A Cotton Candy Week

This has been peek week for the cherry blossoms around here. Although we love going to the tidal basin in Washington DC to see the trees there the reality is that it is super crowded. For a change of pace this year we tried to take in as many other locations as we could to view the trees when they were at their best.

 All the blossoms reminded me of cotton candy. On Tuesday morning this was how the cherry trees on my and my neighbor's front lawns looked. Each day I photographed them to chart the difference.

 On Wednesday we went to visit the National Arboretum in Washington DC. This is one of their oldest cherry trees. In the distance the unusual view is of 22 columns relocated from the Capitol Building during building works in 1958 and later installed here.

 It was a sunny but windy day. Outside in the Asian bonsai collection but still sheltered from the wind the sun created effective shadows for my photo.

 The camellia collection on a shady hillside within the Asian Collections included these beauties.

 A closer view of the Capitol columns. The shadows created at this angle are amazing. What do you see in them?

 On Thursday we made a quick visit to nearby Lake Ann.

 The purpose of that outing was to see the Van Gogh bridge there...but lots of other people had headed there with the same purpose. This is the bridge but not quite from the aspect I had planned.

 Over the other side of the bridge was this calmer view.

 Today's outing was to Meadowlark Gardens Regional Park. The daffodils looked pretty with the old garden bench as a backdrop

 Now I am not a pink person but, for this week, I can try hard to like it. For instance the contrast of the magnolia blooms in front with the cherry trees behind is beautiful don't you think?

 A view of the gazebo on the lake with plenty of cherry trees and another magnolia here in the foreground.

 Meadowlark is a popular venue for weddings. Here we see nature's confetti - petals from the cherry blossoms above create a ground cover around the vivid pink of the hyacinth.

This goose stood patiently for quite some time posing. Children were trying to entice it by throwing crumbs but it steadfastly ignored them.

I call this one "heading home". Pink was on many minds it seems. The grassy areas in the park are still in the winter weary stage as is evident from many of the shots but I just could not resist taking this photo anyway. The elderly gentleman was also busy in several other locations within the park taking photos but it was time to head up that hill and get home before the forecast change in the weather.

In closing I wanted to again show you the cherry trees on my lawn. Wind and some potentially heavy rain are predicted in the next 18 hours or so. Who knows how much of the "cotton candy" will be left on the trees after the storm has rolled through.

It is such a short season but once the cherry blooms have peaked and passed something else will burst into bloom to replace them. I'm expecting that to be the dogwoods so come back soon to see.