Burrowing Bee

Every season has a theme in my life.  Something I am fascinated with.  

Fall I love the changing of the leaves, the shift in the breeze as the canopy looses its grip on the wind, and the migrating birds.  

In the winter my focus shifts to the mammals, trees, and the gatherings and movements of the winter bird guilds.  Mammals wander further making their medicine is easier for me to understand.  The trees stand tall and proud and sing the winter song of stillness.  

In the spring, when the light changes, my fascination shifts to the warming earth, the stirring of the seeds, the chase for the first leaf, and watching for the first juvenile birds of this season.

Summer brings the flowers, the sweltering heat, and the insects.  

So much medicine to be learned each and every day - and in every season...  

These burrowing bees have thick yellow hair on their back legs to catch the pollen.  They, like most bees live in colonies.

Southern Leopard Frog

My mom brought me these tadpoles in late March to raise. Her friend picked them up in brackish water near a road she walks on daily.  We didn't know what kind of tadpoles they were until recently.

The transformation of a tadpole into a frog is slow but their change is a great lesson we can watch and learn from.

What you see is not always what you are.

We are always becoming - transforming...

and like the frog it doesn't always happen overnight.

At some point though the time comes when we are ready to breathe the air and leave the water - to begin a new life.

This one is the last of the the tadpoles that made it to the point of leaving the water.

I hope they stick around!

Morning

This is the first morning I have been able to get outside for morning sounds in the garden in two weeks. The garden is dry in spite of the contour beds that hold the water well.

Some rain would be nice.

The bird baths need water daily...

the squirrels have eaten all the bird seed...

and insects zoom every which way.

The wren is upset because one of our cats is lying near her nest...

and the tadpoles I've been raising are almost ready to leave the water.

I love mornings - even hot summer mornings.