Washington’s 2009 97th Cherry Blossom Festival is winding down this weekend. And it has been celebrated by creatures large and small.

Let’s start with a small picture of Washington D.C.’s cherry blossom experience. National Geographic shares an “early bird gets the opening preview glimpse” of cherry blossom beauty.

Via National Geographic: A prothonotary warbler adds a splash of gold to a tableau of cherry blossoms along the Tidal Basin in Washington, D.C. The famed cherry trees were given to the U.S. capital city by Japan in 1912. More than 3,000 trees—and 12 different varieties—made the oversea journey from Yokohama to the District of Columbia.

I’ve put the Cherry Blossom Festival photos in Dolce Vita, not nature, because I believe that cherry blossoms have a subtle, but deeply sensual connection for women. They are an exquisite gift to our senses, an abundant rebirth of natural beauty.

2009 DC Cherry Blossom photos from raraujo at FlickrMore than a million visitors will enjoy viewing the 3700 cherry trees together, making it a large celebration and ritual of spring in Washington’s Tidal Basin. A visitor to Washington D.C. this past week enjoyed the parade last Saturday, followed by the first-ever Sushi Masters competition on the East Coast.

We embrace the idea of a Horse Whisperer, and a Dog Whisperer. Why not a House Whisperer? Indeed, houses and apartments … places tell us a lot about their souls and those who have lived there before us.

I’ve honestly not thought much about a house having a soul, but I responded viscerally, reading this Architectural Digest article about House Whisperer Marriette Himes Gomez. She speaks Housetalk — “the language a house uses to communicate its most intimate feelings.”

Bracing myself for an “oh Anne”, from my more conservative, rational-minded friends, I acknowledge that a four-year-old house in Southampton, New York probably isn’t telling Gomez that it needs — or wants — a total make over.

The house is a baby.

This photo queues up our imaginations for the rest of the Southampton house, living in relative isolation with the Atlantic on one side and ponds on two others. Let’s pretend!

While this house needed a facelift to suit the taste of the new owner, the original premise of the house was valid: to look rambling and quicky, as if additions came over the years.

Paneling was supposed to show cracks, and the sitting room—the “barn room,” as original architect John Mayfield calls it—was made to look as if it has only thin boards to keep out the wind and the rain, when, in fact, there are boards behind the boards, along with thick layers of insulation.