I went off to the woods yesterday, looking for Spring. The wind was icy and my face was freezing and stiff as I slogged through the icy snow stopping every once in a while to listen.  I listened hard for migratory birds and I looked under every bush for chipmunks.   I sniffed the wind for the smell of a thaw.  I got nothing. Nothing at all. I kept walking into the old part of the woods where the creek flows and sat on a fallen tree near the water.  Still looking and waiting and anticipating.  I watched the water ooze by underneath the ice, like a lava lamp.  I sat until my fingers hurt inside my gloves and there was nothing.  No animals, no stray green.... just ice and snow and suddenly * CRACK*   *POP* *SWOOOOSH*  an ice-dam gave way and water came tumbling over the top of the ice.  I grinned. NOT what I had expected, but Spring had began with a *Bang*...  not a chirp, or a scent, or a color... but a Bang.  How appropriate for this year. And then, of course, I wanted to go poke the ice with a stick to get it to move along... but decided against it as I knew the water was super-deep in that particular section.

Today the snow is continuing to melt and the temperatures are finally above freezing.  The Robins are singing and we smelled the tell-tale scent of a skunk coming out of hibernation.

There isn't much local and fresh right now, but we ARE blessed with a beautiful fresh produce section at our local supermarket.  I guess the marginally warmer temperatures were making me giddy  last week as I filled my cart with veggies.  It's been very culinarily rich around here the last couple of weeks, so I'll share some of that with everyone this week on the blog.