Shy rays of sunshine

In this part of the world, we know that there are still weeks of hard winter ahead of us. Yet (or perhaps exactly because of that!), catching a glimpse of the sun and the blue sky has an intoxicating effect. 

Spring and summer are only a very distant promise, but the sunshine reminds us of "the glad certainty that summer is nearing, and that the good things promised will never fail", as Jekyll so nicely puts it.

It has been snowing much in the last few weeks. Yesterday evening the weather changed again. There was a strong wind and the temperature climbed above zero. Standing in the (not yet complete) darkness, I enjoyed, for quite a while, watching the tall spruces wavering in the wind and listened the heavy lumps of snow thudding down. This morning the trees were all bare:

But more snow is expected, of course.  We will most probably have still several weeks of views like this (the photos below have been taken some days ago):

Even at noon, the sunrays are almost horizontal. As you can see, we have very little sunlight at this time of year. I decided, however, to participate in this week's "Sunlit Sunday", hoping this post can brighten up at least a little bit the beginning of our new week!

Sunlit Sunday: Week 3

hosted by Karen

of My Little Home and Garden!

Going towards the evening...

And, of course,

joining Judith

for Mosaic Monday!