Thursday Thoughts – Winter Birds

/ Leya / 38 kommentarer

Some of my winter guests every year, photographed through my window. Of course Robin is my absolute favourite – and I have two of them. They eat on different sides of the house, this one outside my room and the other one outside my kitchen window. Fighters they are, so better stay apart…

Every year in January there is a national bird count, and everyone who has a feeder or a garden can participate and count their birds during three days and then report the results. For the last ten years the birds have been declining and some species are not here anymore. This is a fact all over the world. But, it is interesting to participate and follow your own reports as well as from the whole country over the years. Some years there is an invasion of a certain species, and this year we had a massive invasion of the Common Redpoll all over the Sweden.

Lens-Artists Challenge #285 – Warm Colours

/ Leya / 57 kommentarer

I am surrounded by colours, especially warm colours, and that is the way I want it. It keeps me going and makes me warm at heart as well.

Colors are the smiles of nature.

– Leigh Hunt

In my garden, there are many colours, and I love to stick my head (and lens) in the multitude of blooms during summer. That is just what I did in the header photo…

This week Egidio starts by inviting us to look at our photos or capture new images showing how warm colors appear in our world and their emotional significance to us.

Down to the tiniest plant and fruit, their colours make me smile. This sensual spindle fruit makes me think of Love.

And, talking about love, my furry dogs have all been wearing warm colours. I constantly need to touch their softness and feel their warm breath in my face. Here’s Milo – unconditional love in warm chocolate brown.

What more do we need? Well, food is mostly wearing warm colours – have you ever thought about that? And how we love to have dinner at warm candle light. It makes us relax and enjoy both food, drink and company.

Autumn might not be the warmest season, but by far its colours are, so the last fiery goodbye to summer is – a warm hug. And at least here in the Scandinavian countries, this is much needed to make us stronger when winter darkness holds us in a tight grip.

To me, buildings feel more inviting in yellow and red than in any other colours. If you visit Denmark, for example, you will find many yellow and red houses, and that goes for Spain too. I think they emanate warm and welcoming vibes.

What about whole countries? Morocco is a hot country in warm colours – in their interior design as well. This furniture and these saturated colours might be a bit too much for us in an ordinary Swedish room, but in their ”right” place they are perfect.

Finally, a heavenly sunrise and a display a soft, fluffy, warm and lovely scenery outside the plane window – (even if we know how cold it is out there…)

But for my very last choice, we will return to Mother Earth and an unforgettable sunset on sand and sea. Love was in the air and in the golden waves…

Sofia challenged us to think about day and night for last week’s challenge. You responded with so many wonderful interpretations with great variety and creativity! Please join us next week too when Anne introduces a new challenge.

So, a big thank you to Egidio for this week’s wonderful theme! If you join us, please use the hashtag “lens-artists” in your post and link it to Egidio’s original post. That helps all viewers to easily find you in the reader. This page has more information about the Lens-Artists Challenges.

Thursday Thoughts – It’s that Time Again…

/ Leya / 36 kommentarer

A lovely week to revitalise my plants – just finished tonight, happy and tired! I will count them tomorrow…

Lens-Artists Challenge #284 – Day and Night

/ Leya / 55 kommentarer

Sofia says that having passed the Winter Equinox, it’s time for the days to grow longer, and to leave the never-ending nights behind us. But before we do that, she invites us to celebrate this Yin/Yang of our everyday life. Please visit her inspirational site for more!

I will concentrate on some special aspects of this, that interest me. Night and day can be so different… not only opposites. I agree with Walt Whitman:

To me, every hour of the day and night is an unspeakably perfect miracle.

Let’s start with a winter’s morning at home –

– it can be both colourful and cold. And the coldest time is at sunrise. That is when I go out to feed the birds so they can better withstand the cold and survive another day.

Then I walk my dog at noon while the winter sun can barely be seen above the trees.

But only a month later, the daylight is more soft and golden – and it’s a joy to stroll along the river.

When we reach summer, the nights are soft and golden too – The light! How we constantly long for it to come back to us…

There are also big differences in days and nights depending for example on which country you are in. Where on the planet and in what season. Daylight can be extremely clear and transparent – in the fresh air of Iceland.


While nights can be almost totally dark, in the wilderness or in countries where electric light is not that much used. It is sad that we humans often want to lighten up our nights (unless it would be too dangerous not to…). Try not to! The eyes will adjust to the darkness, and it is no longer that dark…instead a new world opens up.

Nature is depending on day and night, light and darkness – for food, for security and for reproduction, among other things. This is a spring cherry tree in daylight, waiting for pollinators, and a night blooming cactus in my room. So, if we didn’t have daylight, there would be no cherries…and if we didn’t have our dark nights, this flower would never unfold. (Or, be pollinated by nocturnal insects.)

We also know, that our artificial lights are bad for many of the night living animals. It can mean the difference between life and death. Newborn turtles for example, head for the light, but that could mean into the city instead of out to the sea.

Thank you, Sofia, for the brilliant opportunity to look at different aspects of night and day! Please link your post to her original post and don’t forget to tag it with Lens-Artists.

I want to thank you for all your lovely poems and quotes last week – beautifully illustrated by You alone! They told us much more about you, and maybe more than you knew about yourself too… I loved every one of your thoughtful posts and learned to appreciate more poets and famous quotes than I had heard of too.

Next week, Egidio will be your host with ”Warm colours” Be sure to visit his spectacular site for inspiration! Until then, stay well and be kind.