January gardening

Today's temperatures were in the mid forties. That's not really unusual for this region. What is odd is that the day was predominately sunny. January sun, especially of late, is rare. So, I planned my day to include some January gardening and sun in my eyes.
Gardening at this time of year is mostly comprised of cleanup. There's such a load of biomass. Spruce and fir cones are everywhere and in profusion. Fir needles, twigs and branches cover the yard as do any number of opportunists: ivy, tiny and not so tiny holly trees, blackberry vines, etc.
Just raking and stashing this collection filled an entire 3 bucket size clean-green pail! After the bulk of the cover was removed, only then could I spy the new crop of weeds and other invasives along with the first Snowdrops and some older but still sweet Primrose plants blooming in the warm sun.
After working for a couple of hours, the yard looked cleaner, and I "saw" better. I swear, I can look at something, my yard and garden say, and think I see it but don't really. The sun was so lovely, higher in the sky now, and warming the grass around me. I wanted to take some photos but found no focal point. The sight seemed too general. So, I began to look more closely, sometimes on my hands and knees but mostly upright but giving time and concentration and energy to the task. In the winter and late fall, there's little color and flash like that provided by flowering plants and shrubs and yet, like I wrote in the Abundant Underworld piece, there's so much activity. One needs to stop and really look to see evidence of the transition which is beginning to happen.
The picture of the hellebore shows the transition. I keep the old stalks and flower heads all winter to make sure that seeds are available both for new plantlets and for the birds to eat. In this photo, you can see the dead head of last years flowers juxtaposed, seemingly on the same stalk, with this years flowers. I find the sights quite beautiful at any time of the year but especially now with similar actions almost invisible. In a week, a month perhaps, I'll clip the deadhead and compost it but today, this sunny January day, it treated my sunfilled eyes to such visions.
My happy Buddha is included as a hello to a dear friend who is travelling in India.

Rime

We've spent the bulk of the past week or so birding in the region. The past 3 days have been remarkably clear and cold with the mountains absolutely crystalline on both sides of the Sound. It is a bit of a rarity around here to encounter several such days in the winter. Normally we'll get one, maybe two days of such beauty around the new year but 3 together is a treasure. Therefore, we decided to take full advantage of such a gift and get out there!
We took a couple of day trips to favored birding areas where we were richly rewarded with ample sightings of Widgeons, Mallards, Scaups, Coots, Turnstones, Harlequins, Cinnamon Teals, Pintails, Dunlins, Sandpipers, Bald Eagles, Marsh Hawks, Red Tails, Roughlegged Hawks, Harriers, assorted Gulls, and even Stellar Sea Lions along Marrowstone Island.
Today's excursion was a relatively quick one to Spencer Island where we saw many of the above birds. Again it was clear and quite cold this morning and what struck me as I tried to forget just how numb my toes felt, was the rime on everything: grasses, leaves, water, trees, shrubs, etc. As we walked and the sun rose in the sky, we heard glass breaking! Actually, the thin sheets of ice, some suspended midway along blades of long grass and cat-o-nine tails, were cracking and melting and falling in the sun's rays. My attention, then, passed from looking at the birds to looking at the icy landscape and seeing just how beautiful it was.