We have one more post to go with our Spring theme, and it’s a great one. First, I’d like to thank new poster and Grafton resident MK Stover for playing along this week. Welcome, MK! Now take a minute to head over to her blog, MK Stover, to read her submission, which contains a perfect solution to keep mud from getting on your pink and girlish footwear.

Post by: Susan Chipley
Town: Morgantown
Website: Chez Mama

Spring is a nice thing here in WV … especially after one of our cold grey/brown winters. One of the first signs of spring is the robins you begin to hear chirping as the sun rises. You know spring is here (or at least just around the corner) when you wake to the sound of birds.

Every year, a mama robin seems to find her way to our front-porch light to build her nest and lay her eggs. The kids and I think it’s so cool to keep an eye on the nest for eggs, then babies. The mama usually gets so used to us that she doesn’t even fly off when we go out the door! The babies are looking really cute now, and when we’re on the front porch we hear their soft chirps.

It’s hard to get a good photo. I have to stand on a chair and hold the camera up while pointing it down into the nest. I can’t really see what I’m shooting, and that makes it tricky.

Robin eggs

Baby robins

Post by: Bryan Stealey
Town: Morgantown
Website: Reversing the Numbness

What looks crappier than an old, empty pool on a really crappy day? Not much. Case in point:

The Stealey Pool

That’s the Stealey Pool, which was my summer haunt all the years of my youth. That place was awesome. Pretty much every kid in Stealey (including us Stealey boys) were members, and it was always one of the nicest places to swim in all of Clarksburg. Not only did spring mean the end of school, but it also meant the beginning of swim season and our daily trips up the biggest hill in the neighborhood to our beloved pool.

I was recently in Clarksburg for my Grandmother Stealey’s funeral, unfortunately, and my brothers and I spent a couple of hours driving around our old stomping grounds. It’s getting pretty run down in places, sadly, and I understand Clarksburg in general is going through some pretty tough times right now. Our trip up to good ol’ Stealey pool was an eye-opener. There it was, lonely, tired looking, its age showing in its peeling paint, its cracking concrete deck, it’s rusty fence. Add to that a gloomy day, a shallow pool of dirty grey water at the bottom of the deep end, and not another soul in sight, and the place just looked terrible. It looked dead, almost.

Even though the town is facing tough times right now, and I doubt the pool’s budget has an extreme makeover in the cards, I’m sure that the coming of spring will turn it into a completely different place. The surrounding hills will be lush with vegetation, the pool will be filled with clean, blue water, and the cracks in the deck will be hidden by slowly tanning feet of every shape and size.

I just love how spring makes dead things come back to life.

Post by: Rebecca Burch
Town: Spencer
Website: Carpe You Some Diem!

I know it’s really spring when Charleston’s cherry blossoms start to open up. These fragile flowers bloom only for a week or so before the delicate petals fall from the sky like the snow we were only recently wishing to never see again. It’s easy to get caught up in the hustle and bustle of everyday life and forget to stop and look for these trees to bloom each year.

Cherry Blossoms

There are a few cherry trees in Charleston, including one huge, gorgeous, weeping cherry tree at First Presbyterian Church, next door to the school where I work. As soon as February’s out of the way, I start watching that tree for little buds to start popping up and turning green. Sometimes, I think that watching for those little green signs of hope does so much to get me through the end of winter. Just when it seems like the cold, grey days will never end, the buds appear and my mental focus turns to springtime.

Weeping Cherry

Once the cherry trees bloom, I know that other flowers will follow suit. My apple tree in the back yard isn’t far behind, and then azaleas and rhododendrons, redbud trees and snowball bushes. My dreary commute is rocked by the bright pinks and purples and yellow-green saplings of springtime, and the world seems to come alive again.