3 year old Sam reciting poetry:

     I am a devotee of my grandson, Sam, 5,  and his little brother, Will. 2. These two are phenomenal and I could brag about them, dominating the conversation, forever. Sam is so bright and has the memory of an elephant. He never forgets anything you say. When we visit him, he recalls the stories I have told him the last visit several weeks past. Last visit I told him about a novel that I was reading about a dragon and his dragon master, keeping out some of the adult gore that was also included in this book. This visit he asked me if I had read any more about that dragon and how did the story turn out. I couldn't even remember what book he was talking about and had to delve around in my memory drawers to come up with an outcome of the story to tell him. Little Will who is just barely over 2 years old, can count to 10, in both English and Spanish. His older brother taught the Spanish. Will knows all of his colors, his shapes, many animals and the sounds they make, and is starting to recognize letters and sounds that begin words. Both boys just amaze me.

     But then sometimes you find other examples of a young bright mind progressing outside the boundaries of normal.

     Indeed, once in a while you come across something on the Web, or on youtube that is truly phenomenal. Such are these recitations  by 3 year old Sam (another child named Sam, not my grandson). This gifted little boy loves poetry or poetic prose and has the gift to be able to memorize long sections. But then more-- most impressively he recites these pieces with feeling and complete understanding. I wanted to have these available on my blog. If you ever need your spirit raised, your life made more spiritual and simple, your world infused with childlike wonder, just play one of these videos and good things will come to pass in your mind and possibly in the world around you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVu4Me_n91Y&feature=endscreen&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fzk8E_RKeQ4&feature=endscreen&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahcrYHgK7wg&feature=endscreen&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PipSDeiTOB0&feature=related

Spring gardening

     I love to garden. I am already getting itchy to be out in my flower beds and cleaning out the winter debris. There are signs of spring and I have seen several robins around. (Though I think some robins never even left for the winter, because it was such a mild one.) But it is still too wet and too cold to be working in the garden..  I am already planning on where I am going to extend my paths through my "wild areas". That's what I call my prairie plantings. I had ignored them for a few years and the paths had gotten overgrown. But these are tall prairie grasses and herbaceous plants. Some are 9 or 10 feet tall. Without paths, no one is going to see some of the smaller treasures hidden in amongst the giants. For example, last year when my husband went to mow off the prairie stuff in late October as he likes to do. (We are not allowed to burn off the prairie which is what is recommended, so we mow it each year to get rid of dogwood and birch seedlings that would otherwise take over). Anyway -- when he started mowing he found a medium height monkshood blooming in the middle of the cup plant. He didn't mow it down because he thought I might enjoy seeing it finish its blooming season. He sometimes does sweet things like that. The bare stalks are still out there. So without paths treasures can be completely hidden. I need to plan those paths and then plant some other smaller treasure along them and cut back the giants to allow for this. I have a lot of offsets in my other beds that I can move to the wild area for that reason: purple coneflower, shasta daisy, spiderwort, cassia, and others. I can certainly fill in some of the path borders nicely. But maybe I'll purchase some little showy treasures. I had tried prairie smoke, and pasque flower before and they have killed out. Maybe the clay has been broken up enough now by the giants to allow these little guys to make a go of it. And I used to have swamp milkweed, and lobelia scattered around but they have killed out, perhaps from some dry summers. They like it moist. Maybe I could plant them at the edge of the lawn where my husband runs the sprinklers. I have some wild lupine seeds to scatter. So you can see I have all kinds of plans for the "wild areas".
     My beds around the house are in pretty good shape but they can always use a little tidying up. Shrubs need a little pruning. And it always buy some annuals to stick in empty corners and I fill pots with annuals in gorgeous showy color combinations.
     My thoughts are just tumbling over each other like my unstaked dahlias do at the end of the fall flowering season. You can see that I am getting very excited about the upcoming season. Well, someone sent me this video. It served to relax my aspirations a little bit, providing some views of flowers that can fill the void of late winter. Check it out!
   
http://player.vimeo.com/video/27920977?title=0&%3bbyline=0&%3bportrait=0href=