My Personal Sanctuary

My favorite nature nurturing spot — my own backyard

Nature nurtures me. When I’m agitated, I escape to nature. When I’m down, I run to nature. When I need to slow down and look within myself — yep, that’s where I go too. And when I’m happy? Nature again is where I celebrate and breathe in life and energy.

So when Jocelyn Joy Thomas requested stories about our favorite nature spot, for her writers group, I knew it wouldn’t be a problem.

I looked at the stories I’d already published. One was about my very favorite place on earth, Terra Studios in northwest Arkansas. One was about a beautiful and serene botanic gardens in Grapevine, Texas, only about ten miles from my house. And on another, I admitted in print that I was a tree hugger.

But yet, none of those called to me to be the story I shared with the group.

So I took to the camera roll in my phone. I thought that I’d find something that inspired me, some place I’d visited that I wanted to write about the nature there.

And what I found — besides the pictures of cats and clouds that seem to fill most of my pictures — were pictures of flowers and life and delights of nature, all in my own backyard.

And so with that — here is a mini photo tour of my very favorite nature spot — the backyard on Sheri Lane, just steps out either front or back door.

What would a garden be without iris? One of my all time favorite flowers, when I moved to Texas there was an Iris farm just a few towns away. Alas, they closed up six or eight years ago. But I still have over a dozen different iris varieties that fill me with joy.

And dragonflies! My spirit animal. When I moved to Texas I was sooooo excited to see them flitting about the yard. Dragonflies coming to me — in my own backyard. I’m in heaven during the few months they keep me company.

I’m not sure what it is. It’s not like the purple thistle that I know is a thistle. Maybe it’s one too? All I know is that I fell in love with it. Even though it bloomed smack dab in the middle of the back yard. So what is a girl to do? Mow around it and let it grow, of course! It’s it just gorgeous?

When these little ones are peeping at me from the front window where I sit trying to work on the computer, what can I do? Why, stop typing, and start talking to the doves instead. For this visit I didn’t even have to go outside.

The squirrel lives in the tree line at the back of the house that separates our yards from the houses behind us. But he likes to come visit. He hops through the yard, up a tree, over the roof, and down the tree at the front to get a drink of water and nibble on birdseed dropped on the ground. I even have some fun videos of him hanging from the bird feeder, swinging around as he tries to grab the seed from the hanging feeder. Silly boy!

Mr. and Mrs. Duck. They come visit every spring as they travel back home. Naturally, food must go out that they can get to too. Ignore the blankets. They’re not for the ducks. It was still early spring and we were getting frost at night. So I used those to cover the sunflowers that were just starting to pop up.

The back yard as the sunflowers are starting to grow. Before the end of the year they tower over me.

I had three purple thistle plants sprout up in the backyard last year. Besides the other white whatever it was. I mowed around these too. To everyone else they’re weeds. Not to me. Not to the bees either. They were happy I let the thistles grow.

Primrose — one of my favorite wildflowers. One year, about ten years ago, we went to eat at a downtown local favorite restaurant, Babe’s, a popular chicken restaurant. In the parking lot out back, there was a narrow strip, maybe 8–10" wide between Babe’s parking lot and the parking lot next door. A lonely primrose grew up in the dirt strip, all alone.

So, yes, I brought it home. (Shhhh! I’ve heard we’re not supposed to dig up Texas wildflowers. Don’t tell the authorities!) It was my first flower rescue. And it grew and thrived, and had offspring. About ten years later, each spring about a quarter of the front yard is now filled with primrose.

But today we had a high of 47-degrees. I didn’t spend any nature/nurturing time in the yard today. And most of these blooms haven’t been around for several months now. So I’ll stop this for now and go scroll through more pictures, enjoying the beauty that still exists in my camera roll and in my memories. Views that I’ll relish seeing again come next spring.

Here are some of the other stories I mentioned: