Wanda Roberts Baxter 1918 - 2014

Wanda was my older sister. She died on March 28, 2014, of congestive heart failure, which was brought on by a leaky mitral valve. She was very dear to me -- the oldest of six sisters and one brother, and five of us survive her, as do her three sons, five grandchildren, and five great-grandchildren.

The dogwood tree in front of her house, next-door to mine, has come into full bloom this April. It was planted in honor of her husband, after his death on March 31, 1982.

I made these photos of it yesterday, looking south towards my house.    A closeup:

And the tree itself:

Taft, Texas, 1932

In the photo above, Wanda is holding her youngest sister in her lap, with her other three sisters standing in a semi-circle behind her. Our mother took this photo with her little red Kodak camera, two years before our brother arrived in January, 1934. Wanda, beginning in 1931,  taught all of us four little sisters to play the piano, and she grew up to be an accomplished pianist herself.  She had trained in college. looking towards a career as a concert pianist, but then she fell in love, became engaged, and got married, thus beginning a long, happy married life as a minister's wife. A number of years after her marriage, she received her B.S. in home economics from Lipscomb University.

Dierk Haasis's February Slide Show

Only 5 more days left in February -- but there's still time to watch Dierk Haasis's gallery for this month, before he takes it down and puts up a different collection of his images for March. Don't miss it -- there are so many lovely and satisfying pictures in the February collection.

For January, 2014, by Dierk Haasis

A series of beautiful monthly galleries will again be ours to enjoy this year, as in the past, chosen for us by Dierk Haasis from his extensive body of work. He has a great many outstandingly beautiful images from which to pick the ones he'll share with us.

This January it's a varied selection of his landscapes.  I love the word play with which he's titled this latest gallery: 'scaping.  Its double allusion to "landscapes" and "escapes" highlights how viewing these pictures can take us out of ourselves and away from our present bitterly cold winter weather.