Mother's Day Wishes

A rose for mothers everywhere: Photo by Phyllis Wheele

I won't be online tomorrow due to my ongoing unplugged Sundays experiment so on this Mother's Day eve I'm wishing abundant joy to every mother in the world and especially to my own dear Mom, Grandmother, Mother in Law, Sisters in Law and the motherly friends in my life (you know who you are and I love you)! May your Mother's Day be filled with blessings and may your children rise up and call you blessed. May you see the love you've showered upon your child/ren reflected in their eyes and actions and may God bless your parenting today and always.
 
Tonight and tomorrow I'll also be praying for all of you for whom Mother's day is painful, whether you have suffered from infertility, death of a child, mother, someone else dear to you or some other personal pain. May the God of all peace be with you and comfort you in this difficult time.

Multicolored Blooms: This Week in My Maryland Garden

If you follow my blog you know I love flowers. I just snapped this rose photo minutes before this blog post. It's such a joy to view God's handiwork in the garden!

 This week our honeysuckle vines started blooming. Love the sweet fragrance of honeysuckle!

This week our yellow irises started blooming too. Most of our irises don't have a scent that we can detect but the yellow ones smell sweet and delicious, kind of like honey. Here you can see a ladybug perched on the yellow petals. I think I took this photo and the ones below yesterday afternoon.

My husband planted three flats of marigolds in the front yard and it's brightened things up quite a bit. Should look even nicer once they fill out. Soon the zinnia seedlings will join them and, God willing, the bed closest to the street will be full again.

I'm not sure if this plant just hadn't bloomed before (it was previously buried in a clump of grass, courtesy of previous residents) or if it's one of our regular blue irises that mutated to include the nice white variegation. Either way, it was a nice surprise.

What's growing in your garden? Are there any plants you're especially fond of or looking forward to seeing bloom?

Our oldest echinacea (purple cone flower) and Stella d'Oro day lily both have buds so hopefully I'll have flower pictures from those plants to show you next week. Until then, may your heart be filled with joy and may the God of all creation be with you!

Flowers at Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens

Wild Rose: Photograph by Phyllis Wheeler

As promised in my original post about our trip to Kenilworth Park & Aquatic Gardens, here are the flower photographs. This first image (above) is likely a wild rose. They were growing abundantly throughout the nature trail.

Variegated Iris: Photograph by Phyllis Wheeler

Most of the irises at Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens were bright yellow, like the one pictured below but the white and yellow variegated iris above caught my eye. The yellow irises were growing in large clumps all over the aquatic gardens and you could see them here and there along the nature trail.

Yellow Iris: Photograph by Phyllis Wheeler

 You can see some more yellow irises in the first of the goose family photos posted here.

Water Lily: Photograph by Ben Wheeler

White water lilies abounded in the Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens. According to a park flyer the more exotic water lilies will start blooming next month followed by the lotus blooms. Which of the flower photos did you like best? Have you ever been to an aquatic garden?

May God bless you!

Using Zuma Blitz Powers for Super High Scores

A screen shot of my highest score to date in Zuma blitz

My Tips for Selecting Powers and Achieving High Scores in Zuma Blitz

Just about every week I'm asked via Facebook wall posts and email messages just how I achieved my current Zuma Blitz high score. Now, I'm far from the best player in the world, but my current high score is displayed above and my last two weeks' scores were over 3 million. I'm sharing this so you know that I have personally reached high scores and this isn't just a theoretic article but a practical one. This article focuses on which special powers I use and why I choose them.

Analysis: Which Zuma Blitz Powers Are Best

Every week the Zuma Blitz developers come out with a new puzzle. Before I use any powers I get a feel for the board by playing without any powers at all. In fact, I play far more games without powers than with powers. After playing a few games I analyze the data Zuma Blitz provides and make a determination as to which will serve me best this week. Truly, the best combination of powers will vary for each player based on their own strengths and weaknesses in the game in general and on the current puzzle in particular. I like to pick powers based on my strengths for the current week. So, for example, if I find that I got a crazy high amount of points from the fruit, then I'll pick the fruit power. Basically, I match the three powers (I either play with all three or none) to my three highest scoring areas for this week's puzzle.

My Usual Selections: My Favorite Four Zuma Blitz Powers

I'm guessing that most of you either don't want to take the time to analyze your strengths or just want to know which powers I use. If that's the case, here is my secret. Most of the time I use the multiplier, the time bonus, and the chain bonus. These are the three powers on your second screen (assuming you've reached a high enough level in Zuma Blitz to have access to all three) and in picture two for this article. However, when a puzzle is tougher for me, I tend to replace the chain bonus with the fruit bonus.

Timing: When to Use Zuma Blitz Powers

As I mentioned earlier, I play more often without powers than with them. This lets me bank my mojo (what you need within the game in order to access your powers.

When I do not use powers:

• When multitasking (for example, watching a movie and playing Zumba blitz at the same time).

• When tired, hungry or otherwise distracted.

• Before I think I've got a good feel for the new puzzle of the week.

When I do use powers:

• When I feel especially alert and focused.

• Once I think I've mastered the current week's puzzle well enough for the mojo expense to be justified (this is just an intuitive thing. If I figure out how to quantify it I'll amend the article or write a new one).

I hope this article was helpful for you! Best wishes for high scores in Zuma Blitz!

Sources:

Personal Experience

http://apps.facebook.com/zumablitz/?ref=canvas_bkmk_top&count=0

Adapted from an article written by me and originally published at Associated Content/Yahoo Voices

Goose Family Photographs

I photographed this goose family with their precious goslings at Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens yesterday.

The parent geese didn't seem to mind me taking photographs but they did maintain a fair distance from me. I loved the protectiveness shown here with both parents flanking their young goslings.

 Geese swimming across a small section of the aquatic garden.

This gosling's from a different goose family and appears to be a single offspring. Its parents were far more protective than the other set of goose parents but I couldn't resist getting at least one picture of the cute little gosling, especially because it seemed to want to come over and meet me (it's parents prevented that but it was still cute to see). Hope you enjoyed my goose family photographs. May God bless you!

Kenilworth Park & Aquatic Gardens Photos

Kenilworth Park & Aquatic Gardens Visitor center: Photo by Phyllis Wheeler

Kenilworth Park & Aquatic Gardens Nature Trail: Photo by Phyllis Wheeler

My husband pleasantly surprised me today by taking leave and making a day trip to Kenilworth Park and Aquatic Gardens. This was our first visit to the park and we took the nature trail first. When we visit in the future we'll spend less time on the nature trail and more time in the aquatic gardens section. I'm planning follow up posts featuring photos of a) flowers b) an adorable goose family c) other wildlife so be sure to check back again soon if any of those topics interest you.

Kenilworth Park & Aquatic Gardens Trail: Photo by Phyllis Wheeler

Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens: Photo by Ben Wheeler

Kenilworth Aquatic Gardens Irises: Photo by Phyllis Wheeler

Hope you enjoyed this overview slideshow. May God bless you!

Columbines, Widow's Tears, Irises & More: This Week in My Maryland Garden

Happy May dear readers! Here is our first columbine bloom of the year. I think it's a McKanna's Giant Columbine that reseeded from one of our original plants.

The Widow's Tears are in full bloom. We used to have both white and blue flowers but so far just white are blooming this year.

Last week I posted our first dark and light blue iris blooms of the year and now you can see we have a whole lot of irises blooming (and we still have a whole lot sitting in pots and buckets to be replanted from the excavation too).

This is our first rose off of our bicolor big rose. I don't remember the real name so I think of it as my strawberries and cream rose.

I think this is the same tulip I posted about last week and it's still quite lovely.

Some of the birds have been poking at our seedling pots but these cosmos seedlings that Ben started back in March are still looking good. I really should divide them or thin them soon. There's so much to do in the garden and only so much time to do it all. My plan for the cosmos was to put them in big pots so when they get tall they'll block an unsightly view from one of our windows but the county has a contractor who's had a bunch of equipment parked near our house for months now and we might just plant them on the street side to block the equipment view instead. Of course if enough of the seedlings survive we could do both.

What's growing in your neck of the woods? May God bless you!