The delightful air is full of song
Tiny voices swirl and tumble creating a very bright sound
The pollen gifting life to bumble bees, the hummingbirds and the honey bees
And from afar in the Black Forrest by Colorado Springs, Colorado
A double rainbow filled the sky adding wonder to the smell of rich damp forest floor, the rising smells of the wet trees; a promise of abundant wildflowers to to appear.
Thank you, Elaine, for sharing your double rainbow with us!
From my world to your heart,
Linda
I was sitting still waiting, in the peace and quiet— when a wee joy set down on the edge of the grain head
She fluffed and fluttered, turning this way and that.
Until just the perfect man arrived!
Sometimes we are gifted with the ordinary
Which really isn’t.ordinary after all.
From my world to your heart,
Linda
Terry is enlarging the pasture
Working at it steady so the grass will grow big and strong and healthy before the heat of the summer arrives
The other four pastures are really looking rich and green…Terry says it really nice to have the time and the energy to work on some of the other parts of the farm.
Which brings me to this post I’ve wanted to do for a little spell.
Our cows back in the day
A long time blog friend writes for the local paper in her New York area, the Amsterdam Recorder, she took a wee trip and wrote about it for all her readers to enjoy. I asked her if I could reprint a bit of it for my farming blog and she said yes.
The grandchildren watching the cows being moved years and years ago
“And speaking of being, as opposed to seeing, green, we encountered evidence of recent hot “green” issues along the way. While waging our own battles on the leg of the trip south through Pennsylvania, dodging potholes with varied success, and heaping language not befitting ladies and gentlemen upon some of the drivers with whom we narrowly avoided close encounters of the crashing kind, I noticed something interesting.
While all of America frets and stews about flatulence from cattle, most of which live in the relatively clean, green, rural countryside, a little air freshening around urban backdoors might be in order.
As we wound down the mountains of the Keystone State, sometimes mistaking the potholes on 81 for valleys, the actual valleys were filled wall-to-wall with cities; houses, factories, malls and parking lots.
And every single one of them was shadowed under its own smoggy mantle of flatulence. The kind that emanates from cars and trucks and heating systems and all the things associated with large collections of people. I have never seen a miasma such as that over a barn, pasture or even the most crowded of feedlots.
Alas, because there aren’t many farmers left, the people who eat what they grow and who wear the products of those cotton fields, don’t understand them anymore. They blame them for something they are.”
Amsterdam Recorder
Our cows out on the pasture on the Back Forty,
I know that each and every one of you, gentle readers, are not the people who condemn farmers or farming as a way of life, but huge supporters, for often times I get emails saying “Thank a Farmer”.
Our cows coming in for breakfast years and years ago
But for those who are new to my blog, or new to anyone’s blog about farming…I thought what Marianne wrote was well said. Often times it’s the very thing we are condemning others for, which we are (also) guilty.
So too not preach or make anyone uncomfortable I leave you now.
From my humble heart to your world,
Linda
We experienced a brisk wind all day yesterday,
Yet, at different points sunlight splashed between the foaming clouds
The slight sunrays pattering the sky and dappling the earth
We watched ragged rain play along the mountainside
The wind was strong enough to tatter the trees; flinging leaves here there and everywhere
Then sometime overnight, the wind rose higher and higher in the atmosphere
Giving us the most beautiful sunrise and clear skies!
BUT before all that occurred…just there in the east, as the wind moaned and the clouds rushed away from us…I saw a Rainbow…a fat beginning of one anyway; before the clouds and wind pushed it away.
From my world to your heart,
Linda
It’s been downright cool here of late
Still, the cooler weather has the spring flowers looking nice
The wind has been rather terrible, causing the tall bearded iris to slant and wave dangerously
Some of the plants are showing yellow from the lack of sunshine,
But others seem to flourish in the limited sun and warmth
Still the spring air
of very cool, nights and slightly warmer days
Seem to bring something special to my garden of blooms
So here we are
with the weather a tad raw,
Being gifted with jewels
Of a most wondrous kind!
From my heart to your world,
Linda
I think birds are one of those magical creatures (akin to Fairies, elves, and gnomes)
Who are gifts to us from the Heavens
Since they have wings, they must be the messengers of the Angels
Sorta like email or text messages are to us today
It’s up to us to really read and understand what is being said, by what is felt in our hearts.
While out and about yesterday, Boomer and I came across a little Killdeer having a dust bath.
What sort of message was I receiving?
Walk carefully on the face of the earth, and be a friend to all…an eternal message always.
From my world to your heart,
Linda
The wind picked up yesterday
Becoming a menace by the end of the day.
Then the weather cooled down rapidly…going from 82* to 72* (27c – -13c) within 60 minutes
The wind shrieked, 
and pelted us with little shards of dust
Late, late into the evening, all the little hummingbirds feasted at the feeders, trying desperately to fill up– to stay warm, before the thunderstorms arrive today.
This winter storm is to be in here for three days, but…
Maybe if I am lucky I will get to see a rainbow!
That will be really special.
I took this photo years ago at our home town cemetery. I think it is still appropriate even today.
Today we remember.
All those who cared for us and our way of life.
Allowing us to live in hope.
Your friend on a western Colorado farm,
Linda
Yesterday and today are just wonderful!
So beautiful in fact your heart almost aches
The weather people are telling us it won’t last
Another winter storm is coming in tonight with temperatures dropping twenty degrees below normal
There will snow in the high country again…inches to feet of more snow, where the snow already lays thick
But for a little, the rest of this day, of utter loveliness, we will go forth and enjoy every minute
Before that encroaching winter storm descends.
Your friend on a western Colorado farm,
Linda
My brother and I were most blessed to live ‘just up the orchard’ from our maternal grandparents, Bill and Ruth/ Granddad, and Grammy.
Our paternal grandmother just lived a mile up the road from us in the little village/town called Eckert.
But today, this is a story about my sweet, kind, gentle grandmother, Ruth Love (Wootton) Thomas.
She was a fantastic southern cook, loved to tell us stories, was a teacher of education to children in the First through Third grades and at one point the postmistress of their little town in New Mexico.
My brother and I could spend as much time as we wanted at their house, as long as we walked (we ran, just say’n) through the orchard and let Mom know we were going and then let Gram know when we were heading back home.
Life was simple then.
Over time, after Granddad passed on; Grammy’s mind deteriorated into a form of dementia, of which we never really learned the medical name.
It was hard and sad to see her become a totally different person than who she had been — she became suspicious, fanciful, full of anger and delusional.
One afternoon, when I was visiting with her, she told me that she had now become the Velveteen Rabbit. It was a very sad and poignant moment. It broke my heart. My heart broke even more when she reached over and patted me on the knee.
“No matter what,” she said with a sly little smile, “I am still real.” I held her hand and agreed.
For some reason, she has been weighing heavy on my mind– these last few days.
I can see her as she was when I was a child, who she was when I had my children, and then what the horrible disease, which turned her into a whole other person, just before she died.
Then last night I dreamed I was her the day she stepped out the shell of her body and went to the other side.
I dreamed Granddad/ Will was there, waiting to give me (Grammy) a gentle tug on my hand to lift me up to him.
He made my heart sing, Will always made my heart sing.
I turned to Will…. “It’s been hard, Dear One,” I told him. “I had a highly functioning brain then the rug was pulled out from me. The fall has been long and terrifying.”
“I know, My Sweet Thing, I know.” He smiled. “Here take my hand”, he offered.
So I did.
Ruth Love Wotton Thomas
June 1, 1902—March 22, 1999
O servant, where dost thou seek Me?
Lo! I am beside thee.
I am neither in temple nor in mosque: I am neither in Kaaba nor
in Kailash:
Neither am I in rites and ceremonies, nor in Yoga and
renunciation.
If thou art a true seeker, thou shalt at once see Me: thou shalt meet Me in a moment of time.
And at the end of this lovely poem, Valerie wrote: “I treasure those lovely words and thoughts”…
As do I.
From my world to your heart,
Linda
Life on a Colorado Farm 