May Flowers/Ripening Blueberries

 May flowers! In between bouts of rain and storms, we have had some nice sunny days for our flowers. Our storms...we had 5 tornadoes in the past 7 days in Georgia. The most recent one was just one county over from us and it was so strong, it destroyed a home with an eighteen-year-old boy sustaining severe injuries. We all pray that he will fully recover. Tornadoes can pop up at any time during a severe thunderstorm! The weather forecasters do a great job at informing us of impending storms but still, that last one really did come up very quickly.

Depending upon the soil, the mophead hydrangeas are either blue or pink.  All of them in our area are blue but since these are in a pot, we have the pink ones! (Personally, I love them both. Never met a hydrangea I didn't love.) The blue ones require an acidic soil; the pink ones must be alkaline. Isn't there an Agatha Christie story with the floral wallpaper turning either blue or pink? I must look it up! (I love Agatha Christie! Have you read her autobiography? Please do, it's excellent.)

We have some blueberry plants in pots also and this year, they are producing quite nicely. Richard likes to watch them as they ripen. First, they turn a nice shade of pink, then- blue!

There, don't you just think that is beautiful? Why, they are good enough to eat! Ha!  (And I took that last photo, by the way!)

Hey, let's get close to the flowers in our garden. I am closer to Earth than Richard, he has to bend a bit further down to get shots like these....so, I took these too!

Guess you can see that I took this photo of the rose after one of our thunderstorms! And all the flower photos aren't the best because it was overcast and well, because Richard didn't take them! 

Recently, I was doing some necessary housework, and I put on a CD that my son made me for my birthday. (It is from years ago, he gave it to me in 2013!) There are 25 songs that he put on this CD and I love them all.  Here is one of them....

"I Don't Want to Set the World on Fire".  What a great song!

Hope you are all doing well these days, my friends! Richard and I have tried our best to get out and do our walks during this stormy month of May. It meant that sometimes we lugged around umbrellas with us and at times we were grateful that we had them with us! Even though we have had lots of rain, it truly has made everything lovely and green, not to mention the flowers!

Friends, Romans, Countrymen- Lend Me Your Ears

 

Hello, my friends! (And Romans and Countrymen, too, I even steal from Shakespeare!) How are you all doing? Richard and I went to a a Spring Fling here in Conyers, Georgia a few weeks ago. I love the new mural that was painted in the Botanical Garden there. Hmmm....according to a sign there, they have plans to take out most of the trees and plants and put in a wooden deck.  Sigh, I hope they save some of the nature here.

There was a car show, and you know Richard managed to get a few photos for you.  Lots of folks there but somehow, he can get pictures as soon as people move away!

These cars were spic and span! The owners were so proud of them and would happily speak to whoever came up to them.  

Hey! We also went to the Zoo!  Yes indeed, we have good friends to treated us both to a trip there as a birthday present.  I love pink flamingoes. Chatty Crone had these on her blog recently!

The silverback gorillas have a very nice enclosure.  They have always amazed me. They look so human. I like the shot that Richard got of one from behind.

As you see, I haven't traveled too far recently but I watched every minute of the memorial service when Pope Francis died. I felt as if I had been in Vatican City and Rome! The architecture! I kept pausing the TV for my eyes to linger on the buildings.  It was all incredibly moving, was it not? I can't begin to tell you how much I appreciated the beauty of it all.   I even took a photo of the Tiber River on my phone from the TV.  The service was translated into English, and I even loved the station that I watched, the soft voice translating the wonderful words but at the same time hearing the beautiful Italian language. It was all in honor of the dear pope who had just passed away, but I hope that I can be forgiven for appreciating the majesty of the surroundings. 

Pope Francis! I will miss him.  Here are just a few quotes from him that are especially meaningful for me...

"We were not meant to be inundated by cement, asphalt, glass and metal, and deprived of physical contact with nature".

"I appeal to communicators around the world to tell stories of hope. Seek out the hidden crumbs of good even when all seems lost and allow people to hope against all hope".