Chalkboard Art

Cribbage scoreboard on our garage wall

Snow Art

Over-hanging snow sculpture

While doing some Sunday shovelling, I noticed this snow blanket hanging down just above our front door area. It was created during a minor winter storm. We'll have to see what happens after we get our first full-fledged blizzard of the winter, which is predicted for Tuesday night into Wednesday (Leap Day).

Chief Hawk Tail

Hawk sitting on top of our deck

Kit snuck a picture of this guy sitting on the roof of our deck. At this typing, I'm not sure what kind he is (any help would be appreciated - click on picture to zoom in). Now we know what's been happening to our dwindling sparrow population. As we've been feeding our small birds during the winter, Mr. Hawk's probably been eating them like popcorn.

Cribbage Cave

Playing cribbage in the cave

"Capture as many happy moments as you can." was a saying of Dr. James Miles. Dad pretty much lived his life according to this philosophy. Here is one happy moment that I captured: Kit and I playing cribbage in our cave (our living room in the garage). Note the acorns, which are used to remember what street we're on, in the game. Even during winter months, a few small heaters make our insulated garage a comfortable place (especially since we have real furniture out there).

Leave Up Or Take Down

Neighborhood Christmas lights

I saw some of our neighbors across the street yesterday taking down their Christmas lights already. That seems a bit early to me. We leave ours up yearound. We have a string of C-7s going around our garage door. By changing the colors of lights, you can look appropriate for any holiday or time of year. Leave them up this year!

Getting Organized

It must be that time of year (and our lives) to go through everything in preparation for a garage sale to be held sometime in May. No nook or cranny is immune to a review of questions such as: Do we want it? Do we need it? Do we use it? Does it fit? Instead of thinking of it as getting rid of things, we are viewing this project as freeing up space, in our home, in our minds, and in our lives. Having a garage sale on the horizon really works well for wanting to continue the purging process. As a reward for going through another pile of stuff, I get to do an occasional blog post.

Cats and Dogs

About ten days ago, just a small localized area where we live got four inches of rain in a very short period of time. Our avenue temporarily turned into a river.

In the wake of this early summer storm, we also ended up with a temporary lake in our back yard. Four quick inches of rain is all it took to give us some prime lake-front property.

We never knew that when we were putting in our rock gardens, the rocks would someday be a rampart between land and water.

Needless to say, after it rained Cat & Dogs, we didn't have to do much watering any time soon.

Frostily Foggy

Kit took a picture of our front Maple Tree today. Dense fog made for some beautiful branches. It was frostily foggy. This is how our tree looks in the Winter.

This is how the same tree looked last summer.

Sun Spots

At different times of the day and year, the sun hits our space differently. One lazy afternoon, I noticed this sun spot on our living room wall.

It looked like a Zen painting or some sort of Oriental lettering. This would fall into the category of Temporary Art. Other items found in this category might be Sand Alligators, Snow Forts or Hose Art.

Partridge Family

We don't officially have any pets in our home (except for one Zhu Zhu pet named Pipsqueak). However, if someone asked us if we have any wildlife, I'd have to say that we don't throw any big parties, but we do have wild partridge.

This family of partridge has been with us (usually just during the winter) ever since we moved into Twin Peaks (2003). The fact that we always have food out probably has something to do with it. One lady across the way calls them "her chickens". Actually, they are our partridge. In my previous life, I used to go out hunting birds like this with Dad, but now they come to me, and I shoot them with my camera.

On Deck

In the aftermath of the 2009 Christmas Blizzard, our deck needed some serious attention. With part of it done, Kit snapped this photo to celebrate that we could once again open our sliding glass door.

It's amazing how much snow can accumulate one flake at a time. Let's not even talk about how heavy it is.

Blizzard Warning

Today is Christmas Day! Up in the North Country, we are now experiencing a full-fledged blizzard. The official forecast is for a Blizzard Warning from this morning until tomorrow around noon. If you want to see what it looks like outside here right now (in the Fargo area), just look at a blank sheet of white paper. I decided to look back at photos from exactly four month ago to see some non-winter pictures of our back yard.

Under our deck, instead of snow, we had some pots that were hanging down and morning glories that were climbing up. We had zinnias surrounding our vegarden. Beyond that, a rock and flower garden with verbena & friends.

Here, instead of snow, we see some Sweet Peas in the foreground, with butterflied zinnias in the middle ground, and the verbena bed bringing up the rear.

Maybe the reason I'm reminiscing about August is because now it seems it was much easier to sprinkle & mow than it's going to be to shovel out after this Blizzard Warning storms itself out. Maybe we should start naming blizzards. Let's call this first one: Al Gore 1.

Showcase

This area off our upstairs kitchen and living room is what we call The Showcase.During morning hours, it starts out Red, and gradually changes to Gold by midday.As the day progresses and the sun gets ready for bed, The Showcase starts to show its Violet side.We love the colors of our home, which we call: Twin Peaks.

Dining Room

Last night, Kit wanted to start getting the table ready for Thanksgiving Day.

If you're having folks over for Thanksgiving dinner, it's nice to have a Dining Room. Not until recently, did we add a dining room table and chairs to this space. For quite some time, this was merely a walk-through area between our foyer and our main upper level. You had to watch your head as you passed under the hanging fixture.

I would like to give thanks for owning a home, that has a Dining Room, which now also has a dinner table. Now, I just have to wait until 4 o'clock to make use of it. :o)
Happy Thanksgiving everybody.