Please tell me how nutritious this is for me. How because there’s orange and cranberry in it that it negates all 13 grams of fat. Tell me that the first ingredient, sugar, is dissolved and eradicated when immediately followed by a drink.

Tell me that Weight Watchers would only score this at a measly 2 points, and that it’s okay if I polish this whole thing off with a pot of fresh black coffee because I did my lower body workout on the bowflex this morning.

Tell me I deserve a little indulgence because I just had my annual boob sqwashing appointment. That I’m excused due to cramping and/or PMS. Or that it’s “free” because I plan to paint it, and still-life food is always “free”.

Tell me anything… just don’t tell me that this is going straight to my hips, because I will have to virtually slap you silly.

(Doh moment, calling them crocus)

On top of this fabulous purple growth in my front yard, did I mention I spied, with my little four-eyes, a robin last Friday? Here in the Midwest, that’s indicative of only one thing:

These birds were gathered at my feeder this morning. There was one helluva-hullabaloo amongst our flying friends over the inches of snow that dropped early this morning! With that in mind…

You know spring is coming around our house when the black squirrels are hanging from the suet feeders.

You know it’s spring when you tap on the window to startle them, and all he does is stop for a moment to see where the noise came from. You know it’s spring when you have to open the window and threaten his little fuzzy life before he’ll leave the suet alone. (for 10 minutes. Seriously. Why do I bother?)

You also know it’s spring around our house when there are new birdies hanging around, new as in other than goldfinch, house sparrows, house finches, cardinals, chickadees, hummingbirds and nuthatches.

This is a Dark Eyed Junco, I identified him through eNature. He and his pretty little girlfriend have been hanging out here for a few days now, and I couldn’t be more happy to host them. They’re really cute! I’m waiting for the really unique ones to stop by, like that smores lookin’ bird I saw last year, the Eastern Towhee. Oh come on, doesn’t he make you hungry for a nice big chocolately marshmallowey smore? Me too. Or I suppose it could be that I’ve just been eating plain brown rice for too long.

One more, just for giggles:

Nancy, Angel and Nicole all asked:

How do you take such great pictures? Seriously, is it because you have the eyes of an artist, practice, classes? All of the above. I have a digital camera and it just doesn’t do what I want it to do. ANd, I don’t have the instruction book that went w. it.

Angel added: I second Nancy’s questions……I love taking pictures, but I would love to be able to improve what I do.

Nicole added: I third Nancy and Angel. Tell us all your secrets. LOL Are there any books you would suggest to help us get started?

First, let me just start by saying thank you. I’m flattered, quite honestly, that you guys enjoy the view through my eyes. A couple of years ago I would never have dared called myself a photographer. Now, though, there’s little hesitation when I add it to my list of “things I do”. I’ll probably even add it to my business cards once I learn my camera and what I can really do with it!

What changed? Hm. My camera. I bought a cheap, refurbished Nikon Coolpix 4300 on the recommendation of my friend (and fellow awesome photographer who will. have. a website. soon. Clara). I used it primarily for macro shots, at least those were the shots I loved to take and loved to paint from. Photographs like this viola and this dwarf iris came from that camera. If you search the archives of my photography and digital keepsakes here on my blog – anything before March, 2005 was taken with that camera.

Taba said:

i want to see Chloe!! now! :yahoo:

Now you have me wondering if you’re going to do a nice big painting of her for me since you love me so much and didn’t send me a Valentine? Is that why you wanna see my pup? Hmmm.

I just snuck up on our old girl, Chloe. She’s around 12-13 years old (people years). She has trouble with her eyes sometimes, and she’s losing her hearing, so she didn’t even hear me when I took this pic:

She woke up to the flash, though! She has a mattress (she’s gone through several), that she digs a hole into where she curls up and sleeps. Usually she faces the space heater but as you can see, she tucked her lil nose into herself lastnight. She was confused when she woke up and saw me standing there with my camera, so she started to stretch and stepped outside to get some fresh air.

This is the one that I’ll paint her portrait from, I love how her eye coloring turned out, and it shows her demeanor. She’s a calm girl, our protector.

Oh, and in case you’re wondering, she’s part Shepherd, part Rott.

I guess that explains why the shell is still in tact with a tidy little opening, and also probably why I’m a fruitcake with a camera.

Me, I’m taking the day off today. Not working. I’m going to play, and maybe shop, and maybe find a skin care line.

Speaking of skin care, do you use anything from the neck up that I should know about? For cleaning, moisturizing, that kind of thing? I’m not big into make-up, but my complexion could use some help. I feel like my face is thinning out so much that my skin looks droopy or something! I always have had problems using things because my skin is so sensitive to chemicals. I know the chlorine from swimming so much doesn’t help, it’s drying my skin out a lot. Help?