You know, there are some things you just have to look at a while to fully appreciate. I really enjoy beautiful things, and as I have gotten older, and hopefully wiser, I’ve learned to find the beauty in new and different things, including things I would not have called pretty at a younger age. Especially now that I take my photography more seriously, I’m seeinig beauty in color and texture that I never noticed before. For instance, yesterday, DH planted some trees here, and it was the potting soil that caught my eye. I kid you not, when the sun hit it, it just looked like black diamonds, and I suddenly realized exactly what they meant in Gone With The Wind. It escapes my mind just who was talking, but they held the dirt and talked about how precious the earth was.

Another such thing is china tea cups. Once you know the care and labor that goes into a fine china cup, you never quite look at them the same again. Recently, I saw something pretty to go into a teacup, and that was interesting enough to go into a blog post.

These tea blooms are made by fullbloomtea.com. When they arrive, they are small hard balls, and look pretty unremarkable. You put them in a glass teapot, or a large glass mug, and pour the hot water over them, and they bloom into what you see above. You can reuse them two or three times. It takes several minutes for them to fully bloom, but I just think they are stunning! I’ll never look at tea in quite the same way again.

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