A Cat on A Gate

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Redbud Festival

Good, Random, Fun (Including Barns and Critters)

The Good: A community festival brings people together and provides entertainment and learning opportunities.  Saturday was a beautiful day for the annual festival in Browntown, Virginia.

The Random: Here are some scenes in this charming rural community with views of the Blue Ridge Mountains.

The pink flowering trees are "eastern redbuds." 

The Fun: The festival provides plenty of entertainment including music, face painting, a petting zoo, and an antique car show. 

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Mural in a Restroom

Murals show up in unexpected places. This one is on the wall of the ladies' room in a health food store. I have no idea what's painted on the wall in the men's room.

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Browntown Baptist Church

Browntown is a small town south of Front Royal. You can see it from Skyline Drive.  Here we see the Baptist Church, established in 1844.

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Ben Has CHF

I took our cocker spaniel to the vet on Monday. After a series of tests, Dr. Conner diagnosed Ben with congestive heart failure. She prescribed some medications that are helping him feel better.

He has had a heart murmur for a long time and was diagnosed with heart disease in November. Two months ago he fainted while walking outdoors on a freezing cold day — just fell over in the snow! He's been reluctant to embark on long walks and just stops after a couple hundred feet and looks back the way he came.

After his stay in the kennel while we were in California in March, he seemed to have lost interest in his dog food and had to be coaxed to eat by adding tasty things to his bowl. After we noticed that he looked thinner, I took him to the vet on Monday.

Dr. Conner says he's in the early stages of the disease and the medications can help him stay comfortable for some time. By the next day his appetite was noticeably better and his energy seems improved. The diuretics make him urinate frequently so we have to take him outside even more often than before.

He's not a young dog so we know his lifespan is limited. And my power to help is certainly limited! Meanwhile our other dog seems to be more distressed than usual, and I don't know whether is senses his buddy's illness or is jealous that Ben gets to go outside so often.

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Springtime in Our Yard

It's springtime in Virginia!
I love the cheerful flowers.

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Springtime in Riley Park

In Woodstock, VA

W. O. Riley Park has recreation areas and a small arboretum. The oversized camera is displayed in a sculpture garden.

Woodstock is the county seat of Shenandoah County, Virginia. Many visitors never see this nice park in the western part of town.

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Resident Cat at the Veterinary Office

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Forsythia and Fences

The forsythia is blooming a bit late this year but it is putting on a great show.

On my way home from Woodstock on Monday, I stopped along Sand Ridge Road to call Frank and I was greeted by this cheerful sight. This is west of Toms Brook with Great North Mountain in the distance.

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Smart Dog

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Chickadee

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Maybe I Should Give Up Cooking!

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Themes Near Strasburg, VA

I'm posting for three memes here. All these pictures fit into the Good. Random and Fun theme so I'll start with The Good, and that's spring!

The blossoming trees of spring are putting on a wonderful show. Spring arrived a little late and it seems like everything is blooming at once. It's not great for pollen allergies but it's a real treat for the eyes!

The first image also qualifies for Nature Footstep's newest theme, Trees and Bushes.

The Random: The second image has trees in it too, but I'm using it for The Barn Collective. It also fits nicely into a recurring theme of this blog, Shenandoah Valley scenes. The road shown here runs through Fishers Hill, a charming village near Strasburg.

Fun! Squirrels are fun to watch! They are determined little critters and can be very acrobatic when getting food. This feeder holds suet intended for birds.

A reader commented that I don't post enough squirrel pictures so I hope he sees these! (See all my squirrel posts... or as many as you feel like paging through.)

A Simple Mural

In  Berryville, Virginia

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From Slavery to Freedom

In Loudoun County, Virginia

There were two related events that we attended Saturday, one at Oatlands and the second at a nearby church on Gleedsville Road. Both featured speakers and music, followed by the unveiling of a Civil War Trails Marker.

Oatlands was once part of a plantation owned by Robert Carter III and his descendants. You can find a link to a database of names of enslaved people known to have worked on the plantation on the Oatlands website.

At Saturday's ceremony, descendants of people who once labored there were invited to unveil the marker. It is headlined "The Enslaved at Oatlands" with the subtitle "Passing on Dreams of Freedom to their Descendants."  After the Civil War, some of the newly-free people built a village nearby named  Gleedsville.

Re-enactor, USCT

Robert Wright

During the Civil War, African-Americans serving as Union soldiers were in the USCT, United States Colored Troops. By the end of the war, they made up about 10% of the manpower of the Union Army. 

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Remembering Gleedsville

Yesterday we went to a pair of history-related events near Leesburg. They honored the enslaved people of  the Carter Plantation (Oatlands) and the freed people who settled nearby after the Civil War. Here we see an event at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Loudoun, where a marker was unveiled.

The church was originally the Mt. Olive Methodist Episcopal Church of Gleedsville. It was built in 1890.

The new Civil War Trails Marker tells the story of Martin Buchanan, who in 1863 left his existence as a slave at the plantation and joined the Union Army. It also summarizes the story of the village of Gleedsville, founded by African-Americans after the Civil War.

Unveiling the Marker

Click on the Picture to See a Larger Version

Joining current church members for the event were history buffs and people whose families came from Gleedsville. Some remembered attending church here.

The signs tells us that the village was found by recently freed families — Gleeds. Buchanans, Days, Turners, Allens, Valentines, Johnsons, and Washingtons; and those previously free —Bryants, Thorntons, and Murrays.

My sister attends the church that currently meets here and this is where memorial services were held for my parents.

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