Why Blue Belles Like Bluebells...

 This is a story about a girl who missed her family so much that she was very often blue. 

She lived in Colorado Springs, Colorado, where, as a property manager, she took care of about 50 painted ladies, some of which were also blue. 

She often thought of the Victorian, gingerbread-adorned houses lining the streets of Colorado Springs as grand ladies with ruffled skirts and crinoline petticoats.

When she decided to move to St. Ansgar, Iowa, a town of only 1000 people, to be nearer her family, she found many pretty houses, but none dressed in fine gowns or gay colors.

Still, when she saw this house, she knew it was for her.

 What the blue lady saw was another blue lady, who, like her, needed a lot of love, and some tender, loving care.

So the blue lady started to dream...

And soon, the sad, old house became the Blue Belle Inn Bed and Breakfast.

Her great-grandmother had once lived in the little town. 

She remembered driving from Minnesota down to Iowa when she was a little girl -- to see how the corn looked in Iowa, to swim in the Cedar River, to pick bluebells in shady glens along the river banks.

And that is how a blue girl who loved painted ladies and picking bluebells came to have a bed and breakfast called the Blue Belle Inn.

At Gather.com, people know her by a bench made from a iron headboad that sits in front of the blue house.

When the blue lady first came to Gather, she was shy and didn't know what to say.

She was hestitant to reveal too much, so soon... or at all...

So she shared herself little by little...

...in the backgrounds of photos...

...in photo essays about gardens...

Letting people have a glimpse of the blue lady's turrets...  

 ...spindled rails...

...balconies and pillars...

...until at last, her true colors could be seen.

At last, her friends at Gather got to see the real residents of the big blue house...

Her Gather friends were happy for the blue lady.  And the blue lady was happy, too!

That spring, the bluebells bloomed brighter than ever...

Or maybe the bluebells just looked brighter.

Mertensia Virginica... wild flowers that can be tamed, if you try.

All it takes it a little love, and the blue lady has a lot of that.

English bluebells are a different sort, wild hyacinths, really, but stilll lovely.

Morning glories are bell shaped, too.

The purplish blue wildflowers - weeds? - bloom all around the Blue Belle, as if the place was meant to be when the earth was new.

My nieces call these bluebells. And they are in a way, even though we know they're plain old hostas.

Scottish harebells are another blue bell.

As are blue bell flowers.

Silly dillies, or Scilia, look like blue bells when they bloom behind my house in the early spring.

But now that we have a Blue Belle in the neghborhood, we see the color blue no matter what time of year it is.

When the maple trees are blooming...

When the ground is a carpet of red and orange and yellow.

In the winter, when we can only dream of bluebells.

And we do!

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Through every sparking cold, winter night...

We dream of springtime...

 On every frosty winter morn...  

We think of spring...

When the wind turns blustery and howls around every corner...

We dream of bluebells...

And the warmth that springtime promises to bring... 

When the air is so cold it takes your breath away...

It is okay, because we know that the bluebells are safe and sound, under the ground, wearing their winter coats, and that spring will come... eventually...

When everything in the whole wide world seems white...

We know that the earth will be green again... and blue... eventually...

And we dream of bluebells...

Poking their heads up in the spring...

The first to awake after a long, hard winter...

When I was in Scotland, I was totally enchanted by the quaint stone cottages and castles alike.  And I will freely admit, that after 17 years of living inside or next door to the Blue Belle Inn, I take its beauty for granted.

That is why I got such a kick out of comments made by several Scottish B&B innkeepers when they saw photos of my house... 

"Wow! - doesn't your B&B look magic!  If I ever find myself in Iowa I'll be
rushing to stay with you!"   ...and...

"Your place looks amazing, like something we would only see in a film!"

So if you ever find yourself in Iowa (or Southern Minnesota - we're only 9 miles away...) 

Please rush right over...

 Perhaps to share a cup of tea...

Or to spend some quiet times in the bluebell woods.

You're always welcome at the Blue Belle Inn.