The Leaf Is One With Other Leaves

" This leaf is one with the other leaves:

with the branches, the trunk and the roots of the tree;

with the clouds, the stream, the earth, the sky and the light of the sun.

If one of these elements were absent,

the leaf could not exist."

~ Thich Nhat Hanh

I'm joining the lovely Karen for SunLit Sunday.

Wishing YOU well and much joy! 

Scavenger Hunt Sunday

I'm joining Scavenger Hunt Sunday

at Ramblings and Photos by Ashley Sisk.

1. Birds

Flamingos at the Houston Zoo.
It is baby time and this little grey fluff is the first one of the season.
He was determined to keep his "back side" as his good side! 




2. Beach

This was the closest I could come to one of my favorite places ... the beach! 
I'll just have to dream on.....


3. Bridge

Bridge in the Japanese Garden in Hermann Park, Houston
I love the reflections.



4. Bottom

This is Mina when she first came to live with me (and Teddy and Cassie).
I think her little "bottom" is cute -- with her manx tail!




5. Butterfly

This is from 2009.
Cosmos in Musashi's Garden.
It was a good year for the Monarch butterfly.

Wishing YOU well and much joy!

Metta Meditation

If you've been visiting Twisty Lane for any length of time,

you know I always wish YOU well and much joy.

It is part of my Metta Prayer and meditation

to wish myself, those I love and all those living on this earth

a good day!

Every now and then I receive something in my email or 

I find something on FaceBook that I think is worth sharing.

This is from the Elephant Journal and written by Michelle Margaret Fajkus.

May has 31 days and here are 31 daily aspirations to guide your
Metta meditation practice for the month.
Open your heart and join me!

1. May I be safe.
May I feel secure and grounded. May I feel a sense of belonging to the Earth. May I know who I am.

2. May I be happy.
May I be joyful. May I be content. May I live with bliss.

3. May I be healthy.
May my body be strong. May my mind be balanced. May I exude well-being.

4. May I be peaceful.
May I be calm. May I be patient. May I be loving.

5. May I live with ease.
May I relax. May I let go. May I just be.

6. May I be free.
May I be free from suffering. May I be free to be me. May I be liberated.

7. May you be safe, happy, healthy, peaceful and free.
Visualize a loved one and repeat each phrase to them in your mind’s eye.

8. May you be safe, happy, healthy, peaceful and free.
Visualize a neutral person whom you do not have strong feelings about and repeat each phrase to that person.

9. May you be safe, happy, healthy, peaceful and free.
Visualize a difficult person, someone with whom you are having a conflict, or even an “enemy,” and say the phrases to them. (This one may take a while before you can actually do it!)

10. May we be safe, happy, healthy, peaceful and free.
Repeat the wishes, visualizing yourself together with all your loved ones.

11. May we be safe, happy, healthy, peaceful and free.
Visualize yourself and your wider community.

12. May you be safe, happy, healthy, peaceful and free.
Visualize the light of your metta reaching out to shine upon all beings on Earth.
The remaining aspirations are wishes for all beings, including ourselves.

13. May all beings be safe.

14. May all beings be happy.

15. May all beings be healthy.

16. May all beings be peaceful.

17. May all beings be free.

18. May all beings feel strong & supported.

19. May all beings be loved & cared for.

20. May all beings breathe & relax.

21. May all beings go with the flow.

22. May all beings express our unique power.

23. May all beings open our hearts.

24. May all beings listen.

25. May all beings imagine.

26. May all beings connect with our intuition.

27. May all beings connect with our divine nature.

28. May we all love.

29. May we all share.

30. May we all serve.

31. May we all unite in peace and harmony.

Wishing YOU well and much joy!

And, before I forget, since this is May 4th --
May the Fourth be with you!

Japanese Garden

This was the first year that I made it in time to the Japanese Garden

to see the crepe myrtles in bloom.

In the past I've used the excuse that it is just too hot to go.

Armed with camera, cold water and a fan -- off I went.

I wasn't disappointed.

The crepes were mostly pale pink and white, but every now and then the dark red appeared.

The sound of running water is so soothing. 

It was a lovely, but hot, morning.

Wishing YOU well and much joy.

I'm joining the lovely Judith for Mosaic Monday.

Important Mission

I had never been to the Japanese Garden when the crepe myrtles were blooming.

(Probably because it's always too blooming hot.)

This year I was determined to visit and I made it.

Camera, water bottle and fan in hand.

It was worth the visit.

I almost always see a whistling duck or two and a yellow-crowned night heron.

Not this time.

This time it was the elegant great white heron.

All of a sudden -- there he was.

I walked around the water fall and tried not to disturb him.

He was there on an important mission.

Dinner!

Wishing YOU well and much joy.

I'm joining:

and

Eileen at Saturday Critters.

Art Is

"Art is the essence of life.

Our words and our actions should be filled with art.

The substance of art is complete awareness."

~Thich Nhat Hanh

Party Time!

It's time for Vee's Note Card Party!
On the third Wednesday of each month we meet at
A Haven For Vee for party time.

We select four photographs that we think would make a nice set of note cards
and we share them.


Here are my four:

It's A Good Thing

Earth Day

Earth Day

Meet Julia

Wishing YOU well and much joy!

Thank you, Vee!

It Is Earth Day

Today is Earth Day.

To celebrate I'm sharing a few images from Musashi's Garden, the Japanese Garden and the Houston Zoo.

Don't you think every day should be Earth Day?

Wishing YOU well and much joy.

Sun Lit Sunday

This is the last Sun Lit Sunday for this year.

Thank you Karen for hosting.

I'm going to miss them.

Azaleas blooming at the Houston Zoo:

And at the Japanese Garden:

Last year I missed the azaleas blooming in Hermann Park, the zoo and the garden.

Thanks to our cooler weather, the blooms were running a little late 

and I ran on time! 

What a treat!

Wishing YOU well and much joy!

Good Morning!

"Many of us in this time have lost the inner substance of our lives and forgotten to give praise and remember the sacredness of all life. 

But in spite of this forgetting, there is still a part of us that is deep and intimate with the world. 

We remember it by feel. 

We experience it as a murmur in the night, a longing and restlessness that we can't name, a yearning that tugs at us. 

For it is only recently, in earth time, that the severings of the connections between people and land have taken place. 

Something in our human blood is still searching for it, still listening, still remembering. Nicaraguan poet-priest Ernesto Cardenal wrote, ' We have always wanted something beyond what we wanted.' 

 I have loved those words, how they speak to the longing place inside us that seeks to be whole and connected to the earth. 

This too is the place of beginning, the source of our living."

• Linda Hogan (Dwellings: A Spiritual History of the Living World)

Thanks Kim!


Wishing all of you well and much joy!

Good Morning!

"There are only two days in the year that nothing can be done. 
One is called yesterday and the other is called tomorrow.
So today is the right day to love, believe, do and mostly live."
~Dalai Lama

Wishing YOU well and much joy.

Thanks Kim!

Potpourri

It's Friday.

Time for some randomness with a little this and that.

*

What a beautiful week.

It started off with the first real cool front of the season.

Off I went to the Japanese Garden.

The azaleas are a bit confused -- they were blooming!

**

Then it was off to the zoo where they are busy decorating for Zoo Boo

and for Holiday Lights.

What do you do with a dead tree?

You carve it with a small chain saw into chimps climbing on a tree!

Located just in front of the entrance to the chimp habitat.

***

I have one more Christmas tree to crochet and my Christmas hot pads are all finished.

I started sending off the Halloween hot pads to their new homes.

I have yarn left over from the afghans I made several years ago.

I had to try out the Bavarian crochet pattern -- also called Catherine's Wheel. 

It took some frogging before I was comfortable with the pattern.

It reminds me a little of the cathedral window quilting pattern.

****

I have a list of books to look for when I make my run to Barnes and Noble today.

Top of the list -- the new Bill Bryson -- One Summer in American: 1927.

*****

The cool front didn't last very long.

The heat and humidity are back.

Next cool front is due in late next week.

Another trip to the Japanese Garden and Zoo is planned.

Thanks, Nancy!

******

Wishing all of YOU well and much joy!

Good Morning!

 This is what Autumn looks like in Houston!

Japanese Garden, Hermann Park, Houston

Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished.

~Lao Tzu

Notecard Party!

It's time for one of my favorite Blogland Parties:

Vee's NoteCard Party.





Once a month we all get together with four photos from our blog that we think would make a good Note Card. 
This time of year, before it gets too hot and humid, I spend a lot of time in the Japanese Garden at Hermann Park. Here are some of the images I've shared recently of this very special space.

The Kiss of the sun for pardon,

The song of the birds for mirth,

One is nearer God's heart in a garden

Than anywhere else on earth.

~Dorothy Frances Gurney

"In all things of nature there is something of the marvelous."

 ~Aristotle

"Japanese gardens ask that you go beyond the garden spiritually,

 that you look at the garden not merely as an object 

but also as a path into the realms of spirit."
— Makoto Ooka in The Temple in the House by Anthony Lawlor

"When a garden is used as a place to pause for thought, 

that is when a Zen garden comes to life. 

When you contemplate a garden like this it will form a lasting impression on your heart."
— Muso Soseki in The Temple in the House by Anthony Lawlor

Wishing YOU well and much joy!

Tea in the Garden

During my last visit to the Japanese Garden

I took a little tea cup with me.

I hoped I'd find a place or two I could make this little cup the star.

I think the garden fairies would approve.

Don't you?

"If man has no tea in him, he is incapable of understanding truth and beauty."

~Japanese Proverb

Thank you to our tea party hosts:

Tea Time Tuesday

A Return To Loveliness
Friends Sharing Tea
Teacup Tuesday

Tuesday Cup'a Tea

Share Your Cup Thursday

Wishing YOU well and much joy!

Good Morning!

Listen to the salutation to the dawn,

Look to this day for it is life, the very life of life.

In its brief course lie all the verities and realities of our

existence.

The bliss of growth, the splendour of beauty,

For yesterday is but a dream and tomorrow is only a vision,

But today well spent makes every yesterday a dream 

of happiness

and every tomorrow a vision of hope

Look well therefore to this day

Such is the salutation to the dawn.

~Sanskrit Salutation To The Dawn

Nature Never Goes Out of Style

Last Friday I went to Hermann Park.
It was a cool morning and I got there early so that I could find a good parking place.
I also had the Japanese Garden to myself along with the birds and the squirrels.
An early celebration of Earth Day.

The garden is so lush this time of year.

So different from my last visit.

See the new little pine tree?

Lots of work going on because of the drought.

So quiet.

Hard to believe that the Texas Medical Center is just a hop over the fence.

I missed the azaleas blooming, but the iris were lovely.

A real pop of color.

The crape myrtles will be next.

Peaceful

I took over 200 images on Friday.

The ones you see here are straight out of the camera.

You'll be seeing more.

Zoo photos to come!

Would you believe I'm listening to Christmas music?

I'm trying to make my way through all of the CD collection and this one just happened to be on top.

Instrumental of *old* music.

It's a keeper.

Thank you to Mary for hosting Mosaic Monday.

Wishing YOU well and much joy!

Party Time!

It's time for Vee's Note Card Party.

I have to admit -- this party is one of my favorite in the Land of Blog.

So many nice bloggers, beautiful photos, wonderful ideas.

A big thank you to Vee for hosting.

I've searched for four photographs on my blog that would make a nice set of note cards.

I think they will warm you up and perhaps bring a smile to your face.

They were all taken at one of my favorite places -- the Japanese Garden in Hermann Park.

Nature is profoundly beautiful in this garden.
We can't forget the critters!

Turtles sunning in the Japanese Garden

"Choose only one Master - Nature."

~Rembrandt

Black Crowned Night Heron

"Nature is the art of God."

~Dante Alighieri

Easter is Coming!



"I believe a leaf of grass is no less than the journey-work of the stars."
~Walt Whitman

Black Bellied Whistling Ducks

"The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely, or unhappy is to go outside somewhere where they can be quiet, alone with the heavens, nature and God. Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be and that God wishes to see people happy, amidst the simple beauty of nature."

~Anne Frank

Wishing YOU well and much joy!