Midwinter Picnic

A young family soaks up some January sun at Teddy Bear Cove.

Rx For the Dark Days of Winter

After out near spring-like early February, winter has decided to make a comeback. My internal clock had pretty well decided that winter was over and was prepared for spring. We escaped the worst of the snow, but it's been in the teens and twenties for several days.

In light of the darkness, Bellingham Daily Photo would like to present an image from this past summer to remind us all that spring is nearly here!

Winter Stairs

Nobody uses the winter stairs but I'll bet they're busy when summer calls for a day at the beach!

Skywatch Friday: South Prairie Skyline

Bare trees ring the playground at Mountain Meadow Elementary school in South Prairie.

Jumping for Joy...

...or, well, just because jumping is fun!

Left Behind

"Was it something I said?"

(click to enlarge)

Harlequin Dance

The Harlequin dances on the water, displaying his namesake Harlequin agility.

Life Tanka

do not slide your hand
into your pocket for warmth
put your hand in mine
I'll hold it while the wind blows
and at the end when it's still


Written for One Stop Poetry Form Monday, which focused today on the tanka, a Japanese love poem with lots of rules! Hopefully I followed them all without losing the spirit of the poem. It was a fun challenge, anyway: 5 lines of 5/7/5/7/7 syllables with a season word, no punctuation, and a twist-- the first three lines must stand on their own as a mini-poem, and the last three lines as well (so the middle line is used in both). Phew! If you want to read more about the ancient form of tanka as well as other entries, click here.

Weekend Reflections: Watchtower

Skywatch Friday: Sunstreams

Sun-kissed rain showers over Bellingham Bay

A Sorta Fairytale House

For a sorta fairytale life.

A Man and His Dog

They're coming back empty-handed, but something tells me the dog always has a good time anyway.

Stripes

Valentine Heart and Bellingham Bay

(No, I didn't paint the heart. It was already there, I promise!)

A New Artus Court

While driving through Ferndale a couple weekends ago, we stumbled on this intriguing building being built. The information board near the construction site (above) references the original Artus Court in Gdarisk, Poland but didn't offer any explanation of why a new court is being built. An exhaustive 5 minute internet search didn't turn up any information on Ferndale's Artus court, so we're still in the dark and curious about this building. If anybody out there knows anything about this project, let us know!

Weekend Reflections: No Wake Here...

...but the wind's.

Skywatch Friday: Blue Sky Over Train

Haiku #10

sun warms the valley
except where they are, fingers
cold with the harvest

A New Kind of Pet

They follow her down the street,
faithful puppy dogs begging for a treat
but they don't sit, shake hands, roll over--
and they sound more like Rover's squeaky toy
than Rover.

Minihenge

I don't know if there's any spiritual significance with this stone maze or if it's "just" art, but either way it's quite striking. You can find it by following the railroad tracks south of Marine Park until you get to a little clearing. It's hard to tell the scale from the picture, but there's enough room to walk the maze if you put one foot carefully in front of the other.

Yellow Wall

It's like a block of sunshine on a gray day,
causing me to smile whenever I walk past it.

A Hint of Spring

It was supposed to be a long, hard cold winter

but after several weeks of spring-like weather its starting to feel like winter is over. Many of the trees in our yard are budding out already and the honey suckle already has leaves. We'll hope the weather holds so these early starters make it!

Weekend Reflections: Fleet of Foot

For more weekend reflections click below:

Skywatch Friday: The Grass is Greener...

on our side of the fence!

Harlequin Duck

The water whispers past his wings,
sighing of his beauty.

To learn about Harlequin Ducks, click here.

Private

So what you're saying is, I'm welcome to use one of these, right?

They're for everybody? Cool, thanks!

Men at Work

Fixing up the marina, one piling at a time.