Koala bear and girl with eucalyptus hair. I don’t know, I can’t seem to help referring to this painting as “Kaola Yummies”, after the Japanese snacks with adorable koalas printed on them.

New painting of a bird and girly. Not a scientific bird!

The mint/blue and coral/red color combination has been popular for a while, I thought I might actually be behind on the times with this painting but then I looked at my pinterest feed… yep, still good!

I’ve been outside a lot this month, but mostly camera-free… sometimes I really like to enjoy the outside with no cameras or distractions. But I found some photos I never shared from last month at Lake Lotus. It is a little place full of wonder!

This last photo is a Limpkin. The park ranger told me how it got stuck in a fish line and hook, the fisherman told the rangers and they went out to untangle the line. By the time they got to the Limpkin it had untangled itself but it still has a fish hook stuck in it’s side. You can see it in the photo. Poor thing!

Paintings in progress today, including an often requested Sandhill Crane nest.

Last year The Senator, a beautiful cypress, and one of the oldest trees in the world at 3500 years, burnt down. Now you can go and see the remains at Big Tree Park. I found it rather sad… But, Lady Liberty still stands tall nearby. 2000 years old and 89 feet tall, she is now the big tree of Big Tree Park! It’s her time to shine.

I had the pleasure of visiting Washington DC for the first time during the Cherry Blossom Festival. We spent a full day wandering the National Mall, seeing monuments, and the National Gallery of Art- oh, how I love to see a Monet in person!

But what I will share here is the super cute little albino squirrel, white with red eyes.

I thought, how funny I went to Brevard, NC  looking for the white squirrels that the town is known for, but saw none. And then I randomly see one in Washington DC. But the NC squirrels are white squirrels, and the DC squirrel is an actual albino. I searched online to see how common they are, and this particular guy seems to be a popular tourist attraction in DC! But in my search I also found that DC is known for it’s BLACK squirrels. I wish I had seen one of those- next time!

Birds, bugs, and blooms. Spring!

The last one is Linville Falls. I have seen many waterfalls in Georgia and North Carolina and this was the most impressive, albeit in person and not so much from this photo.

While in North Carolina a few weeks ago I visited the Card Sandburg Home, Connemara.

Walking into the Carl Sandburg home is like going back in time. Everything is perfectly preserved from the 1960s. It is not a recreation, as Lillian Sandburg actually sold the home and contents to the government in 1968. It’s amazing!

Unfortunately the tour of the home is only about 30 minutes long. I could spend HOURS there. There are little notes, photos, and thousands of books to look at. Not to mention all the old items, and collections of things they collected out in nature. What a wonderful place!

I was in North Carolina a few weeks ago. I did not have too much luck birding on this trip, except for these Tree Swallows nesting at the Carl Sandburg Home’s goat farm. They were awesome!