Leaning Toward the Sunlight

I was a vegetarian until I started leaning toward the sunlight. ~ Rita Rudner

Come take a look through early spring with me. Yes, I know, it's not even spring here anymore. But it was when I took these photos and what else would I do with them if not show them to you? Exactly!


The sun shone brightly that morning but it was deceiving. The light screamed "spring" but the temperatures screamed "button up your jacket!"





It also told me that someone's little hand was cold without their mitten. That mitten is no longer there but was on that branch for a long time, waiting for its rightful owner. The branch is a lot leafier now though.





I can't imagine what transpired in order for this chair to fall over the dam. You can see its seat over to the middle left of the image. Quite likely it was out on someone's curb waiting for trash pickup and somebody tossed it into the pond where it eventually made its way over the dam. Okay, so I guess I can imagine what transpired here.





Warm or cold, the sunlight still makes this fungus looks lovely in its glow.

 


And where there are mushrooms, there's garlic - at least in many of my favourite meals. These buds were just a little bit over-exuberant. Despite the netting which surrounded them, they saw the spring light and began sprouting.





Sunlight gives life and warmth to a lot of things and wood is certainly among those.





Settled in for the day, this is Frank's hand as seen through his beer glass. He's writing my winning cribbage score down in the notepad. Okay, so I don't really remember if I won that game. Let's just say that I skunked him and call it a day.

I apologize for my sporadic visits. Getting my home ready for sale is really cutting into my online time. I so appreciate your comments when you stop by like this. I'll get back into more regular visits of my own once the summer sees me in my new home. Until then, I thank you for your understanding.

Thanks always for joining me. More photos coming up soon.

Flowers, Fungi and Ferns - Oh My!

Update July 2: I did a little further digging (so to speak) and came up with an identification of the mystery fungus below. It would appear that it's Xylaria polymorpha (Dead Man's Fingers). It has the ability to morph into different appearances, so that is probably why I didn't locate what I'd expected to see a few days later. Thank you Tammie Lee for attempting to provide a solution. That prompted me to look into the coral fungi where I eventually found what I was looking for.

Most of these photos were taken at least a few weeks ago. They're what seems to be left over on my hard drive and just happened to work out with a flower, fungi and fern theme.

Apple blossoms at the height of spring.

Doesn't this looks like a beautifully-sculpted bowl?

This area is deep inside a well-shaded cedar grove. In the morning, one single shaft of light beamed through to illuminate this fern.

This is the view behind a sunlit flower. It almost looks as if a wee faerie could take up residence here.

Or perhaps right here.

Late day sunshine bathes a field of ferns. Magenta phlox punctuates the picture nicely.

A solitary flower, which looks a lot like the wild chicory I see a bit later in the season - except it's not blue. It's doing its best to grow toward the sunlight through the chain link fence.

This triple capped mushrooms could almost pass for a plate of sloppy pancakes. There's more interesting green fungus all down the right hand side of the stump. And just below that, we noticed a most unusual fungus - something I've never seen before...

Tubular, metallic silver and teal. Frank and I both got busy snapping photos of this one. Notice how some of the tips appear to be either two blips blending into one or one beginning to separate into two? I'm betting it's the latter. If anyone has any idea what this is, please let me know (Leah? Maybe your Mike knows?). It was gone without a trace when I went back to look for it just a few days later.

Further Google sleuthing has identified the fungus for me. Eerily enough, they're called Dead Man's Fingers or by the Latin name Xylario Polymorpha. Here's my source.

A pretty yellow iris looking like sunshine itself.

And just a tiny bit more yellow in the middle of this spring blossom.

Happy Canada Day to all my fellow Canadians!