Flower dreams
Posted: March 15, 2013 Filed under: 365 Life in the Bogs Challenge, Adventures in art, Adventures in Life, Air, beginnings, Daily Walk, Digital Art, Earth, Fire, Flashbacks, hiking, home, nature, Photography, Quotes, Spirit, Spring, Walking, weather, winter | Tags: Dream, flowers, Hiking, Longwood Gardens, MaidinSun Photography, Marsha Norman, Milne, nature, Outdoors, Pennsylvania, Photography, Pooh, quotes, spring, sunset, trees, weather, winter 29 Comments
Blossoms on High Street in West Chester, Pennsylvania. (April 2007)
In my dreams, I never have an age.
~ Madeleine L’Engle
Last night (well, really it was early this morning) I had a dream that was filled with flowers. Someone was teaching me to identify wildflowers by their leaves, their blossoms, and their stems. Wouldn’t it be nice to learn through dreaming and wake up with a head full of knowledge you didn’t have when you went to sleep?
Thursday Travels: Picnic
Posted: March 14, 2013 Filed under: 365 Meditation Challenge, Adventures in Life, Daily Walk, Earth, Fire, hiking, home, nature, Photography, pond, Quotes, Spirit, Spring, Thursday Travels, travel, Vacation, Walking, wandering, water, weather, winter | Tags: Cabot Trail, Canada, Cape Breton Highlands National Park, Coyote, Glasgow Lakes Look-Off Trail, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Hiking, MaidinSun Photography, nature, Nova Scotia, Outdoors, Photography, pond, Ralph Waldo Emerson, spring, travel, trees, water, weather, winter 14 Comments
A stop along the Cabot Trail. Cape Breton Highlands National Park. Nova Scotia. (8 June 2012)
Soon they were all sitting on the rocky ledge, which was still warm, watching the sun go down into the lake. It was the most beautiful evening, with the lake as blue as a cornflower and the sky flecked with rosy clouds. They held their hard-boiled eggs in one hand and a piece of bread and butter in the other, munching happily. There was a dish of salt for everyone to dip their eggs into.
‘I don’t know why, but the meals we have on picnics always taste so much nicer than the ones we have indoors,’ said George.
~ Enid Blyton, Five Go Off in a Caravan
It is not sunset, but it is time to stop for a picnic lunch and relax before our next hike. Although we weren’t able to complete the entire Glasgow Lakes Look-Off Trail, we still managed to hike for a few hours, rock hopping and wading through the stream that was the trail. (See last week’s Thursday Travels if you’re not sure what I’m going on about.) A little rest and refueling were in order. I agree with George. Food does taste better when I’m eating it outdoors.
Balance
Posted: March 13, 2013 Filed under: 365 Meditation Challenge, Air, beginnings, Daily Walk, Digital Art, Earth, Fire, home, Letting Go, Mindfulness, nature, Photography, Quotes, snow, Spirit, Spring, Today's Joys, Walking, wandering, water, weather, winter | Tags: balance, Eat Pray Love, Elizabeth Gilbert, flowers, Health, Hiking, MaidinSun Photography, nature, Outdoors, Photography, quotes, Rumi, snow, spring, Sufi poetry, trees, water, weather, winter 19 Comments
Balanced between winter and spring. Frosty oak leaves.
Your hand opens and closes, opens and closes. If it were always a fist or always stretched open, you would be paralysed. Your deepest presence is in every small contracting and expanding, the two as beautifully balanced and coordinated as birds’ wings.
~ Rumi, Essential Rumi
Herald of spring
Posted: March 10, 2013 Filed under: 365 Meditation Challenge, Adventures in art, Air, beginnings, Critters, Daily Walk, Digital Art, Earth, Fire, hiking, home, Mindfulness, nature, Photography, pond, Quotes, Spirit, Spring, Today's Joys, Walking, wandering, water, weather, winter | Tags: Aldo Leopold, birds, Charlotte Brontë, flowers, garden, Hiking, John Muir, MaidinSun Photography, Maya Angelou, nature, Outdoors, Photography, pond, quotes, Red-winged Blackbird, reflections, spring, trees, water, weather, winter 28 Comments
Electric crocuses
Spring drew on… and a greenness grew over those brown [garden] beds, which, freshening daily, suggested the thought that Hope traversed them at night, and left each morning brighter traces of her steps.
~ Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
Thursday Travels: Leaving the Glasgow Lakes Look-Off Trail
Posted: March 7, 2013 Filed under: 365 Meditation Challenge, Adventures in Life, Earth, hiking, home, music, nature, Photography, Quotes, Spirit, Spring, Thursday Travels, travel, Vacation, videos, water, weather, winter | Tags: Canada, Frances Hodgson Burnett, Henry Miller, Hiking, Macy Gray, MaidinSun Photography, nature, Outdoors, Paquette Lake, Photography, quotes, spring, Thursday Travels, Trail, travel, water, weather, wildflowers, winter 14 Comments
(8 June 2012. Glasgow Lakes Look-Off Trail. Cape Breton Highlands National Park. Nova Scotia.)
Now that we’ve had a little rest on that rock just to the right, it’s time to make our way back. We have other trails to hike since this one turned out to be under water.
Thursday Travels: More from the Glasgow Lakes Look-Off Trail
Posted: February 28, 2013 Filed under: 365 Meditation Challenge, Adventures in Life, Digital Art, Earth, Fears, Fire, hiking, home, nature, Photography, Quotes, snow, Spirit, travel, Vacation, Walking, wandering, water, weather, winter | Tags: Canada, Canadian Maritimes, Cape Breton, Cape Breton Highlands National Park, Debbie Ford, e e cummings, fear, Hiking, MaidinSun Photography, Marion Woodman, nature, Nova Scotia, Outdoors, Photography, snow, spring, winter 13 Comments
(8 June 2012. Glasgow Lakes Look-Off Trail. Cape Breton Highlands National Park, Nova Scotia.)
During the last Thursday Travels post, M and I were still making our way along the Glasgow Lakes Look-Off Trail. The trail was getting wetter and wetter as we made our way up and along the highlands plateau.
Thursday Travels: Glasgow Lakes Look-Off
Posted: February 14, 2013 Filed under: 365 Meditation Challenge, Adventures in Life, Earth, Fire, hiking, nature, Photography, Spirit, Spring, Thursday Travels, Vacation, Walking, wandering, water, weather, winter | Tags: Cabot Trail, Canada, Cape Breton Highlands National Park, flowers, Hiking, MaidinSun Photography, nature, Nova Scotia, Outdoors, Photography, spring, trees, water, weather, wildflowers 16 Comments
Middle Ridge School, 1876. (Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia. 8 June 2012.)
After breakfast at the cabin, M and I drove a short distance to reenter Cape Breton Highlands National Park for our first Cape Breton hike. The day, as you may or may not recall from my previous Thursday Travels post, was gorgeous.
Life in the Bogs 