Birthplace, No. 1

Collecting petals in his truck.

Mike got a job in Idaho. We are very excited. We'll be closer to our parents (2.5 hours from his parents and about 14.5 hours from mine!) But it is bittersweet. We will be leaving this place that we've called home for the last, almost 7 years.

Last week I came home from work and the weather was perfect. I sat on one of our outside chairs while Stan B played in the yard. Our neighbor across the street came out and sat on his front stoop and started playing the guitar while his son played in the yard and his wife was reading in the hammock. I looked up at the sky through the loblolly pines and the great pin oak in our yard and was able to watch the birds flying from tree to tree. Tears came to my eyes. I thought about our wonderful neighbors and our great neighborhood. I thought about how we would miss exploring the creek and smelling the flowers in our neighbors' yards. I thought about how we were legally married here and how our sweet Bear was born here; this is his birthplace. Will he remember it? Does he love it now? Does he know we are moving? So I thought I would, for our Bear cub, write a post a week documenting something that I associate with his birthplace, Chapel Hill.

Number one:
Spring

I have no clue what type of tree this is. The bark is almost silvery and the branches look like fountains of water spraying out the palest pink flowers from the top of the tree. It's quite a sight.

This is a red bud tree. This is in our front yard. There are tons of these trees along our street.

I've never lived in a place with such spring colors. I will try and capture the subtle colors of green, red, orange and yellow in the budding trees. I'm waiting for the exact time. When I capture it I will share it on the blog.

Another red bud.

Tulip magnolia.

Petal dump.

dump truck flowers from erin kawamata on Vimeo.