It rained late last night until this morning, and I had such a fantastic time taking pictures of droplet-covered flowers and leaves! It was really hard to force myself to stop because there were amazing sights everywhere I turned! In fact, I MEANT to take a walk down to our gate and take advantage of the cloudy conditions to take pictures of the yellow Oregon Sunshine flowers that are in bloom. However, I only made it about 25 feet from the front door! Rose buds drizzled with droplets, rose leaves covered with water pearls...I was DAZZLED! Just before I forced myself back into the house, I turned around and gasped at the traditional irises that are filling our garden with outrageous color. I couldn't resist taking pictures of these blue-purple flowers with their yellow throats, and when I saw this on my computer, it was an easy choice for my pick of the day!

Vincent Willem van Gogh (30 March 1853 – 29 July 1890) was a Dutch post-Impressionist painter whose work, notable for its rough beauty, emotional honesty and bold color, had a far-reaching influence on 20th-century art. After years of painful anxiety and frequent bouts of mental illness, he died aged 37 from a gunshot wound, generally accepted to be self-inflicted (although no gun was ever found). His work was then known to only a handful of people and appreciated by fewer still. Wikipedia: Vincent Van Gogh