“My days are like an evening shadow; I wither away like grass. But you, O Lord, are enthroned forever; you are remembered throughout all generations.”
Psalm 102:11-12 ESV
We begin today with a throwback that is from 10 years ago this week. I took this with an iPhone 6, and I am sure I thought it was a quality photo at the time. But truly, these huge fields of canola I found over in west Georgia were stunning. It was yellow as far as I could see. I remembered these fields as I became focused on “yellow” while on a hike last week. You’ll see what I mean later in the post!
The sky was filled with trails one day when I was out on the boardwalk along the lake’s edge. The vapor trails looked like one of those “connect the dots” puzzles or something from Etch A Sketch (do you remember those?). I thought immediately of the crew that had just circled the moon and were on their way home. It has been almost 57 years since man first stepped on the moon. Some of you weren’t born, some were too young to remember, but some of us remember it well. Do you recall exactly where you were and if you watched the event on July 20, 1969? I sat on the couch with my mom and we were glued to the television! I was 18 and just graduated high school!
“Here We Go Round The Mulberry Bush” is said to be a song that likely came about from female prisoners who sang as they marched around a mulberry tree in a prison yard. It turned into a 19th century British nursery rhyme. But thankfully, I passed this mulberry tree while freely walking on a trail last week!
Three types of locusts are found in our area. The Bristly Locust near our house will bloom soon and will likely get a feature. The most common locust that I encounter is the Honey Locust, with its long thorns. This Black Locust is a beauty that I found in full bloom on my walk along the lake.
Our opportunity to have a snow day came on Easter. One visitor was determined to come dressed in a more casual manner, but I do see his shirt is at least an attempt to be “kinda” fitting for the day!
Most of our honeysuckle blooms in May, and it has more yellow mixed among the flower petals. This whiter variety down by the lake was already providing some sweetness for the local pollinators!
My precious wife of 53 years insisted that I leave my normal strict diet behind for a day and allow her to take me to dinner for my birthday last Tuesday. I was more than happy to cooperate and I ordered a “collage” of food!
Long time friends (over 50 years) had a party for me on Saturday this past weekend which included a cake and a lot of good food and fellowship. Seth, Allison, Pam and the grands had a party for me last night at the grands house. They had invited family and many friends. And of course there was another cake and a lot of food. I wasn’t expecting any of this, and I usually like to remain low key. I asked why we were having all this birthday stuff going on and was told that three quarters of a century was a big deal. OK, I’ll accept that. It has been 8 days loaded with love…and calories!
So much I encountered last week was yellow. Folks in the country when I was a kid often called it yeller. I thought I would share a few of the yeller discoveries; like this buttercup.
Not only yellow, but buttery. Even if the name is butterweed, it’s a nice looking weed!
The yellow flag iris was blooming in the wet areas at the wildlife park and birding trail I walked on Wednesday. It is hard to consider calling it an invader or invasive because the flower is such a perfect shade of yellow…
…but it is not a native and probably found its way here as a garden escapee!?? It is definitely yellow.
Hop clover forms dense little yellow patches across pastures and roadsides this time of year. I’ve seen it all my life but never realized it had become naturalized here long ago. It is native to Europe and western Asia.
And while on the subject of yellow, do any of you remember this? This image is from the promotional poster for the 1957 classic Disney movie Old Yeller! The movie was based on a children’s novel that was written in 1956 by Fred Gipson. The setting was on a ranch in Texas and about a boy and his stray yellow dog that became his loyal companion! So, I say we can use “yellow” or “yeller” and be fine! The novel I understand was loosely based on a story about a dog told to the author by his grandfather. One source I read stated the dog’s name may not have been derived from its dingy yellow color, but because his strange bark sounded like a yell. A name based on color makes more sense to me. But, maybe he was simply an old yell-er? Pam may assign that name to me if I start raising my voice too much!
This reminded me of ice cream the moment I saw it. I suppose that needs an explanation or else you will go away thinking that I have completely lost it. A popular creamery has an ice cream flavor called “Turtle Tracks”, available in all our grocery stores. What I think we are seeing here are turtle tracks through the mud. I never remember seeing the lake level this low, especially in the spring. This is usually very much under water, but shallow enough for turtles to travel along the bottom. I see large turtles here. There were a number of these “tracks” visible of various sizes. What do you think?
This plant is growing about 30 feet from our yard (we have yards in the country and lawns in the city). I read one article that implied that these plants should be reported and eliminated so as not to bring harm to native vegetation. I’m not sure who I would report it to, but I’m keeping an eye out for others. I have yet to see another plant near the house. This is Leatherleaf Mahonia. A native of China, this variety of Mahonia is considered to be escaped from cultivation and spreading across the southeast US. It is listed as invasive in some states, including Alabama!
I finally traded my old phone for an iPhone 17 pro. Having a better camera in my pocket might be helpful when out and about in places and in activities where taking a larger camera isn’t practical. I used it here when I was surprised by this wild grandiflora rose growing along the trail.
Our days have been warm and pleasant but nights have remained cool. Seth fabricated a firewood rack for us and brought by some dry hardwood. We are enjoying sitting out by the fire in the early part of the evening.
The sky was on fire one evening which made an orange blaze from the fire pit seem like the perfect addition to complete a spring day!
We wish for you a joyful week!
“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.”
Hebrews 13:8 ESV
Linking with:
Pieced Pastimes, Between Naps on the Porch, Katherines Corner, Follow The Yellow Brick Home,
Life and Linda
Belated Happy Birthday wishes! The birthday dinner looks delicious. I love having a fire in the evening even if it’s just burning brush on the bonfire once the wind dies down. We’ve had rain showers this week, but are still way behind our normal rainfall. We have moose track ice cream in our area. I don’t think there has ever been a moose in Texas!
Thank you Rachel. Funny you mention moose tracks. I saw turtle tracks in the ice cream section yesterday at a local store and moose tracks was right beside it. I guess ice cream is as close as we will come to a moose here also. It’s so dry here we are having to be very cautious with any outdoor burning. Have a great week!
Butch and
Ok first thing this morning is to wish you a Happy Birthday. Glad your birthday was full of yummy cake and sweet friends and family to enjoy it with you. The fire burning looks so inviting. Have a great week. Hugs. Kris
Thank you Kris. I’ll need to be on a strict diet for a month or two to get over all the cake. Problem is, I still see cake sitting on the counter which we cannot allow to go to waste. Have a wonderful week!
Butch and Pam
Happy Belated Birthday to you! It looks like you were spoiled and treated like a King! The grands looked adorable on Easter and I love seeing their smiling faces. I remember watching the movie, Old Yeller, a tearjerker for sure! Have a beautiful week and enjoy your new iPhone.
Thank you Kitty. I certainly had a great week and such treatment will spoil a person for sure. There were a lot of movies and TV shows about dogs back in that time period it seems. Have a pleasant week!
Butch and Pam
Happy birthday! Lovely yellow flowers. Yellow is such a great color for spring.
Thank you Carole. Another yellow that is finally tapering off a little here is pollen. We hope you are having a great spring!
Butch and Pam
Happy Birthday. Thank you for bringing joy into my life. I love your posts and pictures.
Regarding that mahonia, I would contact your local gardener group and see if they might know who you should report this to. A weird thing about some of these non-native plants is they have rhizomes and once those take hold, they are hard to eradicate.
Thank you Lisa. I sure know what you mean about rhizomes, that’s almost like a dirty word when it comes to something you’re trying to get rid of. Very hard to deal with. Have a great week!
Butch and Pam
Happy belated birthday Butch! The birthday week sounds delicious! Lots of yummy food and cake. I enjoyed all the yellow pics. We are currently scrubbing all the tiny corners of our outside porch banisters/railings to get all the yellow green pollen out! It’s a chore! The children look adorable. It’s a great Easter shot. Hope you both have a good week. Clara ❤️
Thank you Clara. The yellow pollen is necessary but sure makes a mess. It has begun to taper off a bit now so maybe most of pollen season is behind us. We do need rain which would help. Have a wonderful week!
Butch and Pam
What a treat, thank you! Your posts are always such fun and so interesting! Your yellows were especially fun to see, and how clever to include Old Yeller! I do remember reading the book and watching the movie…and crying. I remember the moon landing too, gosh we were so young, we were just newlyweds…sigh…
So enjoyed seeing the grands in their Easter photo, they are such beautiful children and growing up so quickly. It’s been fun being able to watch them as they grow.
All of your photos are always stunning, but your campfire photo is so inviting and helps recall many happy memories.
Continued Happy Birthday wishes to you Butch! It’s lovely being surrounded by a loving family and friends and celebrating multiple times [and cakes]. Enjoy!
God bless!
Thank you Sue. Newlyweds in ‘69 puts you a little ahead of us. Seems so long ago if we think of it in years but in many ways almost like yesterday. So many memories. These multiple celebrations will put pounds on me if I’m not disciplined to cut back on a lot of calories for a while. Have a blessed week!
Butch and Pam
Belated Happy Birthday Butch and your cakes look wonderful. The grands are so adorable and their Easter pic is so sweet. I love all the yellows and glad you included a yellow iris…I have always had a soft spot for iris as I grew up with the blue iris being considered a ‘wild’ flower or weed called flags. (which was why I loved them). the sunset is amazing as is your fire pit area. What a nice place to sit and reflect and end the day. Blessings to you both.🥰🌸🙏🏻👒🦋
Thank you Kari. I don’t see that yellow iris in many places but maybe there are more around than I realize. It does seem to need that wt habitat to grow in. We have predictions of temps near 90 by week’s end so the fire pit may take a break. Have a blessed week!
Butch and Pam
Happy Belated Birthday! Adorable celebration with your beautiful Family and precious friends… Amazing photos! I love yellow flowers. Your post made me smile. Have a blessed Sunday.
Thank you Maristella. Glad you are smiling. Family and friends, especially the grands, made me smile a lot this past week. They do all the time actually. Have a great week!
Butch and Pam
Happy Birthday! This post is beautiful. I, too remember the first moon landing. This new expedition brought back many memories. I also remember the movie “ Old Yeller”. I love those old movies. This post is beautiful and I really enjoyed it.
Thank you Debbie. The new moon mission did bring about a lot of memories, not only about the moon landing, but many things from that era. I started thinking about movies and songs and all sorts of things from those days. Have a wonderful week!
Butch and Pam
I’m late for everything here “lately” but I would not fail to wish you HAPPY BIRTHDAY Butch🎈there is a saying that calories don’t count on birthday! One dinner seemed to be oysters. Yum! To this day I’ve never watched Old Yellow because it’s sad. Iv had too many dogs apparently. Mahonia is alive and well in my yard.,it has to be kept in check but presently it’s in full bloom and I love the purple berries and so do the birds. The photo of grands is precious! WL has the right idea, comfort and Easter. It won’t be long before Daniel will be as daring as his brother. The firepit is a great addition if you don’t have mosquitoes. I added mosquito pellets to the pond today. Fighting a viral bronchitis. Understand antibiotics won’t help. Prayers accepted. God Bless🙏🏻
Thank you Alice. Praying you get well soon. I’m glad you mentioned the calories don’t count, I feel better already. WL is right in line with me, get comfortable as soon as possible. I learned there are some varieties of mahonia that are natural and not invasive but not this leatherleaf. Unfortunately we do have to contend with mosquitoes. Have a blessed week!
Butch and Pam
Dear Butch and Pam,
I enjoy your articles and photos SO MUCH. They always put a smile on my face and warm my heart and soul!
First, happy belated birthday, Butch! What delicious ways to celebrate! Calories don’t count on your birthday right? You’re a miracle, Butch! I praise God he placed all of us on this journey.
From all the responses, you have all been a bright light to MANY! It takes a LOT of work to create this articles. So I thank you for the time, diligence, and hard work that is placed in each one!
Yeller is my favorite color. Add the buttery and it’s better! I love seeing all the yellow blooming. The pollen this year has even flared up my joints–but the rain we’ve had today and yesterday has helped a lot!
Let’s talk about those growing beautiful grandchildren! I can’t get over how much older they look. Time goes by so fast.
I loved the Etch-a-sketch skies I’ve seen. MANY crosses too!
I’ll always be in awe at technology and the latest moon mission astonished me!
It seems you two stay in full bloom no matter the season–but I also understand well the changing of seasons as mine have shifted and look so different now.
Thank you for your never-ending support and prayers through each one!
Please give Pam all my love and gratitude too!
I pray for all of you daily!!
PS-I failed to mention the fire pit! You know how I love those!!
Thank you Karla and continued prayers for you. You have also reminded me that birthday calories don’t count so I’m relieved. Honestly, I often think of something I want to say or a caption I want to write and I search for something outdoors to help illustrate it. Kinda crazy with that and of course it does work the other way most of the time…find something interesting and then talk about it. Time does seem to fly and the kids are growing. We have to adjust to “new normals” a lot these days. Have a wonderful week!
Butch and Pam
Happy belated birthday to Butch! You robbed the cradle when you snatched Pam. 😉Love the photo of all the grands. EM holding Daniel reminds me of photos when my olders sisters held me in family pictures. I love your SSS strolls. Could that Mahonia be one of the natives, aka Oregon grape?
Have a great week.
Thank you Rita. I’m familiar with the Oregon grape but this one seems to fit the leatherleaf description and the Alabama Invasive website I found shows that we have it in the area. It would be nice if it turned out to be something different. Either way we have no idea how it showed up in our woods as we’ve owned this property for 50 years. Birds I suspect. Yes, I robbed the cradle indeed. Have a wonderful week!
Butch and Pam
Happy Birthday, Butch! How exciting to have several days of celebrations. Your food collage looked quite tasty! And how about those cakes? Yummy!
I enjoyed seeing all the yellow! And I also enjoyed the sunset in your closing.
I remember the moon landing, but I could not watch it! I was at summer church camp with my cousins. My sister wrote me a letter and described it all. I watched the reruns of it when I got home. 🥺
Seeing the grands for Easter was wonderful. They are getting so big! How fun to all be so close to one another.
Thanks for all the beautiful spring photos!
Thank you Nancy. We are blessed to be close as a family including geographically. My family is small, one sister. Pam’s too, with one brother. It’s a neat thing that we are able to see each other often as they all live here, and we can walk to see the grands. Our grands getting to see this moon adventure now is really exciting too. Have a blessed week!
Butch and Pam
Congratulations, 75 years is definitely something to celebrate Butch!
I do remember the Moon landing, I was living in Parkes, NSW where the Huge Radio Telescope is housed, which had an integral role in televising the landing to the world & where the movie ‘The Dish’ was filmed (a fun take on the real life event).
I even remember the power blackout the night before, shown in the movie, that was all true, as I was babysitting my younger siblings that night while Mum & Dad were at the Function also shown in the film.
You & Pam may find the following interesting;
https://www.csiro.au/en/about/facilities-collections/ATNF/Parkes-radio-telescope-Murriyang/Apollo-11-Moon-landing
Thank you for a sweet trip down memory lane. ☺️
Blessings to you both, Jennifer
Thank you Jennifer and thanks for the link. I just finished reading and also went to an additional article. So interesting and informative. I certainly had no idea of all this. It’s amazing how they were able to put everything together to televise the moonwalk but I guess if they can figure how to go to the moon they can figure a way to televise. Sounds like a number of things were going on that almost caused the televising to fail. You certainly have a special memory of those times. I looked at Parkes on the map and some photos. I’m going to research a little more too. We hope you have a wonderful week!
Butch and Pam
Three-quarters of a century of wisdom, love, and memories – I think those are 75 years well spent!!! Keep inspiring us with your images and words! Best birthday wishes! 🎉🎉🎉
Thank you Mary. I suppose we all feel this way at times, but the 75 arrived much quicker than I expected. It’s like a couple of blinks and you’re here. Have a pleasant week!
Butch and Pam
Happy Birthday, Butch! I’m happy your were celebrated with parties and cakes. I always enjoy your Sunday musings and wonderful nature photos. Thank you! The outdoor fire pit under the stars is lovely.
Thank you Sarah. Finished all the cake tonight so it’s back on the low carb program for a while. The days are warming up but as long as the nights are cooling maybe a fire under the stars will continue to be a nice option. Have a wonderful week!
Butch and Pam
Belated Happy Birthday wishes Butch! 🎂 🎉 Love the photo of your precious grands in front of your beautiful snowball viburnum. Wishing you both a wonderful week ahead ❤️
Thank you Mary. The snowball is now fading with petals turning brown so it was good timing for them to pause in front of it. And it’s always been that the decaying blooms have a noticeable bad odor. We hope you have a wonderful week as well!
Butch and Pam
Happy belated birthday wishes Butch! It looks like a great time was had and those cakes look mighty delicious. The Easter pic of the grands is adorable – what a sweet memory to cherish. I love love all the yellow – it’s just so perfect for April and for spring. I remember watching Old Yeller as a kid too. The fiery sky is beautiful and the firepit looks so warm and cozy. Enjoy. Have a wonderful week!!
Thank you Kim. It truly is about making memories. Seems like between Easter and birthday activities that I probably created too many memories with eating and the scales may tell me. I don’t think I’ll weigh for a while. Have a wonderful week!
Butch and Pam
First of all, Happy Birthday! You should celebrate every way, every day that you can and so as far as I’m concerned, the more parties and dining out, the better. And I love that photo of your grands!
Thank you Jeanie. I like your idea and think I need to take that advice. We do have birthdays coming up right away for two of the grands so more parties are in the works. Have a great week!
Butch and Pam
Happy Birthday Butch! Calories don’t count on birthday, so you’re good! There sure are a lot of family and friends who love you. It is hard to believe so many years have passed sonce Neil Armstrong took that first step on the moon. My sister was still a baby, but Daddy insisted she be propped on a pillow in front of the tv so she could say, yes she saw it happen!!
Thank you Roxanne. I had so many pieces of no-calorie cake that I lost count. I hope your sister always told people she saw the moon walk since she had that special place on a pillow. Me and my mother watched it but I don’t remember my dad being there? He worked shift work before he had seniority to work only daytime so I figure he was working. Have a blessed week!
Butch and Pam
Happy Belated Birthday!!🎂🍨🎈🎉 How beloved you are to so many! May the Lord bless you with many more happy, healthy years!
Thank you Cheryl. The days seem to quickly pass by and turn into years but it’s a blessing to be on the journey. Have a great week!
Butch and Pam