Painting #45 of my Painting a Day project. In Mr. Bluebird's Neighborhood, Spring is arriving soon. From Mr. Bluebird's perch upon on tall dried weed, he can see the patterns that farming makes on the land. Soon these fields will be bustling with human activity as spring planting gets underway.

I've been intrigued with aerial views lately. Maybe my sub-conscious telling me to step back and look at the big picture instead of getting caught up in the minutia of life. At any rate, looking out the window on countless airplane trips seems to have etched the patterns of the earth below into my psyche. I've tried capturing the images with my camera but the resulting photos never look the way my mind has recorded it.

Mr. Bluebird's Neighborhood is mostly rural, reminiscent of the view from above when flying into or out of the Denver airport. Fertile and fallow fields intersected  and cross-hatched by county roads, farm roads, irrigation ditches, the circular patterns of pivots, scattered buildings, water storage tanks and occasional trees.

Sunday afternoon my husband noticed four bright blue birds contrasting against the dead grass ochre expanse of our horse pasture. They perched on the field fencing, then fluttered down into the grass. We watched them for quite awhile, enjoying the flashes of color in an otherwise drab late winter landscape.

This little snippet of optimism made us look closer for signs of Spring: Tender shoots of grass poking up through the snow-softened ground, the melodic call of a phoebe, the aroma of damp earth rising in the warmth of the afternoon sun. We may get hit with one more snowstorm - our traditional mid March storm - but the worst of winter is over. The seeds that were scattered and sown last Fall are awakening from their deep slumber, pushing themselves upward to the light.

So too, we awaken, stiff from the inactivity of winter, our spirits stirring, stretching toward the promise of a new beginning. Yes, in Mr. Bluebird's Neighborhood, Spring is arriving soon.

Interesting facts about Mountain Bluebirds:

They are distinguished from the other varieties of bluebirds by their lack of a russet colored breast. This species has longer wings and a more graceful, swallow-like flight than the Eastern Bluebird. Mountain Bluebirds usually travel in small parties. They frequently hover low over the ground and drop down to catch insects, or dart out from a branch, flycatcher fashion, and then return to another perch. Click here to hear the song of the Mountain Bluebird.