This morning since the mountains were out of the picture we decided to go to Seven Islands State Birding Park. This is Tennessee's newest state park in Knox County. It is unusual in that it doesn't have any recreation facilities it is just a place to see birds and wildflowers. I had read about it in the local paper and looked it up. It is not very developed since it is so new. It was made possible by a family's donation of farm land along the French Broad River. We went last Saturday for the first time. It was bright and sunny and hot. I saw my first Passion Flower. It is the most unusual flower I have ever seen. I had hoped to see more today since shooting macro is not affected by a cloudy day. When I got there, all the ones that were there last week had gone to seed. So we decided to walk all the way to the river this time on the road instead of the path through the field. And I was struck by the beauty of such wide open spaces. Even though there were no blue skies, it was just still so beautiful to me. God answered my prayer and showed me this vast, beautiful field. I thought that it is like his love, so vast. Even though the clouds covered the blue sky, they were intricate and beautiful.
And in my reading from Psalms today is this verse, Psalm 36:5 Your steadfast love, O Lord, extends to the heaven, your faithfulness to the clouds.
And since I learned today by talking to a couple that we met on our walk, that the flowers that I took last week that I thought were so unusual were passion flowers, I will put those pictures here. Don't they remind you of something from a Dr. Suess book.