Spring Butterflies

by Toni Mehling

Everyone seems to be ready for spring.

While the official season is still too many weeks away, you can snatch a sample this Friday. Shenandoah Valley photographer Gail Napora appears at the historic Hardesty-Higgins House in Harrisonburg with her collection of butterfly photographs and products. Napora photographs 23 native Virginia varieties of butterflies that live on the property surrounding her home in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. She uses the photographs to make prints, bookmarks, notecards, tote bags, suncatchers and other decorative items. She will have items for sale Friday during the exhibit.

And while you’re there, have a sandwich or salad and cup of tea for lunch at Mrs. Hardesty’s Tea House. Napora’s event runs from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Friday, Feb. 20 at the Hardesty-Higgins House.

To learn more about Napora, visit her website. You’ll find hundreds of butterfly photos, nature slideshows, and products.

A crocus and a robin bring hope

This is probably my least favorite time of year. The anticipation and excitement of Christmas is past. The days are short and cold. Sickness usually strikes our family at least once.

It’s enough to make me long to hibernate at times, and not come out until the temperatures are back in the 60s.

Two things have given me hope this week that spring is not far away: a crocus and a robin.

I was in my back yard with one of our dogs earlier this week and happened to notice a bright yellow crocus that had pushed its way out of the frozen soil.

This morning, as I ventured out in the gusting winds to get the newspaper, I spotted a robin, the first one I’ve seen since late 2008.

Both these heralds of warmer things turned my mind momentarily away from contemplating another dreary month to envisioning light breezes, daffodils and tulips, and waking to the sound of birds twittering in the trees on a beautiful morning.

Of course, I’m not naive enough to think that mild weather is a mere week or so away. When I first moved to the area 13 years ago, I was astonished that chilly, even snowy, weather lingered into mid-April. Having grown up in the Deep South, I previously took for granted that things warmed up by the end of March.

The anticipation of Spring that a crocus and a robin awake in me is one of the things I love about the Shenandoah Valley. After a long, cold, and sometimes snowy winter, it’s good to look forward to renewal as Creation reawakens.

~~Colleen