4 Red Leaves!

This totally goes on the "What In The World" shelf. The other day (date is important here), I found, under my maple tree, are you ready for this? 4 RED LEAVES!

"So what?" you might say!

"???" I say! (complete with silent waving of arms and expression of disbelief on my face)

"What does finding a few red leaves on the ground have to do with anything?" you might say.

Well, for one, it means that fall is coming. You know. Fall. Autumn. The season before all of the white stuff falls from the sky and covers everything for months and months and months. And it gets really cold. Yeah, Fall, you got it now. It's coming. Soon. The Maple Tree says so.

"But it's only August", you might say.

"I know, right?" I say. (I love that new "saying"), it fits so well. Kind of like when my teenagers started the "whatever". "As if". thing.

But back to reality.....Yeah. Red leaves in August.

Everyone I've told this too just about shrinks in horror. With all of the dire warnings no doubt contrived from NASA, NOAA, the Farmer's Almanac and Uncle Joe. But to tell the truth. It happens every August. Right after the blackberry season. This is the first tree in all of Michigan to start the color show.

Before long, the whole landscape will look like this:

Yeah, I get it, it's gorgeous, and Michigan rakes in big bucks from tourists looking for color tours in mid October, but it's a harbinger of whiter, colder times. When all of the reds, yellows, golds and half of the greens turn into varying shades of grays, browns and whites.

When the whole world is covered in white. When Jeff Foxworthy, the famous comedian states, "You might be from Michigan if you sit on a frozen lake and wait for your dinner to swim by". Yeah, good times!

But before you get all "awwwwww, these pictures are gorgeous, I wish I lived there....", note that the REAL result of these red leaves falling and the soon to be white stuff on the ground is the end of motorcycle season. Go ahead and say it now..... "awwwwww......"

Snow. Again.

This time of year, snow is a moot point up here. There's gonna be snow. There's gonna be lots of it, and then there's gonna be more snow. It happens. Every year, you can almost set your calendar by it.

End of year, get lots of snow.
Beginning of year, snow starts to not fall quite as hard, quite as often, this is a sign that the big lakes are frozen over (or mostly frozen over).
Middle of January, the sun (remember mr. sun?) makes his appearance again, once in awhile, you know, just for a teaser. There's no heat in this sun, it's just pretty and yellow and mostly deceiving, because it makes you think thoughts of going outside to do stuff like plant the garden (which is under 3-4 foot of snow). Deceiving.
End of January, the January Thaw! where traditionally temps rise above the average for a week or so, again, deceiving us into believing that the winter gods are done with us for yet another year.
But it's not so. Phil lets us know every Feb 2 that we are not to be deceived. If you don't believe him, ask the natives. They get deceived also, but know better. They'll tell you that the snow won't go away until August (they're mostly tired of it by now and view it as a never ending curse).

Me? bring it on. I love it. I love staying inside and looking out at it. I love being outside in it. I just love it, yup, a northern girl at heart. What can I say?

But, even though I profess my never ending love of winter every chance I get, does not mean that I invite head shots with snow shovels, ice picks or skiis. I didn't do it. I didn't make it snow, I just like that it does.
And, I look forward to the thawing of the lakes, so the great Lake Effect Snows can once again dump enough of the white stuff in 20 mins to cover a house.

So what do we do until it starts snowing again, but it's too cold? (cause snow and cold, while seemingly compatible, are not! It can comfortably be 30 degrees and still snowy, what I object to is 75 below zero with a wind chill just short of Mars).
We do as Jeff Foxworthy suggests and go sit on 18+ inches of ice, drill a hole and wait for our dinner to swim by!

Gotta Love Michigan!

If It's February, It Must Be 2009!

Yesterday was a beautiful day. About 35 deg. bright sun, and down in our little hole, almost no wind. So Bu-Dawgh got the bright idea to go for a walk. In the woods. Where's there's about 3 foot of snow. (I may be short, but mid thigh, is mid thigh, and that's right around 3 foot). So I made him lead the way, figured we'd get a head start on making our path for walking to work.
This was fun, he's not tall either, there was kind of a gazelle effect as periodically he would jump up into the air (with me attached to the other end of the leash) to get a look around.
Kind of made the whole path thing hard to follow, but at least he kind of blazed the trail. Kind of. We still slogged through the snow, but it was a nice, if not invigorating, walk.

Would have been really interesting if I'd have gone with my first thought and strapped on the cross country skiis. We'd probably still be out there.

So, lately I've discovered Facebook. This is pretty cool, and I've already connected with a cousin who (whom?) I haven't seen in a coon's age. Most of my brothers are on Facebook too. And my parents. Seriously, don't you people have better things to do?

Apparantly I don't!

When it Snows, It Rains...

I love snow, and again, the standard disclaimer applies. I have no control over whether it snows or not so don't hate me for saying that I like it. The only amount of control I may, or may not have is this; there seems to be a correlation between whether we get precipitation or not, based on whether I hang out my laundry or not.

But then again, I didn't hang out my laundry and we're getting more snow. So, see? No control.

The fact that I love snow, more snow, and even more snow is not lost on hubby. He's the one who has to make sure that we can get out and go, no matter how much snow. And he doesn't like it. At all. None of it. He'll take the cold without snow, and I'll take the snow, but you can keep the cold. It's a match made in heaven, I tell ya!

But snow isn't the only precipitation on tap currently at chez C-A-T. We have rain in the cabin. Yes, we have rain IN the cabin. Snow outside, rain inside. See it all happened this way....
Once upon a time CAT went to turn on the faucet to wash dishes. All was good. We had hot water, we had cold water, we had it all, and all was good. Until..... CAT noticed that she was wet. As was the counter, wall and floor. Seems the faucet sprung another leak. Again. Enough! It's not a fix something on the inside of the faucet to get it through kind of spray either. It's an either it's gonna spray or you can tie a rag around it to contain the spray, but either way, there's water coming out!


So, as I pen this prose, I'm also searching on ebay for a new kitchen faucet. The current faucet has no sprayer (it sprays a lot, but it's not supposed to. I told that to a customer service rep once when I called to get another thingy for the inside to keep it from spraying, and she didn't get it). It also has no lever (just a nub where the lever used to be, kind of hard to grip and get an accurate temperature, and which, with the additon of the new dishwasher and the subsequent turning up of the hot water heater, gets rather hot).

The new one will be a country styled arc faucet, with pull out sprayer, and anything but a stainless steel finish. It will also be NEW. And it will be under 100.00 with shipping, thank you very much.

I've found two that I like and another I could live with, all meeting all of the criteria (single lever, sprayer, arc, not stainless and under 100 bucks) and I set them to send alerts to my cell phone as the time to auction end got nearer. There's one I like better than the others, we'll see how this all plays out. It's almost as exciting as an episode of Survivor.

Technology! Gotta love it. Except for the VHS and DVD player, don't go there.


Man, these 3 day work weeks are tough! And next week, another 3 day work week. Not sure I'll make it. And after that, I am back up to 5 days! 5 days a week at work, until, oh, wait, until middle of January when I have a short vacation. But after that it's back to normal.

Road Trip!

So, did you enjoy all of the snow pictures yesterday? I can't help it, I love snow.

And I love snow storms!

But that's not the best part! Unless we get slammed with another storm (yesterday's "storm" totals were just over .5 inch. Come on! That's not a storm, that's a dusting!), tomorrow smells like a road trip!

And just what does a knitter do on a road trip? Finish stuff!

Our current resident (friend of one of the girls, heck she is one of the girls) is undergoing quite the custody battle, and since tomorrow is another one of those "in court all day" days, and since she doesn't have anyone to go with her, I volunteered.

This will be quite ok. I won't spend 8 hours in the courtroom yawning, I'll spend 8 hours knitting! And I won't spend 6 hours on the road wishing to get where I'm going and then home again, I'll spend another 6 hours knitting!

And, I'm taking every knitting project I own that is not finished. And, I'm taking some yarn that doesn't have a project assigned to it to practice a new technique just learned.

And knowing my luck, the snow will come down hard and fast in one of those storms that is really relaxing to me, and I'll end up driving. Ugh.

Tomorrow night one of the churches in town is having a Christmas Tea. This is the church that my cousin's husband is the preacher for (I'm sure there's a better way to say that), and they've invited me. Depends on when I get home, last time we did the all day in court thing it was 8:30 when we got home. Long day!

But it's all good! I'll have my knitting!

Yarn tree picture courtesy of Knit And Purl Mama's Blog

In Which The Mouth Swipes My Pie!

So, today finds me over at my cousin's house armed with pumpkin pie, cranberry sauce and rolls.
Since I'm totally a homemade gal, I did almost all of it. The pumpkin pie came from pumpkins, that no, I didn't grow, but I did can. Those are the best. Don't even have to have pie pumpkins, any that I've tried will do, they just taste way better, fresher than the canned pumpkin mix I've "bought" in the past. Takes 3 qts of home canned pumpkin for 2 pies. The pie shells are made from a centuries old recipe I've had for, well, half a century anyway.
I bought the cranberries and the oranges, but will mix them together with a bit of sugar and cinnamon, add some heat and water and produce cranberry sauce.
As for the rolls, yeah, they're just plain white rolls, but I'll throw in a bit of whole wheat flour just for kicks.
I didn't whip up the cream myself, I don't have access anymore to fresh milk and cream so I bought the old standby, CoolWhip. Hey, that stuff's not bad!

I will take my pie (made 2 of them, The Mouth swiped one), Cool Whip, cranberry sauce and rolls and head over to my cousin's house as soon as the rolls are out of the oven (and I haven't started them yet, but it's still really early, she'd shoot me if I showed up really early).

And in return for all of this early showing up and all, she will reward me with wine! Lots and lots of wine. Knowing her, it will be an all I can drink kind of thing, bottomless, and not even in good wine glasses, but in tankards. Yeah! That's what you should drink wine out of, saves the need to keep going back for a refill.

I did not finish my mossi cardi, grrrr, but I will take it over to work on, when I'm not swilling wine or on the floor playing with the kids.

So, two things happened yesterday that merited remembering. When The Mouth dropped off my groceries (my vehicles are in various states of protest, and the one that runs currently does not have plates or registration on it so I can't go too far), she spotted the pies. Pumpkin pie is her favorite, and as it was, the 2 pies happened to be cozily nestled into my 2 remaining pie pans, my favorites, as it were, mostly because they're the only 2 I have left.
The minute her eye went for the pie, I knew I was in trouble. So, I did the only thing a loving mother would do. Grabbed a piece of paper and a pencil and hastily scrawled out a contract regarding loss of life and limb if the pie pan was not returned. Laughing at me, she signed it, making such comments as "you know I'll bring this back". Yeah right, if I knew that, I'd still have 8 pie pans instead of my current favorite 2!

The second thing that had me rolling on the floor relates directly to the new tin roof we put on the cabin this summer. And Bu-Dawgh. And the current location of his leash, which is outside the front door. I knew the snow was going to come down, the temps had warmed up and you could almost see the snow inching it's way down off the roof. And Bu-Dawgh loves to play in the snow, next thing I heard was the goosh-plop of the snow off the roof hitting the ground. Thinking this would be an awesome thing for an oversized puppy I went out fully prepared to see him happily bounding around in the new fallen avalanche. He was not. He was up on the deck, hiding underneath the summer aquarium, shaking. Not shaking as if to shake off the snow, but shaking as if he was scared to death. Trembling. And very much willing to leave his snow outside. He's such a baby. He's recovered though, already been out playing in it. I suspect before long, he'll be looking forward to the goosh-plop so he has some new snow to play in!

Off to start the rolls now. Have a great turkey day!

Schmucked By A Snowflake And Other Ridiculousness

Let me set the scene. Happily, if not merrily, working away at my real job yesterday and oops. Left something in my car. Better go get it.

Happily, if not merrily I wander out to where I park my vehicle to retrieve said item. While there I discover a bunch of things that need to be transferred, not just one, so more than one trip needs to be made.

Happily, if not merrily, I meander back and forth between vehicle and work space relishing this little break, and loving the fact that it's snowing. Even if it is just a little.

The skies are cloudy and dark (it might snow), the air is brisk and cold (definitely gonna snow), and I'm lovin' it (with apologies to McDonalds).

When all of a sudden.... a kamikaze snowflake ATTACKS me where I stand. I've never seen such a thing, usually snowflakes are such docile little objects, but not this one. Noooooooo, this one has a death wish. I didn't mind when it flurried around my head, snowflakes are kind of known for their ability to flurry, and I didn't mind that it actually seemed to rush me a time or two. Silly little snowflake. But then, it schmucked me! Right in the eye! Hard! It probably weighed a pound at least, and I really have no idea how it managed to flurry for so long, being that big and dangerous. This seriously cuts into my happily and merrily meandering as now I'm jumping up and down, holding my eye, waiting for this huge ice chunk to melt. There had to be blood. I'm sure there will be a bruise.

But Bu-Dawgh protected me, he did. While I thought I saw him laughing, probably not, I was only able to see out of one eye, he did chase down a few of my co-conspirators though.

And, that's how my day ended yesterday! Today looks to be much better!

Last Ride Revisited!

Ok, so yesterday wasn't the last ride, but this afternoon very well may be. It was a gorgeous ride to work, I took a detour. Just cause I could!

Tomorrow is bringing rain, Saturday is bringing more rain and Sunday is bringing the "S" word and freezing temps. I know not to ride when it's snowing. Don't ask me how I know, just know that I know.
Just like I know that Indian Summer is probably officially over and the next thing we look forward to is months and months of dreary gray skies.

NOT!!

I love winter, I really do. Here in N. Mich it virtually snows every day. OK, these days that means something else to most people other than what it means to me, or something like that.
It snows every day. It is humid here. When there is humid-ness in the air and the air is freezing, well, you do the math, or meteorology, or whatever. It snows all the time. Which is cool, cause some of my favorite activities require the presence of snow and ice. Skating is fun, after the initial workout of shoveling feet and feet of snow off the ice. (do not suggest that I shovel snow off the ice as it falls, it does take awhile to freeze enough to support said snow, plus my weight, usually by that time, there is quite an accumulation). Skiing is WAY fun, the problem there being that I have been skiing my whole life so I'm not afraid of going break neck speed down a steep long hill with boards strapped to my feet. Eventually my age is gonna catch up with this. Hopefully this won't be the year that happens. And there's snow mobiling, which is awesome and how I intend to get to work some this winter, now that I have a sled that doesn't require my neice to help me start! And, the dreary gray skies usually only last until the big lakes freeze over, then the sun makes it's presence.

Logging (a really cool term cause it makes people think you're big and bad) is fun too even if it is only cutting firewood on a smaller basis than what you'd normally think of as logging.
Snowshoeing is really fun (when you don't fall off of them... just sayin'....) and cross country skiing is fun too, especially when you go backwards on the trails, at that point all bets are off.

So, Mother Nature, bring it on, I know just what to do with all of your snow, ice and freezing-ness, lake effect or otherwise. I grew up here, I've lived here pretty much my whole life, I can handle you, BRING IT!!

Let me set the every morning scene..... get up early, cause that's how I'm wired for whatever reason, have a cup of coffee while looking at the night sky, which includes a really cool pale yellow moon, watching the frost settle over everything turning the landscape into fields of diamonds glittering in the early morning darkness. The wind is usually nil and I'll go out to start my chores.
I get to make my paths out to the barn and critter houses, I like making paths. I get to have my breath taken away by the cold fresh air, I get my usual cuddles, kisses and snuggles with all of my critters and then I go inside where the dry wood heat goes right through me, wake up hubby, have another cup of coffee and then venture back outside to go to work.

Life is good!
(plus, my electric bill went down, so now I'm all happy all over again!)

The Tree Out Front

My neighbor has this beautiful Sugar Maple Tree. Huge. Gorgeous. Beautiful Tree. Really pretty. And I'm going to cut it down. Once again it has betrayed me.

This really really pretty gorgeous huge tree, every year, this time of year shows it's betrayal by *gasp* turning red. It's really pretty when it turns red, it seems to go branch by branch, from the outside in. But my own personal belief, at least this year, is that it doesn't really need to advertise the fact that summer is in fact, *whisper* "over" *end of whisper*.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Blah, blah, yadda, yadda, yadda, I get it. I know. Summer's over. My dead and dying garden is a testament to that. My closed windows yell it to me. The ferns in the woods shreik at me every time I ride by. The cool crispness of the air on my bike ride to work, and the colors... Well, the colors are really quite cool, everything from pale yellow to deep, dark burgandy. Salmons, oranges, reds, even purples. The air dries up, the leaves show their colors and then fall and walking anywhere produces a crinkle under foot.

Fall does have it's good points. There are the leaves, as previously pointed out, breathtaking. Peak season is in about 2-3 weeks.

The cool crisp air is perfect for getting those last minute projects done, perfect for cutting and stacking firewood. The season seems to inspire the "nesting instincts" of even highly evolved (or less highly evolved) humans. There's the "hurry" to get stuff done.

And there are the bike rides.

O.M.G. You haven't lived until you've ridden on the back roads of N. Mich during peak season. Just gorgeous. Take a break here and there to sit and enjoy the sights, smells and sounds.

Because....

it's coming......

A Whole Gob of Randomness!

Guess I'm gonna need a new picture pretty soon!

This post will be fairly random, kind of in a random mood today. This is never good as usually it ends up being fairly unproductive.

Why is that? Because today is the day that the folks come home. They winter in Arizona. This just isn't fair. Who ever thunk up the idea about leaving this Winter Wonderland Where The Snow Keeps Coming and Coming and spending their hibernation months in greener pastures should be shot had a pretty good idea. Why stay and fight the snow when someone will do it for you, you know, keep your driveway plowed, keep the roof shoveled off, deal with frozen water and sewer lines.... stuff like that.

There's ALMOST no snow left, just in spots where it was banked up and my Mother's daffs are starting to peek up. They are on the north side of the house so it takes a bit longer for them to creep out of the ground. She'll be glad to see them.

I found a turkey nest full of eggs yesterday. Don't know how long they've been there or if they've frozen or not but I marked and put them in the incubator anyway. The egg count is up to 28. Maybe I won't need to buy birds this year after all!

Still making ice at night. The waters are all clear of ice but there's a skim of ice on our farm pond as well as any puddles every morning. Usually gone by midmorning, the sun is bright and warm (warm is a relative term up here, we realize that, just like cold is relative down south) yet you still see the glare of ice for a few hours in the morning..

Hubby hooked up the battery charger to my bike last night. Watching the weather but I'm thinking tonight might have to be the first ride of the season. I'd love to start riding to work tomorrow, we'll see.

My Wings lost last night to Nashville. Hubby says the games are fixed. He's a bit of a pessimist but it does make sense. The organization would make a ton more money if eaach round went the full 7 games. Next game is Wed. nite. We'll win I just know it. It's a best 4 out of 7 series, and we've already won 2 of the 3 played. The stash busting is a logo from a group I joined, a whole bunch of us hockey fanatics (Wing-Nuts) who are using the playoffs as an excuse to finish up some knitting projects.



Friday I will be without my Bu-Dawgh for the first time. I'm sure I'll survive, not sure he will. How can you be the Poster Puppy For Separation Anxiety if you don't have your mommy to hold you at night? But this is a necessary separation. He's going to visit the Nice Lady Down The Road who will take care of our little territorial issues. I don't have a problem with him marking outside, but I kinda think the house is my territory, I already know that. I don't have to mark it but for some reason he feels the need. Again it's my house, the cats have the barn. And Bu-Dawgh is just gonna have to adjust!

Tonight if I have time I'll try to finish cleaning off the deck. Get the firewood piles consolidated, sweep it off nice, and get out the deck chairs. Also get more seeds started. It's too cold to leave them out yet so I have to bring them in at night. I have an old black plastic tarp that I put them on during the day if it's sunny so they stay plenty warm.

Green... and More Stuff

Green!
One of my favorite colors. This time of year I just ache for green things. Thought I'd give you some pictures of Green things today, in honor of the upcoming St. Patricks Day. I told you I'd give you pictures but I lied. Either that or I forgot my camera - you know the one, the Awesome Camera That I Bought Myself For My Birthday Last Year camera. Oh well, work with me here.

Pine Trees (a picture of a pine tree would go here if I hadn't forgotten my camera)
My absolutely favorite kind of tree ever! The big one in the background is named "Katie" (picture a big white pine in the background). When the kids were younger they would climb up and up and up. I love the smell of pines all the time. they are beautiful just after a fresh heavy snow. And in they smell sooooo good in the spring!

Yummy Yarn (The would be a picture of all of my green yarn, which is all categorized by color, you know, green!)

I have a lot of greenery in my house. I'd show you a picture of the boughs that top all of my windows, but well, again, no camera.

Sweater I knit
I knit this cabled Aran a long time ago. Green is one of my favorite colors and this sweater is no exception. (Picture a really pretty sweater, really, it's pretty!)

Favorite Mug
Well, not the favorite, but close. (It's green, I'm sure you know what a mug looks like)

Plants
Aloe, Geraniums, and Cactus. (I would have put a picture here of the plants that I overwinter in the house, if I had remembered my camera)

More stuff.....
I went down to my craft room (formerly known as "The Mouth's" room to take a picture (you know, with the camera that I don't have)of my shelf of green yarn and found that the icemaker to the fridge directly above was leaking. A lot. We had puddles. I thought I saw a trout jump. Seriously, I thought about putting hubby's waders on! I'm no stranger to leaks in our house, I would refer you back to the Great Aquarium Bursting of Seams that happened 2 yrs ago, but I'm not over it enough yet to be objective.
So anyway, turned the water off to the fridge (not a bad thing this time of year, but I will have to investigate and fix it before I want ice in the summer).


Refresh my mind. Did I or Did I Not tell Mother Nature that I had had enough of winter for one year? I did, I know it. I always figured she liked my going out in shirtsleeves and danceing in the new snow barefoot rituals, so she kept piling it on. So naturally, when I said UNCLE, I figured she'd take the hint. Notsomuch. More Snow yesterday. Again, this is March and this is N. Mich, but come on! I have a brother who is tormenting me mercilessly because he gets to go out and ride his harley and I can't even get mine out of the barn. ENOUGH!! UNCLE!! Whatever it takes!!

It's time to do laundry. When I open my sock drawer and the only thing I can find is Santa Clause socks with Ho Ho Ho on them (picture Christmassy cute socks), it's time. That's a clue. Hubby yelling about not having any jeans is another clue. No, he doesn't do laundry. He did it once and that was enough. One of these days maybe I'll get brave and show him where we keep the washer and dryer, but it's not gonna be today.

Is Daylight Savings Time kicking any one else's butt? Seems the older I get, the more I am resistant to change. So along with my email to The Powers That Be to consider not scheduling Nascar and a Red Wings game on the same Sunday afternoon, I'll mention the Daylight Savings Time thing too. I mean, if no one complains, how will The Powers That Be know that I'm unhappy with it? And if it takes 7 complaints and they only have 6, then I can be the one who makes the difference. It's tough, but someone has to take up the cause.
Here would be another pretty picture of a pine tree.... use your imagination... you've all seen a pine tree!

Go Wings - another win last night!