Spring Blooming All Over

It's spring fever. That is what the name of it is. And when you've got it, you want - oh, you don't quite know what it is you do want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it so!  ~Mark Twain
  
Spring was late in coming this year, but it came in a hurry this week with record warm temperatures after a week of record cold temperatures. That's spring weather for you. But the temperatures rising into the 60s, then the 70s, and today the 80s was enough to convince the flowers to bloom. Forsythia bushes are exploding with yellow blooms in yards along the road. I have a struggling forsythia that's trying to get re-established after being dug up when we built on to the house. We dumped it over on the side of the yard without proper planting, but those bushes are tough. It's putting up shoots and blooming this year. My japonica bush is going red. My peonies have pushed through the ground and are almost visibly growing. All three of those are from sprouts or bulbs I dug up out of my grandparents' yard. A heritage of beauty to be passed from one yard to another, so that not only do I enjoy the blooms, the sight of the flowers also stirs memories of the hands that planted them. 
 
Yesterday on my walk, I saw my first butterflies. Today I ran my face into my first spiderweb. That's spring for you. A constant entertainment to someone like me who enjoys walking on the farm. I've seen it all before but every spring, I'm ready to see it all again. A joy to behold. And maybe this year the pictures will be even better than last year. This bluebell picture isn't. But you've got to understand that I was taking the picture with one hand while holding Oscar's leash with the other. He still has two and half more weeks of captivity. That's how he's feeling about being in the house. A meek and compliant prisoner, but it's obvious he's far from comfortable. I was hoping to make a house dog out of him, but it's not looking like he wants that. He has become a nice companion here in my office. So maybe he can be an office dog.  
 
The front door to springtime is a photographer's best friend. ~Terri Guillemets 

What brings you joy in the springtime?

P.S. I sent the prize packages out today. Sharma, Rita, and Tawnya, you should get them before the end of the week. Congratulations and thanks to all of you who made this giveaway such fun for me, even though your number didn't get drawn this time. Maybe in June. Got to figure out a prize. 

Diane K., I sent you a Facebook message, but if I don't hear from you by Monday, I'll draw a new number for one of the 2nd place prizes - a couple of books.

Spring Fever

~~We had a beautiful day here in Kentucky country today. The sun was shining; the mercury was rising in the thermometers; the flowers were blooming; fishing worms were getting drowned; and sweaters were getting shucked. Spring is here and so now it must be time for a good case of Spring Fever.

~~Do you have it? What is it? A time for lazing in the first warm sunshine of the year? A time for throwing off all responsibilities and going hiking or fishing? What does Spring fever make you want to do or are you like Mark Twain says in the following quote?

"It's Spring fever...You don't quite know what it is you DO want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it so!" ~Mark Twain

Maybe it's not just Spring fever that makes you feel that way. I feel that way a lot when I'm writing, when I'm trying to tell my characters' stories. I want to write a good story. No, I want to write a story better than good. I want to write something that will come to life in a reader's imagination. Something that will sing. Something that will be totally made up but oh so true at the same time. And I've always wanted to write so much that it does sometimes make my heart ache. So maybe I have writing fever.

~~Trouble is the fever - just aching to write a good story - doesn't produce the words. That takes fingers on the keys. I'm trying to meet a quota of pages a day. Words would be better because you can cheat a little with pages. Five or six lines in and you can convince yourself you've done a page when actually you've got about twenty lines to go. But when the fever is on and then Spring fever comes knocking too with all that warm sunshine, sometimes I just melt down like butter in a hot skillet.

~~I met with a lovely book club in Taylorsville, KY last night. It was fun hearing the ladies talk about what they liked about my book, The Believer. Everybody loves Hannah in that book and Issachar - a couple of supporting characters who really make a difference in the story. And Hannah would definitely have Spring fever and run off to the woods to climb some trees.

~~What does Spring fever make you want to do? Whatever it is, if you're in this part of the country the next two days are going to be really good days to treat that "fever."