October Marches On & Gives Me a Beautiful Gift

Hi friends and fellow bloggers,

I hope you are well today.

October gives us a mixed bag of weather. We've had some spectacular, sunny days and clear blue skies and we've also had days where it pours like cats and dogs. The particular day I snapped these sky photos for you, we had a brief spell of pouring rain. 

I had gone to the post office to check mail. Imagine my surprise when I came outside to see the rainbow.  Initially I thought it was just the very faint rainbow I saw near the church steeple but when I turned my head, I was amazed to see a full rainbow arc and it was a beautiful sight.

 

I hope you enjoyed the rainbow as much as I did! 

I'm joining in with Skywatch Friday this week. Thank you for your visit.

A Perfect Gift

 Hi friends and fellow bloggers,

I hope you are all doing well on this last weekend of April. I'm doing well. I'm trying to make the most of the time by doing small task around the house to tidy, organize and declutter. I'm also aware that the last day of the month is fast approaching and I haven't completed the tax returns yet. 

I actually started way back in January but we were waiting for 2 T4 slips (they didn't appear on line in the CRA account) so they eventually arrived but I got busy with other things. Now I think I will simply start all over again and use different software.  The one I like is Ufile but for a few years I used a few others like Turbo Tax and Simple. I can't remember why I did that.

I was watching a YouTube of a young friend of mine in Botswana on Thursday. It was storming and raining heavily in her town and after the rain a beautiful rainbow appeared and beautiful blue skies. I said to myself that I wished I could see a beautiful rainbow too and that I hadn't seen one in quite some time. Lo and behold I was out for a walk on Friday and I was gifted with a rainbow. 

November Ended on a Bright Note

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Where I live I seldom see a rainbow even though it rains a lot.

I'm not sure why that is.

So when I do see a rainbow it is an exciting event.

~~~~~

Rainbow (source Wikipedia)

A rainbow is a meteorological phenomenon that is caused by reflection, refraction and dispersion of light in water droplets resulting in a spectrum of light appearing in the sky. It takes the form of a multicoloured circular arc. Rainbows caused by sunlight always appear in the section of sky directly opposite the sun.
Rainbows can be full circles. However, the observer normally sees only an arc formed by illuminated droplets above the ground, and centered on a line from the sun to the observer's eye.
In a primary rainbow, the arc shows red on the outer part and violet on the inner side. This rainbow is caused by light being refracted when entering a droplet of water, then reflected inside on the back of the droplet and refracted again when leaving it.
In a double rainbow, a second arc is seen outside the primary arc, and has the order of its colours reversed, with red on the inner side of the arc. This is caused by the light being reflected twice on the inside of the droplet before leaving it.

and

It is difficult to photograph the complete semicircle of a rainbow in one frame, as this would require an angle of view of 84°. For a 35 mm camera, a wide-angle lens with a focal length of 19 mm or less would be required. Now that software for stitching several images into a panorama is available, images of the entire arc and even secondary arcs can be created fairly easily from a series of overlapping frames.

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As I sat at my computer desk and was looking out toward the mountains I spotted some colour just beyond the leaves of my bush.  I went out to the balcony to take a closer look and discovered a rainbow.

I went out 3 different times to capture photos.
Though it started to pour rain I wanted

to be sure and get at least one or two decent ones.
I didn't take the photo as instructed by Wikipedia notes above. I just went out and did my best to capture the rainbow while it lasted.

On my 3rd attempt I was blessed to see two rainbows!
As it states in Wikipedia, the 2nd arc does have the colour red on the inside of the arc.

I felt very blessed and extremely excited to see one rainbow but even more excited to see two of them!

In the Bible there is a scripture
 where God promises Noah he will never again wipe out the population of the earth by flooding. He says the rainbow will signify his promise.


There are a few other verses that deal with the rainbow.
One of them is Revelation 4:1,3

"After these things I looked, and behold, a door opened in heaven . . . 3. And He Who was sitting was in appearance like a jasper stone and a sardius stone; and a rainbow was around the throne . . ."

This is a beautiful and happy image.

I feel expectant after seeing the rainbows and am looking forward to a wonderful month in December.

~~~~~


I know the Christmas season can be a difficult time for many who are hurting and lonely.
If that's you and you are reading this I share this thought with you.

Linking up with

Skywatch Friday

and

Friday Foto Friends

I Meant To Do My Work Today

by Richard Le Gallienne

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I meant to do my work today,

But a brown bird sang in the apple tree

And a butterfly flitted across the field,

And all the leaves were calling me.

And the wind went sighing over the land,

Tossing the grasses to and fro,

And a rainbow held out its shining hand--
So what could I do but laugh and go?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I found a similar poem recited by Elton John

Listen here http://www.amazon.com/Meant-Work-Today-Day-Country/dp/B000WU0TLI

To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.

Ecclesiastes 3:1

Rain Falls, a Promise is Made

Photo Credit: http://community.webshots.com/user/anttisarki/profile

After a week or more of blessed sunshine, it was pouring rain overnight and into the morning. Rain brings a freshening of the earth, in addition to a cleaning for our enjoyment on another sunny day. It just so happened that my reading for the day was also about rain.

In Genesis, chapters 6-9, I read again about the flood that God sent upon the earth due to the evil and violence in the world.

¹¹The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.

¹²And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.

¹³And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.

Genesis 6:11-13

But God found in Noah, a perfect man for his generation.

Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God.

Genesis 6:9

So he made a way of escape for Noah, his family and all the animals, both clean and unclean by getting him to build and Ark and enter into it for the duration of the 150 day period (Genesis 7: 24) over which the water prevailed on the earth.

I've loved this story about Noah and the Great Flood since childhood. It is because it is so incomprehensible to my human mind that man could be so wicked and violent so as to provoke God to flood and encompass the entire earth. Yet, God in his awesome love and mercy would save the world and even the animals so that the world could be inhabited once again. This speaks to me of how awesome God's love and mercy really is. He didn't have to save us but for one Godly man, He did! Praise His Name!

This wonderful story concludes with God's promise to us to never again send a flood to encompass the entire earth; the mark of which is His beautiful rainbow.

¹¹And I will establish my covenant with you, neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.

¹²And God said, This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations:

¹³I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth.

Genesis 9:11-13

Whenever I see a rainbow, I am reminded of this wonderful story and God's promise to us, His children. I am grateful that God keeps His promises.