Joy, bliss and lots of water

It was, as my lovely Gabi said, a weekend largely devoted to water. First, we hooked up the four rainbarrels purchased last week to the gutters installed two years ago...

We may not get our chores done speedily, but we do get them done, eventually.

First off, I must say how happy we were on Saturday morning to look outside and see sunshine instead of snow! Yes, the weather predictors had been saying, "The snow is coming the snow is coming" all week, and we were believers. Instead, we we were greeted by sunshine and temperatures speeding all the way up to the high fifties... yes, there's some sarcasm there. Still, a lovely day. We spent the afternoon fixing up the rainbarrels, and all was well and good in the world.

Sunday was simply beautiful. The first miniature iris were budding, lots of sun, the lawns turning malachite green. New growth is such a stunning color this time of year. It takes your breath away.

I bought some pansies and potted them up for the front and back steps. So cheerful to come home to.

In the afternoon we were took the kayaks out to St. John's University and Lake Saga-somethingunpronouncable. It was great. The wind was up a little, but not enough for whitecaps. Just some fun waves to bounce over the front of the boats. The water was frigid, but with our big, strange-looking skirts on the kayaks we stayed dry and warm.

Best was venturing into the little pond-like areas around the lake that are inaccessible for most of the year. However, yesterday the water lilies were still a foot below the surface and the water is still high enough that we explored further than we ever have before. We found a second beaver dam (old and abandoned, by the look of it). We saw dozens of turtles sunning themselves -- they're very easy to spot this time of year because they are a deep dark green but the watergrasses are still brown. In a month they'll be virtually invisible.

As always, we saw many varieties of birds at Lake Sag. Common loons, two kinds of chickadees, ducks, geese, goldfinches, kingfishers... and an eagle on our way home.

We also saw (and heard) a herd of 15 deer, does and fawns. They were incredibly noisy running across last year's dropped leaves.

So, yes, proof positive that winter is over.