Early spring flowers

I visited Meadowbrook Pond again this evening, with the intention of checking out the spring flowers. While it is a little early there are still a number of different flowers to be seen. I am afraid I know very little about the names of flowers, but I sure do enjoy them. I am hoping to get up to see the tulips in the Skagit Valley, luckily it is a late year for them due to the cold weather. I just love wildflowers, and am looking forward to the late spring and early summer, particularly in the mountains. Here are a few more shots of what is happening at Meadowbrook Pond. I will post some more flower pictures from Meadowbrook as the spring progresses.


I am still trying to figure out how to get the text to line up better...

Stage and Screen

In the last week I have seen a couple of movies and a play. The movies were Doubt, starring Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Meryl Streep, and The curious case of Benjamin Button starring Cate Blanchett and Brad Pitt.

I had seen an excellent production of Doubt at the Taproot Theater last year, it was interesting to compare it to the movie. Phillip Seymour Hoffman is a great actor and was great in this as well. It is not really an uplifting story and it leaves you guessing, but I thought the movie was a fine interpretation and would recommend it.

The curios case of Benjamin Button is based on an F. Scott Fitzgerald short story and is the tale of a person who is born old and becomes younger as he progresses through life. It is also a love story, albiet a kind of odd one, and not necessarily always a happy one. I found it very interesting, and really enjoyed it.

Today mom and I went to the Book-It theater to see The beautiful things that heaven bears. It was a wonderfully done production (as are all the Book-It productions), the story of an Ethiopian immigrant set in D.C. We both really enjoyed it and as an added bonus there was a 45 minute discussion with the cast and crew after the show. I love it when they do this, it is always interesting.

A walk in the (urban) woods

Yesterday was an "errand day" consisting of exciting things like getting a haircut, buying a microwave, cleaning the house and going to the dump/recycling center. I did get to Twin Ponds park in Shoreline in the late afternoon for a walk through some urban woods. I had the pleasure of seeing a Flicker (and later saw four of them in the same tree at Meadowbrook!) These guys are very cool, I watched him work for his dinner for a while, he was feasting on that old tree. After a while I moved on and enjoyed the chorus of bird song and the spring growth. It is a very nice little space even if it is very close to the freeway (I find the freeway noise a little unsettling) .

The spring is in full swing and a joy to see with lots of color.




I am not sure what these spikey guys are called but they were a lot of them around.

A quick trip to the Mountain Loop Highway

Last Sunday Terry and I took a Sunday drive up to the Mt. Loop as we hadn't been up there in quite a while. We had the treat of seeing an American Dipper. I didn't get a picture of it, but you can see one here. The road is still closed at Deer Creek, and there was still a good amount of snow there. The snow is mostly gone at the lower elevations. We saw this rather humorous snowmobile trailer at the Deer Creek turnaround.

We walked around the "Youth on Age" old growth stand (named after the plant called youth on age that grows there), I love this small old growth stand. We were very fortunate to see a Varied Thrush while there as well. The river had decided to make some changes to the trail over the winter, and created this beautiful scene.










I love "The Stilly", it is a beautiful river.