Well, we’ve waited a very long time for Spring colors to start coming back… I’m tired of Winter’s grays & browns! But in this case, I had to drive all the way down to St. Louis to see some Spring flowers just starting to bloom! And I’ll take ’em… and try my best to bring some color back to Chicago too!!

Another beautiful morning with a dusting of overnight snow
& plenty of sunshine on some mossy tree bark!

Well, lookey here… yet another one of my ceramic fortune cookies has been found at Illinois Beach State Park. So much fun finding out that they are still being found by random people while out there enjoying the park. Even more impressive that Adam “found me” here on Facebook and shared his story & photos with me!

This from Adam…
“Hi Gary, thank you for the good fortune! My kids and I found a cookie this past Saturday and my mother did the research and found you. Hoping you can view the post about it on my page and the pictures associated with the outing to Illinois Beach State Park. I recently discovered it during the lockdown as well (Sept. 2021), and I’m now there almost every time the weather is favorable. Kids love it too! A lot of joy has come from your kindness. From the thrill of finding the cookie nestled in the root structure of the tree to the people’s reaction from posting about it and finally the excitement in locating the maker! We hope there may be more to find still and will be back again soon. Thank you!!!”

Me likin’ the lichen… and the mosses… and the groovy bark textures! Makes it kinda perfect for another natural Texture Tuesday!

#texturetuesday

Totally enamored by these bright-colored leaves as the sun was shining in through my dining room window the other day! Not sure what kind of plant his is… but I’m diggin’ it!

For this week’s LILLSTREET THROWDOWN class project, I decided to kick it off with a little visual inspiration! Only Mother Nature can create this amazing collection of shapes, colors & textures! But my students were going to give it a try too!!!

Looks like my pals Allison & Terry were back at Illinois Beach State Park yesterday to continue their scavenger hunt for the “elusive” hidden fortune cookies… for their third time! Looks like they found three more “cookies” this time… which makes up for their second trip where they found none! Looks like it was a beautiful day for hunting… and much easier to find them before last night’s snowfall.

A bit more color peeking through… but still plenty of clouds!

Such cool leaves with great cuts, lobes & holes through the leaves…
and they’re HUGE! These leaves are almost three feet long!!!

And another one finds it’s way out of the frozen cold… and into a warm home! This little fortune cookie was found sitting right on top of the entrance sign to south unit of Illinois Beach State Park.

More fortune cookies still out there…
in both the north & south units of the park!!!