The other day around 7:00 p.m. I was passing through the sun room and looked out the windows like I probably do about 50 times a day. I knew Alex and Bella were outside enjoying the cool spring evening, so when I saw two black objects down in the woodsy skunk cabbage part of our yard I wasn’t too surprised. I did wonder however what they were doing because they really don’t go down there that much. The very next minute my brain finally went CLICK. I looked on the deck and sure enough, there were Alex and Bella just laying there. The black objects were not my dogs! They were bears; the first ones of the season.

When my brain finally registered the fact that they were bears I couldn’t help but wonder why the dogs weren’t barking? Surely they saw them/heard them and Bella notices everything that even comes close to her yard. Yet there they laid, looking, but not making a sound. I could see now that the bears were not in fact in the yard but right on the other side of our chain link fence that borders the woods. A mother and two cubs. Big cubs for this early in the year. I quietly called the dogs inside and ran to put the zoom lens on the camera.

Here is what they looked like from the back deck where the dogs were laying.

I walked down into the yard to get closer, but not too much closer. After all, I don’t know this bear. Shooting through a chain link fence is not the best and it was getting dark but you get the idea. Here is the mother bear.

There were having a delightful meal of fresh skunk cabbage, ripping off huge leaves and munching them down like crazy.

She sees me!

I walked back up the house to continue watching them. Within a few minutes of getting back in the house I noticed that one of the cubs had come over the fence and was now technically in my yard. (There is a spot in the fencing that sags from so many bears going over it!) Back down in the yard I went with the camera. He heard the clicks of the camera before he realized I was there. He was very curious about what I was doing.

His sibling is still on the other side of the fence and curious too.

how’d he get over there????? maybe I should try ...

All too soon they had their fill of cabbage and moved on. It was nice to see them! I hope they come back soon.

More spring photos!

All photos taken on the grounds of Skylands Botanical Garden on Thursday.

(Same tree as previous photo from the opposite side which is done blooming! Magnificent old tree, don’t you agree?)

Photos taken at Skylands Botanical Garden.

When you think about a large mass of beautiful cherry trees in bloom, no doubt your mind goes right to Washington, D.C., right? What if I told you that a park near Newark, New Jersey has more cherry trees than D.C.? Branch Brook Park in Belleville has over 4,000 cherry trees of over 14 different varieties, all planted in natural settings, making it the largest and most varied collection in the nation.

When Rick mentioned that we should go, I went online for more information. Their website said their Cherry Blossom Festival was next week. As our spring this year has rapidly been exploding with the last few days reaching high 80’s I thought I’d better call and find out how the blossoms were. The woman at the Visitor’s Center assured me that the trees were at their peak now, not next week. So yesterday over a long lunch hour for Rick, we headed down that way.

It was a nice day, but unfortunately the wind was blowing. And, when we got there we could see that most of the trees were either losing their blossoms in showers of petals in the wind, or they were pretty much done. Darn! We missed it! We decided to see what we could see anyway. The trees are not planted en masse so the effect is quite different from a row-like planting, allowing each tree to show its own unique beauty. They are spread out over a large area. Some trees were still beautifully showy. Here is a sampling of what we saw on our walk.

Beware of small cherry tree elves!

Just the gnarly shapes of some of the older trees, like this one, were amazing.

These two women/girls were wearing Easter bunny ears. They certainly picked a beautiful place to spread their blanket!

Next year we’ll have to pay better attention so we can hit it during their peak! Those poor people next week at the Cherry Blossom Festival won’t have anything to look at. I think Mother Nature pulled one over on them this year.

But like I said, spring is exploding around here.  It seems like the trees popped overnight about two days ago and every morning when I get up the leaves on the trees have doubled from what they were the previous day. It’s crazy early for that to be happening!

Here is a small taste of some things in bloom around my town right now.

This beautiful dogwood tree in front of the town hall.

A weeping cherry that is so large you can’t see the house behind it! I love this tree.

Can you see that someone tied lavender ribbons to its branches? Probably for Easter. The year we moved here it was Easter weekend and they had little eggs tied tied to its branches.

Not sure what this is, but it’s a miniature waterfall of white blooms. Maybe a mini weeping cherry in white?

I had to include this creepy sign for the florist. What do you think of it? I guess it’s been a landmark for years, only Kim tells me that it used to look even more like Michael Jackson than it does now!

I stopped by the local nursery to snap some pics of what they have out now. An explosion of color! (The daffodils in my header were taken here.)

I don’t know if it’s my over active imagination or what, but these daffodils look to me like they are trying to look around in every direction and saying ... hellloooo!

And last, but not least, this sleepy bee found a great napping spot. At first I thought he was dead but when I stroked him with my finger he moved his legs a little bit. Lazy spring bee!

They call us the Garden State for a reason!