Summer Inspirations

SUMMER INSPIRATIONS

I have never been much of a flower gardener.  In fact I have probably brought demise to more flowering plants that I have nurtured.  But, one year my son bought me a pink rose bush and it has managed to survive.  I believe he bought this bush when he was in high school and he will be 42 in August so it has lasted a long time.  It always has amazed me with it's ability to last through these cold Wisconsin winters and bloom again the following summer.  It has even been eaten down pretty far by the deer that trail through our yard.   Yet it still comes back.  

My husband and I have horses and we spend a lot of our time during the summer riding in state and national parks.  The picture of the sand hill cranes was taken in the horse riders campground near Palmyra in the Southern Kettle Moraine Forest.  We were there for a three day weekend and every day they appeared fairly early in the morning and stayed until early evening when they flew away to reappear the next day.  We were pretty sure that they were feasting on horse feed that had been dropped or left on the ground by the previous week's campers.  I got pretty close to them to take these pictures and they acted like it was an every day occurrence.  They were not frightened by our horses when we rode by.

These are the kind of things we think about in the winter when it's cold and could certainly be the inspiration for a new quilt.