé's garden plot.  When the girls were young (two and six years old), I gave each of them a small portion of one of the back beds. They chose the spring bulbs and perennials to plant in their section.  Each May, they add annuals to fill in the gaps. It's been interesting to watch their colour choices and planting skills (with a bit of my help) evolve over the years.

And today the leaves on our beautiful Schubert tree (prunus virginiana) are opening! Am I crazy to be so excited every spring?  Things are happening outside of our yard too. The tiny forest behind the park that faces our street now has a soft, green haze--the promise of all of its beautiful leaves opening in the days ahead.

At an art course I took a few years ago, the teacher had us use jewelers' loupes (specialty magnifying glasses) to look at the inside of flowers. Have you ever had a close look? There's a little world inside of each of them.  This striped crocus seems to be harbouring a little tropical forest in its center.

In the photo below are three kinds of botanical tulips.  I love how they open well ahead of the hybridized tulips.  They are short and sweet and very cheerful.

The flowers below are scilla.  I'm not sure that anything could be more beautiful. Their waxy delicacy and that gorgeous periwinkle blue finds a way straight to my heart.  I have a painting sketched out in my studio that I need to start on, but I'm thinking that a painting of scilla may be next on my list.  I cannot stop looking at these photos.  I'll have to cut myself a little miniature bouquet for my studio.

Finally, here's a vagabond daffodil that made its way to just outside of Emma's flower bed. I like how a garden will talk to you and let you know where it would like to grow. 

For oft, when on my couch I lie

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the daffodils.

William Wordsworth

May your hearts and thoughts this week be filled with daffodils (and scilla and crocuses and tulips and soft green spring leaves...).

Happy

Above is what I consider to be a little bowl of 'happy'.  It's a small dish that I have in my front hallway filled with little, pretty things that make me happy.  There are glass hearts, an Eiffel Tower, beach glass, tiny shells and little stones.  It never looks quite the same.  Something might be taken out or put back in.  I have noticed visitors (kids especially) sifting through it with their fingers.

My sister Nancy (who designs beautiful jewelry that I wear it most days) made a comment this week that she can sense happiness in my paintings lately.  (Thanks, Nance. Your ongoing encouragement means so much to me.)  I am feeling happy lately.  Painting more often, moving forward in a creative direction, starting this blog (which serves the artist and writer in me)--they're all helping me to feel happy and right in my world.  I've actually caught myself singing out loud a few times lately.

I also made progress yesterday on making a digital print of one of my paintings.  This has been a real struggle for me with a huge learning curve attached to it. I am really looking forward to being able to show it to you in the very near future.

So here's my wish for you, my readers -- that you find your own little bowl of 'happy' in the days ahead, whether it be by creating something or doing something you enjoy or being with people you love.

"The creative is the place where no one else has ever been. You have to leave the city of your comfort and go into the wilderness of your intuition. What you'll discover will be wonderful. What you'll discover is yourself."

Alan Alda