06/30/11

This is a tale of the sunflower.

Bear with me as I explain:

A couple of years ago I saw that a sunflower was rising up out of the backyard in an area where we had had a bird feeder for the winter. That little seed had been missed by a hungry feathery friend and had nestled down in the soil for a cozy time before desiring to sprout forth with joy!

What joy I had upon seeing said flower bursting forth in glory.

I was so very excited to photograph it and checked each day to see if the sunflower was beginning to bloom.

Upon checking one evening I knew that the next day would be the day for me to begin the photographing of this beautiful creation. I was so excited!

I awoke the next morning, rushed to the window to view the beautiful yellow unfolding.....

... and saw that the head of the sunflower had been bitten off during the night by some animal... probably a deer.

NICE.

Fast forward a couple of years.

I began to view in the same area several of those gorgeous yellow sunshines rising up from the ground. I was ecstatic! Not only were they rising up but there were LOTS of them.

I couldn't wait... I had anticipated this for a long time.

I went out the next day to view the progress.....

.... only to find that Steve had hit them all with Round-Up weed killer the night before.....

DOUBLE NICE.

I asked why he had done so.... and he just said he thought he should get rid of them.

But wait!

Out of the ruins of the Round-Up killed beauties I see one standing alone... it had fended off that weed killer and now was a glorious green waiting to burst forth with color!

I was now so excited I was dancing.

I began to check on it every day. I would have cuddled it if my family had not thought it strange. (Of course... I do things every day that they think are strange so why did I not do it???)

Then it came. The day I had waited for.

It began to bloom!

Day 1

I checked on it every day. I took pictures of the growth each day. I also learned that the yellow that I thought were flower petals were not flower petals but actually more similar to the sepal petals. The actual blooms of the flower were the inside and so all of those parts on the inside are tiny flowers. I learned something new through this photography adventure! (Thanks, Kevin!)

Day 2 ~ notice the little flowers are opening up more.

Day 3~ check out the growth in the center!

Day 4 ~ look at the changes!

Unfortunately, there is no day 5 or 6 or 7 or 8 or.... well, you get the point.

Something (we think a storm with heavy wind) knocked down my beautiful sunflower on day 2. It was still blooming so I kept photographing it hoping that Steve could just prop her back up and do something to hold it steady.

When he tried.... it died.

I did not get to watch it change into actual seeds in the sunflower. I did not get to view the other blooms that were waiting to burst forth!

TRIPLE NICE.

So much for me and my sunflowers.