Merry Christmas from Sand Creek

There is plenty of snow on the ground here to guarantee a white Christmas. The creek is very much open, enough to attract waterfowl that have lingered in the area. Yesterday The Hermit saw an unusual, slate-gray duck on the creek. I went out with binoculars and camera but I did not see it. However, I scared up a pair of mallards- the first December mallards I have ever seen here. Later I saw a mammal swimming; from the size and color I'd say it was a beaver. The Hermit, after consulting Sibley's bird guide, said the duck he saw  looked like a black scoter. That would be the most unusual "yard bird" ever! I'll be checking the creek often.

The tree is decorated, the stockings are hung from the stairway with care, but I have yet to bake Christmas cookies and wrap gifts. The Hermit will take the kids to town to go sledding while I do some "setup" on certain gift items...I am just itching to use mine, and it's my gift to myself so I would be allowed to do that, but that would give the whole thing away, you know! Then I'll make a Christmas eve dinner of ricotta stuffed pasta shells, not exactly traditional but it sounds yummy. Tomorrow after the big unwrapping we'll head to my brother's house for the family Christmas. I hope this holiday finds you surrounded by people you love, with many blessings to share!

(for those of you who saw this post BEFORE I edited the egregious spelling error, in the title no less, I apologize! I'm usually so obsessive about spelling!)

my first Christmas bird count

'Tis the season, and while my count isn't until the 27th, I'll give you a little tale of my first attempt at being a serious birder...

I was in my first year of graduate school in South Dakota, and I had dated a guy in my undergraduate ichthyology class a couple times. He was already a passionate ornithologist, while I carried a more casual interest in birds from my childhood. I always wonder why I went into fisheries instead of birds...the tradeoff between more jobs and more fun I guess.

He asked me if I would like to go on the Brookings, SD Christmas bird count, and I agreed. (at this time I did not even own a pair of boots rated for South Dakota winters!) A neighbor in my well-preserved historical Classic house, that was now divided into apartments, was also going. We went to the bar the night before. That's where the fun began...

Let me tell you this: Never go on a Christmas bird count with a hangover! I sat all day in the back seat of a car with a poor heating system, my feet frozen, with my cheap K-mart Focal binoculars, trying not to throw up. I tried to be interested in a flock of horned larks, and I reluctantly got out of the car in a small rare hardwood forest to see a couple of great horned owls. I was mildly amused when the group got together at the end of the day and some of the older birders vehemently disputed our duck sightings. ("They were in OUR territory!")

I did not go on another Christmas bird count for over twenty years. I met The Hermit right around the time this count occurred, so my ornithologist guy got dumped, although I don't think it was serious at that point. I probably went back to my studio apartment in that beautiful old house, got under the covers on my futon, and shivered it off. I had a bird feeder outside my window, and I got an occasional red breasted nuthatch that winter. Life was good.

action: music

Okay, it was a good idea at the time, but I'm having trouble keeping up with Reverb10. It's a time thing, mainly, but I'm also not feeling particularly inspired by the writing prompts. Maybe it's because I tend to be a reflective person, and the prompts are usually for thoughts I've already considered. Like this one:

December 13 – Action When it comes to aspirations, it’s not about ideas. It’s about making ideas happen. What’s your next step? (Author: Scott Belsky)

I took that next step on Saturday (the 11th). My "aspiration" in this case is to DO something with my music- to send it out there for the universe to hear, to write, to perform. I've been dragging my heels with the "doing" part of it; my inner critic can be powerful at times. But on Saturday, for some reason I felt the urge to sit down with my guitar and record some songs. Recording has been intimidating to me, maybe because it makes me more conscious of the act of playing and singing, and as soon as I'm aware of what I'm doing, mistakes happen. The only way around it: get used to recording; I can always hit "erase".

I did manage to get used to it enough to record a few songs. I made myself listen to them, and for once I liked what I heard. I liked it enough, in fact, that I wanted to share it. I have shared music before by making YouTube videos and on MySpace, but both are pretty cumbersome to use for music sharing, and people can't download an mp3 from them. (or maybe you can on YouTube? I don't know) So I did some Googling, and found out there are all kinds of file sharing sites available, most of them offering a couple gigabytes of free storage space. I decided on Dropbox based on a few good reviews. It's pretty easy- just drag files to a special folder on your computer, and they appear online!

I now have the songs I did Saturday, plus an older recording of "Amazing Grace" on flute, on my sidebar. To listen, just click on the title (or right click to open in a new window). Depending on your default media player, you can download the song by right clicking in the player window, or by clicking on a pop up menu.

The songs are old favorites that I have been singing for years, except for "Pancho and Lefty", which I just started doing recently after hearing Emmylou Harris' version. More to come soon!

Catching up on Reverb10

My friend "rayfamily" at Tilting at Windmills has been participating in Reverb10, a daily series of writing prompts designed to help reflect on the year gone by and set goals for the year ahead. I've been following, thinking "Yeah, this might be good for me, BUT...(enter excuse here)". Well, today when I looked back on my blogging efforts for the year and found a measly 65 posts, I decided this might be a good thing to get me back into the habit of writing. So I'm jumping in, but I have nine days' worth of catching up to do. I won't go into each prompt as much as I'd perhaps like to, but they have stimulated some good introspection. And I won't take the time to write out the entire prompts in this catch-up post, so if you're interested in the whole story, please visit the Reverb10 website. And, if I can get into the game this late, you can too if you want.

December 1- (One word that describes 2010): Motion. It seems this year I have constantly been in motion. From the busy-ness of everyday life, job, and kids' activities, to moving forward with some much needed house projects, to the inner sense of motion. Motion = the opposite of standing still. In the past I have had a tendency to stagnate, to avoid action. I think I have been much more in motion this year, always seeking, growing, sometimes spinning in circles, sometimes trying uselessly to swim against the flow, but always in motion.

December 2- (What do you do every day that discourages writing): Basically getting caught up in everyday life, and NOT taking that time for myself that I know I need.

December 3- (Recall a moment in 2010 when you felt the most alive): Okay, this is one that deserved a blog post in itself, and I fully intended to do it, but I got too busy...

The evening of Halloween I took Calvin, Starflower, Mr. Attitude, and a couple of friends trick or treating in the town of Sandstone, about eighteen miles from home. Calvin had no intention of trick or treating, but he had hoped a friend would come along so they could lurk around and scare kids. (Teenagers!) That friend could not make it, so Calvin and I had an hour or so to ourselves. I decided to drive down to the Kettle River, to an old dam site and some cool trails that go through rock crevices and over the sandstone bedrock by the river. It was near sunset when we got there. The river was raging from the torrential rains that had happened earlier in the week. For a few minutes we stood at the water's edge, just listening to the power of the water. Then we walked around, hopping over crevices, noticing rocks carved by years of flowing water, but now well above the river bank. The sky was pink and indigo, the paths were covered with fallen leaves, and the air was crisp. Calvin and I were noticing the same things, and appreciating them in a way we seldom get to do. We lingered there in the twilight, mother and son. I think we even hugged once or twice.

(Then I got the wild idea to drive down this small road that follows the river. I didn't get too far, and almost got our 2007 Suburban stuck in a gigantic puddle. Calvin and I could not stop laughing.) NOW THAT'S LIVING!

December 4- (What have you done to cultivate a sense of wonder this year?) I have tried to catch myself "in the moment", aware of my surroundings, turning off the internal noise. I have tried to see the lesson and gift in every experience and every person I encounter. I have contemplated the Tao te Ching.

December 5- (What did you let go of?) Tough one. Some things are easier to let go than others. I can think of more thoughts/ideas that I should let go of than ones I have. Perhaps the big one was letting go of my disappointment in politics after the election, and turning to working towards what I believe in.

December 6- (What was the last thing you made?) Those of you who follow this blog have probably figured out I'm not a crafty person. The only things I make are food and the occasional home brew, and I don't consider those "made" by me since I am only a facilitator in natural processes. I am a musician, but again I don't "make" music so much as I facilitate it.

December 7- (What have you done this year to connect with community?) That's easy. Surprisingly, Facebook has helped me connect with people, even a couple new local friends. That, and participating in community theater. It's been a good year for community.

December 8- (How are you "beautifully different"?) I'll take a rain check and give this one a think.

December 9- (What was the best party you attended this year?) I'm not a party person. I'd have to say camping out at the bluegrass festival, meeting up with some old friends and picking with Dick and Lloyd was my party event of the year.

Looking forward to tomorrow's prompt, and I will do my best to stick with this.

Bragging about my bird watching son

When I arrived home some time after dark with my older two kids in tow (basketball practice), Mr. Attitude had some news for me. "Mom! I saw a big gray bird!" Cool! I asked him "Was it this big?", while approximating the size of a Gray Jay with my hands. That would have been a rare thing! "No", he said, making a smaller measurement with his hands. "But it was bigger than a chickadee?" "Oh yeah!"

Then he got out the camera. The boy, who just turned 9 on Monday, had taken PICTURES!

Even on the tiny screen of the camera, I recognized this Northern Shrike! I have been keeping an eye out while driving, hoping to see the first Northern Shrike of the winter, and my son sees one right out the window near the bird feeder. A lifer for him, and a proud birding mama moment for me.

Northern Shrikes are a rare, but pretty reliable winter visitor around here. We usually see one on the Christmas Bird Count, but they are solitary and you have to know what to look for. They are predators, and this one was probably scouting the bird feeder. I love their gray color and black mask.

Saturday evening musings

I'm sitting here in the cabin, where the computer is located, watching a Lawrence Welk public TV pledge special. How nerdy is that? Actually, Lawrence Welk brings back warm fuzzy memories of evenings at my grandparents' house. There was an innocence and earnestness about those shows, along with a healthy dose of corniness, that sticks with me.

I've been kind of floundering this week, re-adjusting to having free time in the evenings again. Being in "Hello, Dolly!" with Starflower was a good experience. I'll never forget the energy the cast brought together, and the feeling of performing a quality show for local audiences. That's what I love about community theater- it's one thing to pay exorbitant prices for tickets to a traveling Broadway show, but a totally different, wonderful thing to see people you see regularly show their hidden talents and bring a Lawrence Welk-type earnestness to every show. That said, I don't know if I'll do it again. It's a huge time commitment, I have a few other musical projects I might rather work on, and it would have to be a show I really like. Please, Ms. Director, don't even consider "The Music Man!"

So I'm coming off that, the darkest part of winter is upon us (well, not the darkest yet, but the month leading up to the darkest day is pretty dreary), and for some reason my mind has been cluttered with random thoughts. I've found it hard to focus on anything lately. I've tried to remedy that by starting to do yoga, but so far whenever I get near the yoga mat I have three cats and a dog wanting to get in on the action. That, and I can't figure out how to hook up the Blu Ray player and there are no batteries in the remote so I haven't been able to watch a yoga DVD. So today I did probably a better thing...I went for a walk outdoors. The air was crisp, and a dusting of freshly fallen snow sparkled in the sunlight. I went out to the pond first, which had several inches of ice, enough to walk on. There was some slush above the ice on part of the pond though, so I'm going to wait a week or so and hopefully it will freeze enough to shovel for skating. Then I walked along a ridge which used to be the edge of a gravel pit in the 1930's. I saw lots of deer and rabbit tracks, and even a few snow free spots where the deer had bedded down for the night. I followed the old main railroad grade back to the railroad siding which leads back to the cabin. I noticed a lot of fallen trees since I had last walked that way; our big wind storm in late October may have brought down some dead and/or dying wood.

I came out of the woods with a new sense of clarity. Not completely clear, but it was what I needed to get back into living on this late November day.

winter is here

I spent the morning taking care of unfinished summer business while the snow fell, like bailing water out of a canoe and kayak and turning them over on shore. I guess this is to be expected for this time of year, but last week's 60 degree weather had me thinking there would be more time.

This is going to be a busy week. Dress rehearsal for "Hello Dolly" is tomorrow evening, complete run-through rehearsals on Monday and Tuesday, and a morning performance for the elementary school on Wednesday. Then evening performances Thursday-Saturday, and a matinee on Sunday. So unless I find something really unusual to blog about, see you a week from tomorrow!

under the blue roof

My other blog is back after a long hiatus. Check it out! (the link is on the sidebar)

election reflections

Like many people yesterday, I was in a state of shock, anger, and despair at the election results. Not that I had any particular affinity for the Democrats that were defeated, but that mean-spirited divisiveness had once again prevailed. I think that many people voted with emotion, whipped into a frenzy by rallies and slogans, instead of reason. And I fear that many average people—working class neighbors, churchgoers, men and women who gather in Main Street diners across the nation—were manipulated. The media industry told them they were dissatisfied, and since people have a tendency to want to identify with a group (the tribal mentality), they started feeling more and more dissatisfied. And sincethat media industry has taught us we no longer need to be civil in public discourse, hateful words flew like never before.

I admit to getting caught up in that negative energy at times, letting it consume my thoughts. Last night I vented my despair on Facebook, which is good for purposes like that. What followed were some very thoughtful comments that helped me to put things in perspective. I will repost them here:

John: Actually, no one having a clear majority for a while might be good. I'm hearing some Republicans admitting that they do not have a mandate. Maybe that whole, "listen to the people" thing might happen. Yeah right, beer me.

Robin: It always blows my mind that there are powerful people who think destroying the environment is an acceptable way to make money. Like they don't have to drink clean water or breathe clean air. Short-sighted lunatics.

Will: Note to Deb: the federal govt is a lost cause. Has been for awhile. Not that they wont cause trouble (er.. not be honest about real troubles). Concentrate on local, on social networks. sustainable agriculture & culture. permaculture. Read up on Sharon Astyk, Transition Town, Nicole Foss ("Stoneleigh"), etc & other wise souls. listen to nature, forests, wildlife. work for peace.

Will: (quoting Chunyi Lin)

Hello my friends! Take everything easy. Whatever will be, will be. Don't make your own judgment. As long as you know you are doing good things for people, no matter what other people may think or say about you, just continue with ...what you are doing. Then you will find peace in your mind. Then you will live a happy life.

Laura: Easy there, Deb. I've been really down this week; I know, despair is so tempting, but remember this: we who are tempted to despair, we who notice, we who care: we need each other.

Vicki: Well, I've been blue today, too, finding it hard to believe that arrogance and self-interest continues to rule. Then I remember what my grandmother always said: Pride goes before a fall. I believe it.

Today is a new day. Life is too short to get caught up in despair and helplessness. So I will stop spending my precious energy raging against what I cannot change. I will do what I can to make my small part of the world a better place. I will smile and say hello to strangers. I will attempt to understand and listen to someone I do not like. I will sing and dance. I will play the flute. I will plant a garden. I will do crazy, fun, spontaneous things with my kids. I will teach what I can. I will always be learning. I will practice compassion. And, as Wendell Berry says in Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front: I will laugh. Laughter is immeasurable. I will be joyful, though I have considered all the facts.

Edited to add: There were actually some good things that happened on the local level. Our county elected a new sheriff, who I believe will make much-needed improvements to local law enforcement. My district re-elected two state legislators, both whom I know personally and I think are outstanding people. And they both have family members in "Hello, Dolly!"

"an extratropical cyclone of rare intensity"

We Minnesotans like to talk about the weather. At my workplace there is often an undeclared competition over who had the lowest overnight temperature, or the most rain in the rain gauge. But don’t think for a moment that we would dare call two days of gusty winds, heavy rain, and even snow by a name as exotic as “cyclone”. We get blizzards here, not hurricanes. This enhanced satellite picture, taken at about 4:30 Tuesday afternoon, sure looks like a hurricane, though! And I was just south of the eye.

I had been hearing since Monday that rain and heavy winds were expected starting Tuesday. The Hermit spent the day bringing wood in the house and putting tarps over outdoor wood piles. The rain began Tuesday morning, and all afternoon I had the strange sensation that my sinuses were about to explode. This was due to the record low air pressure that was making its way across northern Minnesota. By afternoon the wind was starting to pick up.

Starflower and I had play practice in the evening, and indoors we could hear the wind blasting the upper level of the auditorium as the rain pounded the roof. Meanwhile, out on the football field, our high school’s team was battling the extreme conditions and came out with a 48-0 victory in their first playoff game. Go Eagles!

Our drive home was interrupted by a large spruce that had fallen and was blocking the road. It had to be a good two feet in diameter at the base. I had to take a three mile detour, all the while thinking about trees, wind, and power lines. I was happy to see the lights still on at my house when I finally pulled into the driveway.

The rain fell late into the night, occasionally driven like nails drumming on the steel roof. I found out the highest wind gusts were over 40 miles per hour here, and may have even hit fifty. However, the strong frame of the house barely shook. Some time over night the rain turned into sleet, then snow, and I woke to an inch or two covering the ground, and still coming down. When I looked out at the rain gauge in the morning I could tell there was already more than two inches of rain.

By the time the rain stopped Wednesday afternoon, there was five inches in the rain gauge. I found out on the National Weather Service Web site that Askov, the town where the spruce fell, had the highest total precipitation for the storm, at 4.94 inches.

The Kettle River and all the local creeks were swollen like I'd never seen them before. Not even in the spring has the water ever been this high on Sand Creek since I've lived here. This photo, a mile upstream from my house was taken yesterday, after the water had gone down a bit.

The water was so high the three 3-foot culverts under the road were completely submerged. The flow created vortexes like this one on the upstream side at each culvert. One dead end road to the east of my house was completely under water.

And I have a new pond, for now! The water had already gone down quite a bit when I took this photo yesterday. Needless to say, Sally's Pond is as full as it gets, but it was already in the shadows and I could not get a good photo of it.

The good news is, we did not lose any of our large white pines in the wind, and the house is still high and dry. A cyclone in Minnesota...What will they think of next?

Well! It's about time for an update!

Has it really been over two weeks since my last post? Life has been THAT busy. Between the normal work busy-ness, Calvin's football games, Starflower's volleyball games, Mr. Attitude's piano lessons, play rehearsals that sometimes last until 10 pm, and a weekend trip to Nebraska, I have hardly had time to breathe. But for me, that's a good thing. Sometimes I have a tendency to get mired in stillness and reflection. In a month, after the final curtain call, I will have more than enough time to sit in front of the wood stove and contemplate life. Hopefully I'll have the energy at night to pick up a musical instrument and do what I love.

We had a wonderful, if all too short, trip to Lincoln, Nebraska for my stepdaughter Sarah's wedding two weeks ago. It was fun to be "on the road again", fun to see my extended family all there, and fun to have a reason to get dressed up and curl my hair! Lincoln seems like a nice city, and I hope to visit there again when I have more time to see the area.

When we returned home all road weary at 9 pm that Sunday, I went out to the well to get a jug of drinking water. When I turned on the faucet, nothing happened. No water, no pump turning on, nothing. The Hermit and I drove that shallow sand point well by ourselves about fifteen years ago when this place was just our weekend getaway. It originally had a hand pump, but when we moved here nearly eight years ago we installed an electric pump and pressure tank, which were run by generator power until we got electricity. The well had given us years of reliable, clear water, but in the last couple of weeks something had changed. The pump would no longer hold its prime, and the water had sediment in it. I don't know exactly what happened, but it was a bit disconcerting, to say the least, to suddenly be without a source of water.

Our plan had always been to drive a new shallow well in the 8 x 8 basement in the house. The Hermit and a neighbor worked on it this summer without success; funny how water can be about 12 feet down by the cabin, but not by the house 200 feet away. But I think The Hermit shares my feelings of having had enough of this do-it-yourself-ness. We wanted water, and we wanted it now. So we borrowed some money from my dad, and had a well professionally drilled. With the economy as it is, the guy was available to come out and drill just two days after we called, on a Friday, and the water line to the house was completed the following Monday. We now have running water in the house, even if it is only a hose with a valve on the end. It makes all the difference!

It turns out we are sitting on a dream of an aquifer. Just 37 feet below the surface, in sandstone bedrock, the water flows at over 40 gallons per minute. If we lived just a mile to the south or east, across the Douglas Fault, the bedrock would be basalt and water would perhaps be much further down. There are no sources of pollution that I know of in our watershed, and the water is crystal clear.

I can't wait to get the plumbing finished, and water heater up and running! No more hillbilly showers! 

When the guy came with the backhoe to dig the water line to the house, he smoothed out a lot of the back yard. Starflower is contemplating a regulation-sized volleyball court there next summer. I'm all for it; from what I saw in her games, she has a lot of potential as a player. Her middle school team consisted of all sixth graders with little or no experience, yet they held their own and even won a few matches.

Here's Calvin, who is now officially as tall as me (5'7). He lives for football and pep band (and X box). He will be traveling to New York City in March for the St. Patrick's Day parade--our small town marching band was selected, the first band from Minnesota in many years! But today he was doing a necessary chore, hauling wood from the big pile out front to the house. We had our first fire in the wood stove a week ago, and while the fall has been mild, I know cold weather will come soon.

I have survived the first month of rehearsals for "Hello, Dolly!" It has been a lot more fun than I expected, mainly because of the people involved. I have made new friends and reconnected with a couple old friends. I have a new appreciation for all of the work that goes into a theatrical production. My favorite part is singing; just the other night I was very tired and not wanting to go to rehearsal, but after a few minutes of singing I found a new energy, and I was hitting all the high notes and getting into the whole stage character thing. But, for the time commitment reason, I won't be sad when it's over.

So there you have it. I didn't get to certain things, like my garden harvest, but I have the next two days free, so...

Real tomato ketchup, Eddie?

I could write about the wonderful fall colors that are quickly disappearing. I could even take some photos. I could write about the beautiful weather we're having, how we've gone nearly two weeks without rain (which, by the way, is a good thing). I could write about the multitude of green tomatoes I harvested nearly two weeks ago before the first big frost hit, which have been sitting on a table top in the entry way and have now suddenly decided to ripen, the day before we leave for Nebraska to attend The Hermit's daughter's wedding. That's right, I'm actually crossing state lines, and not just a quick foray into Wisconsin, which doesn't really count. I don't remember the last time I have been so far from home!

But, speaking of tomatoes, I wanted to share a culinary discovery I made last night. Of course I most likely did not discover it, there are probably a million recipes out there on the Internet, but I thought it was pretty cool. As I was preparing our baseball playoff celebratory meal (Go Twins!) of hot dogs, I suddenly realized we were almost OUT OF KETCHUP! Surrounded by ripe tomatoes, but no ketchup! I can stand a hot dog with mustard only, but when you're watching baseball it just ain't right.

While I was weighing the options, the least appealing of which was driving ten miles to the store, I recalled that I usually keep a small can of tomato paste in the pantry. Hmmm....What is ketchup, but tomato paste plus a few other flavorings? Using the ingredient list from the near-empty bottle of Annie's organic ketchup as my guide, I started mixing. A little vinegar here, a little Worcestershire sauce there, onion powder...Voila! Ketchup! I don't have an exact recipe to share, but those are the essential ingredients. Most commercial ketchups contain a lot more sugar or high fructose corn syrup than they actually need; I added a tiny pinch of sugar but it would have been fine without.

I don't have a laptop so I won't be blogging from the road, but maybe I'll have some time to compose some rough drafts with pen and paper. Have a great weekend!

my newest adventure- musical theater!

I was never a theater person in high school. When you're in a graduating class of 600+, activities like "sports", "band", "drama", and "industrial arts" quickly get allocated to those students who claim them first and make their mark, and there is not the opportunity for everyone like there is in a small, rural school district. Like where I live now.

I was a "band" person, and I was happy with that. I also dabbled in cross country and cross country skiing, but I made my mark in band. Not to brag, but I was voted "Outstanding Senior Band Member" the year I graduated. Okay, so I was bragging a bit there.

Anyway, I never had the desire to get into theatrical productions. Nor did I have the encouragement. I was just a shy teenager, with at least the encouragement that I was good at playing the flute.

Fast forward 25+ years. I know I have an aptitude for music, I have a desire to become more involved in the community, and...Starflower expressed an interest in trying out for our local school/community production of "Hello Dolly" this fall. So what did I do? At first I wanted to be in the orchestra, but I found out they had two flute players last year, and only one of every other instrument, so my services would probably not be needed. But, I thought, if I would be driving Starflower to late night rehearsals, I might as well be involved onstage! So I auditioned, and Starflower and I got parts in the chorus.

The theater bug is getting to me. I am mildly obsessed with the musical parts I am singing, getting the parts embedded in my head, and I actually look forward to learning choreography and everything else that goes with a stage production. So we'll see how it goes, and if nothing else, I'll emerge as a better singer!

here's the problem

I've been trying to fix this header photo thing for a couple days now. Whenever I upload a header photo, no matter what the original size, it is automatically scaled to 300 pixels wide! Anyone have any ideas?

UPDATE: I have found a way around it. I just have to make sure the original photo is 920 pixels wide, no more, no less, and be sure to uncheck the "shrink to fit" box. For some reason "shrink to fit" is shrinking the original photo to 300 pixels, not 920. Ahh, Blogger...But, I get what I pay for. And it's still a bargain!

By the way, the new header photo is actually an old one, taken in September 2007 at one of my favorite places, Banning State Park. Our school is just across the road from the entrance to the park; in fact, the school's land is pretty much surrounded by park land. The cross country team practices on the park trails. I recently purchased a new parking sticker for $25 so I can go to the park while waiting for kids to be done with football AND volleyball practice. That's right. Starflower is now on the junior high volleyball team! She's in sixth grade, and they need all the players they can get so they allow sixth graders to play. They won their first match Thursday afternoon against my mom's alma mater.

Things just keep getting busier and busier...

new look

I finally had some free time this morning to mess with the blog. Unfortunately, Blogger's response time was kind of spotty so it was frustrating getting what I wanted done. Anyway, I like the new design features, and the ability to have pages that are linked right below the header. I mean, that concept is how many years old??? And this afternoon, when I had taken some pictures and wanted to write a post about my never-ripening but oh so abundant tomatoes, my computer would not read the SD card. Sigh.

Leaping into another activity-filled week here. Calvin has football, Starflower is now entering the world of middle school sports in volleyball, and Starflower and I are auditioning for our school/community theater production of "Hello Dolly" tomorrow--wish us luck! I was just going to volunteer for the orchestra, but I found out they had two flutes last year and one each of several other instruments, so my services would probably not be needed. If they need a flute player I would by all means do it, but I'm thinking my first ever onstage role might be kind of fun...

UPDATE 9/15- Suddenly my header photo appears to have been re-sized. WTF??? I will not have a header photo until I can figure this out....

tales from the river

It was an interesting day at work, so interesting I would rather post it here than on Facebook...where I already have an interesting status for the day...let's just say my daughter and I will be testing our wings in local musical theater...

Anyway, rain was predicted, so we headed to the closest electrofishing sampling station, which happened to be full of fifteen pound carp. I absolutely refuse to suffer a work related injury bringing these things into the boat; I'm too old for heroics. So I did more of a graceful dance with them, and somehow it all worked out.

We decided we had enough time to go down river and sample another station. The access for this one was barely a dirt track down to the riverbank, which was not sloped for convenience. We got in okay, and actually saw some amazing fish, including several 18" smallmouth bass, before rain shut us out.

Perhaps we should have exercised some judgment in launching. After all, there had been a half inch of rain in the area the night before, and the ground was kind of soggy. But since this is not really my project, I went along with the decisions of the crew leader. In this case, that led us to backing a heavy boat and trailer down into a place where it was not immediately possible to get the whole rig up over the river bank and out of the water again. Not to mention, there were mosquitoes. Lots of them.

After an hour and a half, and lots of ideas, and lots of mosquitoes, we got the trailer and boat out of the water with minimal damage. We arrived at work about ten minutes after quitting time. I was about seven miles away from home when I got the cell phone call: "Mom, are you going to pick me up at Kenna's house? We have sixth grade orientation tonight!" So I turned around, so close to home but yet so far and still reeking of fish slime, and brought Starflower to her orientation and taught her how to open her locker and all that. We arrived at home, long enough for me to cook a quick spaghetti dinner, before I had to drive back to school to pick up Calvin from his day at the Minnesota State Fair with the marching band. Whew.

Tomorrow is school clothes shopping. The adventure never ends!

About that other trout stream...

If you recall, last week I gave a little teaser about sampling a trout stream along the St. Croix. We made it there on Thursday, and it was NOTHING like that meadow-meandering stream I wrote about last week. This stream was nothing short of mystical.

If you're looking for it from the river, all I can tell you is good luck. We could hardly find the mouth; it was a narrow flowage barely visible in the grass. But once you get out of the river plain and start walking into the woods, this stream takes on a life of its own. It rushes over rocks and sand, twisting and turning through floodplain forest. As soon as we took the first turn into the woods, armed with backpack electrofisher, my coworker and I found our first brook trout.

A bit about electrofishing...it is the accepted way to sample small streams. The fish are stunned by an electrical current, but not enough to kill them. They are netted, usually put into a bucket, and when there are a good number of fish we stop sampling to measure them, take scale samples (to determine ages), and release them. Of course, it is more effective than rod and reel fishing, which is probably why I hardly fish any more. The action is just too slow. :)

Back to this small stream...as it wound its way up the St. Croix bluffs, we shocked up brook trout after brook trout, and hardly anything else. There were hardly any pools more than a foot deep, but still they were there in the cool spring water. Most of them were small, averaging about 4 inches, but we did get a couple 8 inchers. We ended up with over a hundred brook trout, from the mouth of the stream to where the water got too shallow to find any more.

Brook trout amaze me. They survive in the smallest of streams, as long as water temperatures are right. They are beautiful fish.

morning in the garden

I can't decide if this looks like a garden, or like all the other neglected areas of our yard. But believe me, a bountiful harvest lies within. The sun was breaking through the morning mist.

The jeweled orbs of web weavers were everywhere.

My tomato plants have been going absolutely crazy in the combination of abundant rain and high temperatures. I have not had to water the garden since I planted it. And for the first time in years, we have not had frost in June, July, or the first half of August! But still I have been impatient for RIPE tomatoes. Yesterday I found the first blush of red among the Stupice tomatoes. It's the beginning of a wonderful, crazy barrage I hope!

And my winter squash long outgrew the confines of their 4 x 8 bed. Vines are sprawling everywhere, and it appears as though I will have an abundance of several varieties. Including one pumpkin! This beauty is already the size of a basketball. I have never successfully grown a pumpkin before.

I have been picking green beans every few days, canned eight pints of dilly bean pickles, and froze about eight quarts of beans. I picked two more buckets of beans today, but the harvest may be winding down. That, and a deer has been eating the leaves.

I harvested onions this morning, and was kicking myself for buying the cheap onion sets at the grocery store instead of the tried and true starts from Territorial Seeds. The white onions did okay, not spectacular, but I didn't get any red onions bigger than a golf ball. Half of them flowered, and that means the plants put their energy into flowers, not bulbs.

Garlic did as well as ever, although I almost waited too long to harvest it; the bulbs were already starting to separate. I have not spent money on garlic, for eating or planting, in several years now.

Cucumbers and watermelons have had a slow start, but I may be on track for a record watermelon harvest this year. Just one sweet, juicy melon would be worth it!

Today is a cool day, with the high only around 70, and lows in the 40's predicted. It's supposed to be windy, so I don't need to worry about frost yet...I hope.

UPDATE: A second look reveals that I have TWO pumpkins, as well as some Guatemalan Blue squash!

wild cardinal flower

I had another fish-seeking adventure at work today. The destination was a small, unnamed tributary to the St. Croix River that I first blogged about nearly four years ago. I can't believe it's been that long already. If you were following me at that time, you may recall that this stream had been dammed by beavers and was quite difficult to walk. This year it did not appear to have any active beaver dams, although remnant logs were scattered here and there and the stream was still challenging, especially on a humid 85 degree day. We only caught two trout by electrofishing, one of which may have been young-of-year, but several others were missed in the dense overhanging vegetation and swift current of this cold, clear stream.

I was at this stream about a month earlier than the last time, and there were more species of flowers in bloom along the stream and river banks than I remembered. Ironweed, blue gentian, Joe-Pye weed, goldenrod, and cardinal flower, which I have not seen any further north along the St. Croix River than this area. I took this picture on an island where we paused for lunch before walking the stream.

Tomorrow I am headed back to the river to sample another small brook trout stream just north of the Osceola landing. I am told that one is much easier to walk, and much more scenic, than this one was. I'll bring the camera!

No more ugly floor

(the view from Starflower's room; notice one very relaxed kitten in my rocker, and one perplexed looking flame point Siamese checking out the new floor)

Things are really coming together in the house now. I spent the weekend installing a laminate floor in the great room, to cover up the bare weathered plywood we have been living with for so long. I think it sets off the colors in the slate hearth nicely. I will be doing the same slate in the entry way some time soon.

This is the same flooring that I installed in the master bedroom last Sunday. Installation in both rooms went amazingly well. The hardest part was starting out, figuring out how to stagger 51 inch whole boards with cut pieces to span the length of the room. Once I worked out a scheme, The Hermit ran the table saw cutting boards to my specifications. I have found it's always dicey doing home improvement projects with a spouse, but we managed to work together somehow.

In other matters, I picked two ice cream pails full of green beans tonight, and I have three heads of broccoli ready to cut. Garlic is ready to harvest when I have the time, and if all goes well I will be in tomato heaven starting in about three weeks.