Beautiful Daffodils

This afternoon I noticed when the sun was setting that it was shining right through the daffodils under our kitchen window. I couldn't help but take some pictures. So beautiful!

Love the ruffle around the sunny yellow corona. All the little details of a daffodil make me smile.

I love the little crinkly brown part of the stem where the flower begins (spathe). It's like a little wrapper was peeled off to let the "candy" inside emerge. After some snow/freezing rain yesterday, they hung their heads a bit low. I hope they perk up soon.

This is a closer shot of the first flower. Notice the little nick out of the petal at "9 o'clock"? This tender little flower is kind of like all of us....we have our flaws, but with a little sunshine in our lives(God) we are still beautiful. (ok, that's sappy...but, that's what observing nature does to me) After all, He did create it all. And, my oh my what a wonderful artist He is!

Love the gradation of that sunny yellow at the center right down to the buttery cream color of the petals.

No, I am no daffodil expert. In fact, I did a Google search to find out the technical names of the parts of the daffodil HERE. Wow, amazing what you can Google.

Ahhhhhhhhh.....beautiful daffodils!

Uh, is the beautiful factor of a daffodil what makes Riley and Jack bite them off their stems and shred them in the grass? Ugh....I found another one today! Bad, bad puppies! :)

I love this poem by William Wordsworth called Daffodils:

I wandered lonely as a Cloud

That floats on high o'er Vales and Hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine

And twinkle on the milky way,

They stretched in never-ending line

Along the margin of a bay:

Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced,

but they Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:-

A poet could not but be gay

In such a jocund company:

I gazed-and gazed-but little thought

What wealth the show to me had brought:
For oft when on my couch I lie

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude,

And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the Daffodils.