Droplets

Yesterday we experienced a pre-January thaw leaving the porch screens adorned thusly.

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My hogmanay to you is this wish: Happy New Year's Eve!

Snow Sprouts

Look what our tree branches sprouted the other day!

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Thanks for your kind comments concerning my encounter with the stair steps. Fortunately no bones were broken in the fall but I've been tenderly nursing a bruised gluteus maximus and latissimus dorsi. (Old anatomy textbooks are good for something.)

Screen Print

The current view from our back porch.

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A few blogposts back I decided to start using the day's date as the post title but that seems to cause the Link Within gadget to link to only the latest posts and I don't really like that. Evidently Link Within does a word search to choose the links it displays. Of course, I could delete Link Within but pride and vanity will not allow me to do that. "Pride cometh before a fall." Is that from Proverbs? Perhaps someone was trying to teach me that lesson on Christmas day for I took a painful tumble down a flight of stairs in our house and am still feeling the effects.

December 25th

A very Merry Christmas to you!

December 24th

Several years ago I wanted to buy a snowglobe containing the Nativity scene and this was the only one I could find. Its nice, but always gives me a chuckle---one of the Three Wise Men or Kings appears to be about to dump his urn of frankincense or myrrh onto Joseph's head.

Happy Christmas Eve!

December 23rd

We're in the Christmas shopping season so naturally I decided to visit a museum. There was a reason for that decision---an exhibit entitled "Privy to the Past". Privy to what past, you might ask, but you would be asking the wrong question. In this case, "privy" means an outhouse and everyone knows what that is, right? Yes, its a hole in the ground with a little house on top of it. The "Privy to the Past" exhibit contains items which have been discovered inside various privy holes in our area. Not THOSE items, but bottles of the apothecary, soda, and liquor variety. Members of an antique bottle collectors' club study old plat maps to find saloon and hotel sites from the past. Then they get permission to dig there in hopes of uncovering buried treasures in privy holes. The exhibit was enjoyable to view as old fruit jars and bottles are an interest of mine. More fun than Christmas shopping.

December 21st

After I purchased this "Season's Greetings" sign it dawned on me that it could be used year round. Every day of the year is part of a "season".

December 17th

Many years ago I bought this Christmas puzzle at a rummage sale and finally this year I decided to open the box and put it together. It fits in nicely with our other Nativity scenes displayed in the living room.

Oh, I feel beat this evening after spending the whole day in the kitchen making dinner rolls and cinnamon rolls and gumdrops. Yes, it is possible to make homemade gumdrops. Somehow, also, it is possible to get caught up in unplanned cleaning of shelves in the pantry and rearranging of glass bowls and dishes. How on earth does something like that happen?

December 16th

Today I walked through a snowy cemetery to attend a committal service for a neighbor. Committing a person to the ground---sad time to do that right before the Christmas season. We could have stayed inside the church and avoided the trudge to the gravesite on a cold day but we didn't. Commitals are very poignant. No glossing over of facts---a person who was alive a few days ago is now being laid to rest in the ground. And it takes place right before your eyes.

December 14th

Want to see one of my Christmas decorations? Gaze at the above photo. Want to know what I did today? Read on. I left the farm for a few hours and "went to town" as we say out here in the country. "Town" is about 15 miles away. The roads were a bit snow-packed but that's no problem for a seasoned rural girl like me. I shopped at the mall, enjoying the glittery holiday decor there. Then it was on to the grocery store where I stocked up on food and supplies for upcoming Christmas gatherings, not to mention normal, everyday eating. As far as I'm concerned, shopping for groceries is nothing but just plain work. Other types of shopping can be fun, but not grocery shopping. In my opinion, anyway.

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I'm having trouble coming up with titles for my blogposts and have decided to try just using the day's date as a title. It maybe will look strange, but I'm going to try it for awhile. (Hopefully, I can remember what day it is. Sometimes I have trouble with that, too.)

Burning Bush in Winter

Hey, take a gander at what I just posted on Paintbox Pictures blog. Its a doctored photo of how our burning bush looks right now as we shiver in the deep freeze of winter. Red leaves are gone but red berry things remain. All I did was click the watercolor effect button on Photoshop Elements. It looks cool as a computer screen background (as any photo does, of course).

Snow Chart

Wish I could think of something creative to say about this photo taken fresh from the out-of-doors here on our farm. It maybe sort of looks like a chart. That's as creative as I can muster today.

Colored Lights and Cookies

An ordinary string of colored lights can make things appear special. Would the reverse be true?

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Today I frosted cookies of the gingerbread type. Not men, but stars. The recipe included its own version of frosting: 1 package Knox gelatin, 1 cup sugar, 1 cup warm water, 2 cups powdered sugar, and a pinch of salt. Bring the first three ingredients to a rolling boil then turn heat down and simmer for 10 minutes. Pour over powdered sugar in a bowl and beat hard until thick. Then frost the cookies and enjoy.

Today's Cooking Style

While sipping morning coffee today I was pleasantly surprised to see a somewhat familiar face on the morning show I like to watch. She was demonstrating how to make one of my favorite treats---cinnamon rolls. While I may not ever try her recipe (now really, how can anyone possibly remember a recipe that is demonstrated as rapidly as they do on TV), I certainly may visit her blog now and then. Its a good one. Be prepared to laugh if you go there.

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As for the subject of treats, I involved myself in making more holiday cookies today. They turned out deliciously, but I can't imagine demonstrating the recipe on TV. I would have had to make several batches of the dough so it could be shown quickly to a TV audience in the various stages of its formation. It would need to morph hurriedly from an ingredient list in a cookbook to a finished product being pulled proudly from the oven. I am definitely not up to that for I work slowly and methodically when cooking and baking. Not to mention sometimes sloppily and droppily. How about you? What is your cooking style?

Wondering

Wow, what a pleasant surprise to open up MbyF this afternoon and find seven comments to my back-to-blogging blogpost of yesterday. Thank you to all readers and commentors! Now, if only I could think of something to blog about. Hmm.....let's see......maybe a recounting of my exciting activities of today would work. Fed calves, scraped cow manure, drank coffee, took a walk, washed dishes, frosted Christmas cookies. Do you suppose anyone else in the world did exactly those same things in exactly that same order? I wonder. And, I wonder if you wonder and ponder about those types of things. Life is full of things to wonder about and ponder over, isn't it. Did I think of something to blog about?

Still Here Still Life

After an exciting round of mixing up cookie dough and washing dishes, the wild notion came over me to do a blogpost.  Good thing, for after three months of not blogging, I hardly remembered how to do a post.  Yes, I’m still here, in midlife and in the farmlight. 

Bunch of Monarchs

White Gentian

From a wooded area near my home.

Unknown Golden Flower

Currently blooming in a possible prairie remnant on our farm.

Goldenrod

Flowering Spurge

Variegated Fritillary

These also were found at the prairie preserve mentioned yesterday. Vervain is the flower shown above. Below is a prairie grass whose name is unknown to me.

Lady's Tresses

Most of the flowers on this blog were found growing near our farm, but this one is from a prairie preserve several miles away.

Prairie Sunflower

Goldenrod

Indian Grass

Wild Lettuce

Bees on Thistle

Blue Lobelia

Checkered Skipper Butterfly

Whorled Milkweed

Black Swallowtail

Monarch in Full Span

Bachelor Button

Cloud Sulphur Butterfly

Evening Primrose

The blooms of this wildflower are open in the morning and primly closed in the evening.

Butterfly Milkweed

Monarch Duo

Double Coneflower

Grayhead Coneflower

Asiatic Dayflower

A very tiny (hence the blurry photo) and unique blossom.

Cosmo

Queen Anne's Lace

Tick Trefoil

Sulphur Butterfly

Butterflies Continued

American Lady

Black Swallowtail

Two Butterflies

Painted Lady

Monarch