Ten Things of Thankful - Some sunshine and respite

Some sunshine and respite brings a bit of joy! Hopefully you felt some joy and gratitude this past week, in spite of whatever else might be going on in your life or in the lives of your loved ones. I'll share some of mine with you as I write this post which I'll be linking to the Ten Things of Thankful blog hop managed by Josie Two Shoes. By clicking the link you will be able to read the posts others have shared on her site.

While we have had some teaser days of sunshine offering us a bit of hope that Spring, with less of the wet stuff, was on its way, it seemed to be a false hope. We had been following the weather reports for a couple of weeks to see if we might escape to the coast when the sun was shining there. Finally we saw a window of opportunity, even though the weather in our area didn't look as promising.

Dark clouds with heavy rain moving across the valley as we left for the coast.

Blue skies, calm ocean, little wind, only a light jacket needed

Our drive to the coast took a little longer than expected due to a long stream of traffic that had come to a complete stop. After waiting for 15 minutes or so, we decided to turn around and take a different route, which proved to be quite scenic. We hadn't driven our chosen detour route in years. We learned the next day that there had been a fatal accident early in the morning that we left and our intended route was closed for hours following the accident. I am so thankful that there is more than one route from our area leading to the coast.

Because recently we had heavy winds in this area as well as on the coast, there were many signs that the beach had been affected by the storm. There was a fully intact dead stingray on the beach. I had never seen a dead one on the beach. The mass of jellies that had been washed ashore by the high winds a week before had been washed back into the ocean by the time we arrived.

(Just a heads up, even though I took two cameras and captured lots of images, somehow when I downloaded my photos, I was missing some of the photos I'd taken. The only thing I can think of is that somehow I accidentally deleted some on one of the cameras. I'm definitely going to have to be very careful not to do that again!)

While eating in a restaurant Friday evening I saw whales spouting quite a ways out in the ocean. It is always fun to see evidence of whales even though they were so far out all I could see was the spouting. Earlier in the day we had seen sea lions sitting on a buoy, and seals playing in the ocean.

At a lookout point at Seal Rock State Park someone had left what I think was a geocache rock that had been painted blue with some kind of figure. The number 12 was painted on it and circled as was the year 2017.  I think the words Sea Hawk was written at the bottom. I've never gone geocaching, so it was fun to discover this even though I wasn't playing the game. I left it where I found it.

My husband had really wanted to get some photos of some birds that had been sighted along the South Jetty at Newport. He was especially excited to take some pictures of some Harlequin Ducks.  They are beautiful multicolored birds.  I'm thankful he was able to see them and add them to his list.

It is interesting to see plant life anywhere, but I enjoyed seeing some very old nursing trees where all that is left of the original tree is a stump. In the rotted center or sometimes along the side of the stump can be seen new growth of a different tree or shrub of some kind. It is quite fascinating. We saw evidence of this in the forested areas at the edge of the beach, and in the gardens at the Connie Hanson Garden Conservancy in Lincoln City.

One of the beautiful plants that some thought should have been the state flower of Oregon is the trillium.  They are such simple, yet lovely plants.

Trillium growing in the Connie Hanson Garden Conservancy
  

It is not unusual to see wild blackberries growing just about anywhere on the Western side of the Cascade Range in Oregon, but I was surprised to see so many wild strawberry plants growing on rocky areas at the coast. The plants are just blossoming at this time.

Wild strawberry plant growing on rocky hillside on the Oregon coast

As we were heading home from the coast, we spotted a large herd of elk. They are known to live in the area, but we don't always see them.

On one of our favorite radio stations was playing a song that made us laugh. Sometimes the lyrics of songs have a way of doing that.  My Rice Ain't Got No Gravy by Johnny Nicholas was playing.   Click here to listen. We ate a lot of rice when our children were growing up, and quite often I served it with with a combination of meat and vegetables with one type of sauce or another, and sometimes with gravy

When we were almost home, we decided to stop at the Basket Slough National Wildlife Refuge, and I am so glad we did.  Years ago there were many Western Meadowlarks in this area, but their population has decreased over the years as farmlands became housing developments. I loved listening to them singing as they sat on telephone wires as I waited for the school bus in the mornings.  We saw one sitting on a power line at the refuge. My husband edged the car as close as he could to where the bird was so I could take a photo out the window.  I don't know which I was more excited about, the beautiful sound it makes or seeing one up close. Click here to listen to the sound.

Western Meadowlark at Basket Slough NWR

One of the other great things that happened this past week was receiving a phone call from a friend I had made many years ago when we were both serving as volunteers at the grade school our children attended. (Our daughters were best friends.) It was fun catching up on what has been going on in our lives.

Thanks to a yearly appointment I had with my dermatologist last week I received help in an unexpected way. At the end of the appointment she asked if I had any questions. I told her I did, but I would save it for my ophthalmologist. She said that she might be able to help. Long story short, she prescribed some medication for me to take to help with what she thinks is a case of rosacea in my eyes. Since taking the medication she prescribed, the irritation I'd been having, in spite of using lubricant eye drops, seems to have lessened. Yeah!

Thanks to some fairly loose rules for the Ten Things of Thankful blog hop, meaning ten might be less or it might be more, I'll wrap this post up. A huge thanks to all who have made it through reading this long post, and a thanks to my husband for being there with me every step of the way.