If only for the day, Spring was a welcome visitor around these parts. The temperature rose to +20C, - the warm wind blew gently (until late in the afternoon when it got all pumped up and sent great gusts of warm air across the meadow and through the Valley).

Off to the north west the last vestiges of winter capped Apex mountain...



...here in the Valley the clouds were wispy and spoke of summer. In the south the moon was faint against the brilliant blue of the sky.

The curly willow is a delicate golden filagree at the edge of the garden


and down by the river the leaves were tenderly green on small bushes, whilst the buds on the cottonwood still cast a yellow hue to leaves just partly opened.


Before the tulips appear in their delicate spring colours, Spring clothes herself in ravishing yellows and the daffodils and forsythia are bright and glorious....


The buds on the flowering Almond .....so anxious to add a little pink flavour


and driving past the Lost Garden yesterday I noticed the Star Magnolia and the Forsythia were beginning to bloom.

I carry a little picture of them around in my memory....
and sometimes my heart truly aches for the peace and the happiness that garden brought to our lives.

The weatherman does not have kind words about tomorrow's weather......