There are buttercups blooming already.

That is so pretty the way you wrote that. It sounded even nicer than the way I put it. I can't imagine not experiencing those things. I live in the south so our winters are pretty mild, altho we had a good 8" snow this year, and everyone enjoyed being out in it and making snowmen. I used to live in Chicago, now we had some serious snow there.

Oh thank you for appreciating my way of writing on my comment to your topic, i' am not really good in english, i actually find it hard to look for the words describe how i feel for the topic you have started.

A buttercup is a pretty yellow mostly flower. There are some white ones but they aren't seen around here as much. It is the first flower we see here before spring. They spring up everywhere. Just gets you in the mood for the nice weather coming soon to stay for a while. They kind of look like a small tulip but with a much softer texture. Just makes you think country living when you see them. At least that's how I feel. Sorry I don't know how to show you a photo.

Forties isn't real bad though, is it. We just have such a mild winter here, and I never dreamed we'd have this much warm weather this fast. Today it was almost too warm. We went down to my brother's cabin by the lake and cooked out and I am telling you, it was almost too warm. It makes me dread the hot humid summer.

Really. I can't imagine what that would be like, except when I was in Germany. We felt like we had four seasons in one day there. And the snow. Whoa. Down that was experiencing snow!

Well, yeah we get that too, but maybe not as bad, because where I live is mostly country, trees, wooded areas and all. It is too bad the air gets bad because of things like that. At least we don't have any industry here that puts pollutants in the air. We're about 2 hours from any place that does that.