Daffodilmania

This past winter was long and brutally cold. The dogs did not want to go out and romp in the snow. Ice crystals decorated the windows in the house. I lost count of the number of times the driveway had to be shoveled and I thought my ugly UGGS would be permanently molded to my feet.

"No matter how long the winter, spring is sure to follow."  

The earliest burst of spring color, daffodil yellow, trumpets spring's arrival. This is no caution light; spring is here...good bye winter. And in beautiful Oakwood, 1 1/2 acres filled with over 160,000 daffodils scream, "Hello Spring!" to the winter-weary.

What a beautiful sight this is for tired-of-looking-at-winter-grays eyes! It's a sea of sunshine. Cars drive by slowly to catch this happy yellow moment, walkers stand at the curb and take in the dramatic yellow landscape.

But spring in Ohio means one day it can be 80 degrees, people wear shorts and cut the grass, then it snows the next...

Under the giving snow blossoms a daring spring. ~Terri Guillemets

The snow was short-lived, but here long enough for people to take some beautiful snow photos. After one day of snow, the daffodils popped back up strong as ever to have people once again slow down in their cars and for the walkers to congregate along the curb. As William Shakespeare said, "April hath put a spirit of youth in everything."

Think Pink!

"Pink isn't just a color, it's an attitude." ~ author unknown

Meet a bathroom with some SERIOUS attitude...

Hubs and I went to Findlay to visit his parents. We had half a tank of gas when we left Dayton, which is plenty to make the 100 mile trip. The general rule is that as you travel north, the gas gets a little less expensive, so we watched the gas prices as we drove. 

Just south of Lima on I-75, Exit 120, we saw a sign for gas at $3.21. (It was $3.47 in Dayton). We pulled into the station, I went in to get a cup of coffee and to use the bathroom. 

And my eyes were bombarded with PINK! Did someone paint the bathroom with Pepto-Bismol? That is the color of this bathroom. 

The light switch is pink, the soap is pink, and even the graffiti on the bathroom door is pink.

Just makes me wonder, is the Men's room painted blue? Hubs will have to check that out next time we stop.

Shawnee Fuel Stop

1250 W. Breese Road

Lima, OH

Bruce Munro: Light

Bruce Munro is a British artist best known for immersive large scale light-based installations. His Light exhibit opened at the Franklin Park Conservatory in Columbus, OH on September 25 and will be there until February 2014. In the United States, Munro has found that botanical gardens provide the scale that he needs for his outdoor pieces. 

People of all age groups were in attendance. Quite a few children were there because their art teachers at school had told them about Light. Hubs and I got there around 9:00. It was a beautiful, clear, cool night and we were some of the last visitors to leave.

"You need a medium to find yourself and to explain things to other people, and light happens to be mine." ~ Bruce Munro

Light Shower is in in Himalayan Mountain Biome at the Conservatory. As visitors follow a meandering path over a bridge and past a waterfall, over 1000 tear drop lights hang above, creating a mass of raindrops in suspended animation.

"Eden Blooms is a hybrid creation that has evolved from a number of design concepts. But it was during a visit to the Rainforest Biome of Franklin Park Conservatory that the idea of creating an exotic, illuminated bloom was formally sown!" ~ Bruce Munro

Chindi hangs in the spaciously expansive Desert Biome. "Dust devils came into my mind and I decided to give form to these ephemeral vortexes also called Chindi." 

Over 100 individual fluorescent hang above the lush tropical vegetation in the Pacific Island Water Garden Biome. Appropriately named Lightning Storm, these tubes flash and are accompanied by rolls of thunder.

Icos makes its debut at Franklin Park Conservatory. This suspended piece contains 361 glass spheres and two miles of optical fiber.

Beacon is a dome covered in 2730 plastic bottles. Visitors can view the glowing hemisphere up close and in the round. 

A trip to Australia inspired Munro to create Field of Light. This landscape-scale installation is in the Sculpture Garden. 2750 lighted glass spheres on slender stems rise from the ground and softly glow with pulses of colored light. Crickets chirp, colors flow like ocean waves...mesmerizing, peaceful.

Five Giant Snowballs are suspended in the Grand Atrium. Each cluster of 127 glass spheres glows with an ever-changing parade of colored light.

Twelve Water-Towers are connected to light projectors and audio systems which causes them to respond to the music to create an ever-changing rhythm of colorful light. These towers are created from over 3000 one-liter plastic bottles.

In this playful exhibit, Whizz Pops, 45 glowing spheres are situated on the Zen Terrace. They look like they are filled with illuminated bubbles.

 

Sunflowers

Dayton to and from Columbus is an hour and a half drive each way, dealing with traffic and passing through mostly farm land. I don't mind the farm land...it's very pleasant...but the traffic, UGH. Lots of trucks, lots of people who place themselves in the left lane and then refuse to move, lots of incredibly fast drivers, lots of construction. (Orange should be Ohio's state color in honor of the construction barrels that are all over our interstates).

On a return trip from Columbus, rather than taking the usual I-70 to I-675, I took Route 68, a two-lane highway that goes past Young's Jersey Dairy (yummy ice cream) and through the picturesque, artsy town of Yellow Springs. Just north of Yellow Springs is a sunflower farm with the most breath-taking view: an ocean of yellow highlighted by the sun and bright blue Indian summer sky. 

Magnificent...and on the road less taken ~

The Road Less Taken

Wanderlust can be satisfied by taking a road less traveled. The other day, I went downtown to have lunch with my dear friend, Annette. On my way home, I cut through the South Park neighborhood and saw a sign for SPUG, aka South Park Urban Garden. I'm all for community gardens. It's one way of bringing neighbors together...digging in the dirt, watching the fruits (or vegetables) of labor growing, looking out for each other's gardens, trading vegetables..."I'll give you this bunch of chard for 3 of your tomatoes."

Those spur-of-the moment decisions are what satisfies wanderlust. If I had not decided to turn off of Warren Street onto a side street, I never would have come across SPUG. Gotta listen to that little voice!

This is the sign that caught my eye and made me pull a U-turn to go back and investigate

The fall garden plantings

A garden guardian ~ 

Woodman Fen {Five Rivers MetroParks}

It's amazing what a person can find out when walking a dog...a dog is a "chat magnet"; people want to know his name, breed, how old, "he looks like my dog," how much does he weigh...

So when Hunter and I were at Delco Park, a woman inquired about him and soon our conversation evolved into how an area at Delco should be planted with flowers to attract butterflies. There's a small butterfly garden in the park but this spot could be a butterfly meadow. Anyway, she asked me if I had been to Woodman Fen. I had not so when I got home, I looked it up and put it on my list of places to explore.

Woodman Fen is a 33-acre wetland ecosystem located in Dayton's Belmont neighborhood.   Many years ago, this area had been converted into a vegetable farm. In 2003, Five Rivers MetroParks bought the land and restored it back to its natural state. You'll see prairie and wetland plant species as you walk along the boardwalk. There is also a trail that circles the perimeter of the fen, but I didn't walk that because this time of year the bees are very busy gathering the last of the pollen. I sure didn't want to have them mad at me for disturbing their work!

This is a magical place in the middle of a city..."fen-nominal!"

Delco Park

Walking my dog is a daily event. There are times when walking around the neighborhood gets old so recently I've been changing up our routine.

On a gorgeous, sunny September afternoon, Hunter and I took off for Delco Park. Just briefly, Delco holds a big place in the city of Kettering's history: Charles F. Kettering was one of the founders of Delco, which stood for Dayton Engineering Laboratories Co. The company was sold to United Motors Corp in 1916 and eventually sold, under the new name of Delco Light, to General Motors in 1918 after United Motors Corp. and Chevrolet Motor Co. merged into General Motors. In 1995, Virginia Kettering convinced GM to donate the land to the city.

For Hunter, this trip to Delco was a walk in the park and for me, a walk down memory lane. Hubs and I spent quite a few years at the Delco soccer fields in the blistering heat or the freezing cold, varying degrees of rain showers/storms, and also plenty of gorgeous days cheering for our favorite soccer players! There were the early morning games when a walk across the road to Krispy Kreme for donuts and coffee was the course of action and well-timed phone calls to bring the thermos of Bloody Marys were known to happen, too. Grandparents sat on the sideline to cheer for their grandkids, family dogs came along, the siblings of the soccer players became buddies. Good times, good friends, good memories!

Big Dog in a Small Car {Sugarcreek Metro Park}

Monday was a very sad day for my family. We said goodbye to our 15-year old chocolate Lab. He was our first family dog. He was my first ever dog.

On Tuesday, my other dog and I needed to get out of the house and out of the neighborhood. Dayton has beautiful metro parks and we hit the trail at one of our favorites, Sugarcreek. Sugarcreek MetroPark is home to the Three (now two) Sisters, which are 550-year old oak trees, a tall grass prairie, woodlands, some steep trails, and of course Sugar Creek.

Hunter gets so excited when he sees me put on my tennis shoes and then go to the closet for his leash. He knows what's coming up. Right now my son has my Tahoe, so that leaves me with my small car and a 90-pound dog. It's quite a picture!

What I didn't think about was that it rained a lot on Monday. 

Rain + dirt trails = lots of mud. 

At first I tried to navigate around the muddy areas on the trail but that turned into quite a joke and it was stressful. We came here to get rid of stress. Shoes can be washed, dogs can be washed, cars can be washed. Our hearts needed some healing from the pain of losing our long-time dear pet. We walked through the mud, we splashed in the creek, we had a marvelous time!

A wish and a prayer for our dear old dog ~

Prairie flowers

Steep enough for you?

Sugar Creek

Hunter and the woodlands

Muddy, muddy, muddy!