Friday Foto Friends...I'm a bit late!

 Good Afternoon Friends! Here it is Friday already, and I haven't posted any Friday Fotos for my friends yet! Sorry! I was hoping to have more to share than what I do have, but it just didn't come together, so it is what it is.  I'll keep watching out my room with a view while I write, and if I see anything photo-worthy, I will let you know. Meanwhile, here's what I've got:

A few days ago, while on our morning walk, I was enjoying the remaining wild plum blossoms on the trees scattered about through the wooded lots...

Hard to believe something so beautiful would be growing on something that looks like this:

I call this the Isaiah 61:3 tree...

"To console those who mourn in Zion,

To give them beauty for ashes,

The oil of joy for mourning,

 

The garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness;

That they may be called trees of righteousness,

The planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified.”

Rather fitting, don't you agree?

Later I spied these beautiful redbuds blooming on the redbud tree next to the beauty salon where I go to get my hair cut...(and yes, I did go get my hair cut...believe me, it needed it badly)...but aren't these lovely?

What was once just a bare ugly looking twiggy kind of tree all winter suddenly has burst forth with such beauty!

Yes, it is still February,

And I expect for most of you reading this it may still look a lot more like this:

And really and truly, even here in Florida it doesn't quite look like this yet:

But I do love that picture, don't you? Looks like a garden of hope and serenity and peace...

(I love this Thomas Kinkade calendar, and was surprised when I opened it up that it had these wonderful Bible verses on each page!)

But today it is 81 degrees here in Florida, (and I just heard our AC kick on) and here's what's actually growing in my "secret memorial garden" right now...these little azalea bushes that I planted last year had these buds on them the other day when we were expecting that big freeze. So my son covered them up for me with old sheets so they wouldn't get frozen...

And here is how they look today:

Here's a close up...aren't they sweet little ruffled edged azaleas?  I love them so much and am so happy we were able to save them from getting frozen:

Although azaleas are pretty hearty and usually do weather the bad the weather fairly well...but I'm glad we took care of them.

However, we are expecting a cold front to move in tonight, with a lot of rain and the temperatures will drop down in the low 40's over night and our high tomorrow will be around 63, so "old man winter" isn't quite done for us yet either.  I know that's no consolation for those of you digging out from under a couple of feet of snow today...I'm sorry. But I hope you enjoy the pictures anyway.

Now, the other day I saw this over around the bend in Still Waters Pond, and that's about how it looked to me without my zoom lens.  I actually thought it might be that alligator that someone said he saw in our pond (but that I've never seen or heard and doubt seriously the veracity of his discovery)...I mean it does kind of look like an alligator sunning himself on an old broken down dock...

So I zoomed in and focused my camera a bit better, and this is what it was:

Just a shadow and old dark wood. No alligator! Whew! I am quite relieved!!  But isn't it funny how our eyes can play tricks on us and make us believe things that may not be totally correct?

Now, if you focus your eyes really closely on this picture, you just might see two Canada Geese flying over Still Waters Pond early this morning, and you would be correct:

They were moving so fast that they are just a blur of wings and bodies, but they were sure making a racket, yelling out their goose call as they flew over the house and away for the day to wherever they go and then come back here again at night. I waved at them as they flew over the top of our house. I think they actually did wave back...but then again, my eyes could have deceived me a little bit. LOL.

Okay, let's shift gears a bit. Some of you may be wondering how my appointment at the Orthopedic Doctor's office was yesterday.  Well, it was interesting and good.  He did confirm that I do have "Adhesive Capsulitis" of the right shoulder, A.K.A. "Frozen Shoulder".  My options were to just keep going to PT and see if it gets better, or to have a shot of cortisone in the shoulder right then and there to see if that will help, but still continue the PT.  I opted to go ahead and have the shot, which was very interesting.  In fact, it was so interesting I thought you might want to see for yourself:

This was the ultrasound picture of my shoulder and muscle area where he injected the shot, while watching the needle go in on the ultrasound. I was able to watch it too, and it really didn't hurt much at all.  As a matter of fact, if you read the Dr.'s notes above that I included, you will see that he said "The patient tolerated the procedure well."  I wish I could say the pain in my shoulder went away right away and that everything is just great, but it will still take some time to do its work. I am trying to be a good patient.

So, since I was such a good girl, hubby rewarded me with a trip to the local Cracker Barrel for lunch since we were already pretty close to it (and also because we had a gift card for it that was a Christmas gift).

Thursday's special was turkey and dressing and sweet potato casserole, with cranberry sauce! That's what I had, and it sure was good.  Hubby had the hamburger steak with mashed potatoes and gravy and green beans. He said it was good too.

But what I was more interested in was his plate!  Look at that beautiful blue and white flowered plate! I've never seen that one before at Cracker Barrel, and I don't know how he rated to have such a pretty plate when mine was such a plain old white restaurant ware boring plate!  I looked around at other tables and didn't see anyone else with this beautiful plate! 

Maybe the effect of the steroids were already affecting me, but I just had to have another picture of that plate! LOL. This was after he finished eating, sorry it's kind of messy, but that was the best I could do without a dishcloth! LOL.

I actually considered asking the waitress if I could just take it home with me, but that would have been a little too crazy, even for me. I did look at the bottom of it to see where it came from...it's a Corona Hotelware plate, made in Colombia. I looked online and couldn't find this exact same thing, but what I did find was too expensive to even consider, so that's that. I don't need another plate anyway...but I just really liked this plate! LOL.

Okay, I think I've finally come to the end of my pictures for today. 

I hope you enjoyed this little walk through the garden and around the pond and even into the Doctor's office with me, but most of all this lovely dirty blue and white plate! LOL. I need to come up with something better for a more suitable ending to this post...

Oh, I almost forgot!

I know you've seen pictures of my kitchen cabinets many times before (and you see why I like blue and white dishes, btw).  Well anyway, yesterday afternoon one of these lovely cabinet doors almost killed me...well, not quite, but it was a very close call!

I opened up this door to put some dishes away, and the glass panel fell out almost on top of my head and landed on the counter below and did not even break!

(this picture shows it being held in place by a clamp after being glued back to the door)

It was a very close call! If that glass had hit me in the face and broke, it could have been quite a terrible thing.  As it was, it landed on my sweet little birdie that was sitting there so innocently with her lovely spring bonnet, and it broke off her tail completely! Thankfully it was a clean break, and I was able to super glue it back on and she is just fine now and so thankful to be back in one piece.

And I am very very thankful that the glass did not break over my head or on my face or hands...it could have been quite disastrous. I praise God for His protection over me, and it reminds me that 

"His eye is on the sparrow, and I know He watches me".  The little "sparrow" did get hurt, but not mortally. He was fixable.  And this "little sparrow", me, did not get hurt, not even a scratch, and I praise God for sparing me what could have been terrible. And after some super silicone glue to reattach the glass to the door, and one of my hubby's super clamps, the door is as good as new today. Praise God for small miracles!!!

Okay, that's all folks. I hope you have a blessed and wonderful weekend. Stay warm and safe.