Encouraging Deep Roots

The past few days have been beautiful and it looks like we are in for sunshine and warmer temperatures for the next week. After a hard winter, it's been nice to be able to get outside and breathe in the fresh air.  I could step outside my door and walk my neighborhood, but I truly find that too confining. There is something about wide open spaces, walking in the woods and being still that speaks to my spirit. I always have my camera with me so I'm ready to take a photograph of something that strikes my interest. I'm thankful that we have an Audubon center about 10 minutes from my house that provides all that I need to fill that desire within me to get out into nature. I enjoy it because each time is something different. As I walk I find any inner turmoil that I have quieting down and for a bit of time, I'm not tied to technology and busy checking off my to-do list. I'm just in the moment and enjoying the present.  I'm very social and enjoy being around people, b...

As I've shared before we lost two of our roosters over the past few months.  I woke up on Tuesday morning to find that something got the remaining three.  I'm pretty sure it was coyotes because for all three of them to get killed at once meant it was probably more than one "something."   As annoying as they were, they will be missed.  I had always planned on writing a children's book about them but never got very far with it. I thought I'd share the beginnings of  the story I was writing about them.  I'm warning you; it's very rough around the edges. :-) Rooster Tales On a country road, at the edge of a forest and next to a little white church lived five handsome roosters.   Their names were Brewster, Malcolm, Soar, Falcon, and Adventure.    These five brothers spent their days running through the woods, roaming the fields and basically making a nuisance of themselves The brothers looked exactly alike, except...

I love this girl of mine and her tender heart towards animals.  This picture really reflects how she is with every animal she comes across. She gets down on their level.  She is gentle with them.  She is kind.  She loves them with all her heart.   We found this baby bird on the grass yesterday and apparently it is learning to fly and didn't make it very far from home.  Emily immediately wanted to find a box and feed it.   I convinced her to leave it where it was and it would fly back to it's nest.  Later on, it was gone.  But she would have kept it if I allowed her. I think all these critters know she is a kindred spirit because they keep finding their way here.

Little Chester showed up on our doorstep about 6 weeks ago.  He was skin and bones and obviously, someone had dumped in on the side of the road.  So while I wasn't looking to add another pet to our mix, we took him in. He fattened up and was the sweetest thing.  He purred constantly and was very affectionate and playful.  He was also very curious and was always getting into something.  That was his downfall. Yesterday, unbeknownst to us, he had climbed up in the wheel well of Dan's car.  As Dan drove away, Chester either jumped or fell off and got hit.  I took him to the vet and he had a broken femur, a head injury and a damaged bladder.  They sent him home with pain medication and an antibiotic and he was scheduled for surgery on Monday. However, I came down to check on him in the wee hours of the morning and he was in a lot of pain.  I gave him pain medicine and this morning noticed that he was gasping for breath as well as b...

All Things Bright and Beautiful... Author: Ce­cil F. Al­ex­an­der, Hymns for Lit­tle Child­ren, 1848  All things bright and beautiful, All creatures great and small, All things wise and wonderful: The Lord God made them all. Each little flower that opens, Each little bird that sings, He made their glowing colors, He made their tiny wings. All things bright and beautiful, All creatures great and small, All things wise and wonderful: The Lord God made them all. The rich man in his castle, The poor man at his gate, He made them, high or lowly, And ordered their estate. All things bright and beautiful, All creatures great and small, All things wise and wonderful: The Lord God made them all. The purple headed mountains, The river running by, The sunset and the morning That brightens up the sky. All things bright and beautiful, All creatures great and small, All things wise and wonderful: The Lord God made them all. T...

It's Loving Our Children Tuesday at my friend Kate's blog today.  Feel free to join in the fun! Ever since she was born, this girl has been crazy about animals.  She would be happy with a houseful of them!  And they are just as crazy about her.  I remember going to a barbecue at someone's house and all the children were running around and playing.   Emily was 3 and I couldn't find her.  When I finally did, she was standing in a pasture, petting a cow and the thing was licking her! The only problem is that she is highly allergic to EVERYTHING.  Cats, dogs, feathers, horse, and so on.  But no matter how hard I try, I cannot keep her away from them.  It seems like everywhere we go, she finds some animal to pet and love on.  Of course, it always ends the same way....itchy eyes, watery nose, sneezing, eczema flare-up, hives and sometimes wheezing.  But she keeps on touching all those silly animals. I've kind of given up on ...

Some days all you feel like doing is laying around!

I'm being stalked. There are many days as I sit in my sewing room, I feel eyes on my back. Or as I take the trash out, I'll hear rustling in the bushes. It's gotten so I don't go anywhere without carrying a sturdy weapon. It can be frightening at times. But I'm coping. The other day I was sewing and felt that uneasy feeling as if someone was watching me. I turned around quickly and caught sight of the culprit. Or in this case, culprits. This is their new thing. They fly up onto my back deck and stare at me through the window and begin crowing at me non-stop. It is quite annoying because they are making a mess of the deck. The other day, in an attempt to break them of this habit, I threw open the door and flung water at them! They scattered for a moment. But they were back soon after. I've been polishing my stew pot! ;-)

Emily and I went yesterday to pick out her new dwarf bunny. A friend from church breeds them and graciously offered to let Emily have one. Emily slept in until 11 a.m. yesterday morning. I was just getting ready to go wake her up because we had to leave in 25 minutes when she came down the stairs. She told me that her plan worked. When I asked what she was talking about, she told me that she had forced her eyes to stay open until about 2 a.m. so that she would sleep late and when she got up it would be time to leave! LOL This girl is too funny at times. Anyway, off we went and she picked out the one she liked. Dwarf Hotot rabbits are generally pure white with just a little black ring around each eye. Meet Molly. I was a little concerned about Emily's allergies but it's hard to keep saying no to her because she is crazy about animals and they seem to love her too. So I gave her some allergy medicine before we went to see if we could ease her into it. So far she's bee...

We seem to attract animals around here. There must be something about us that says, "Welcome!" Come and make yourself at home. LOL Meet Bucky (as Emily calls him). He comes without fail, twice a day. Usually it's early in the morning and then again in the evening. He lets us get quite close to him and seems pretty unconcerned about our presence. He'll graze on grass but more often than not, he jumps into the chicken pen and eats their feed. The roosters are not so sure about him and I don't think they really know what to make of this large creature who so boldly ignores them. Usually, they just mill around and crow at him. I'm concerned that he is going to meet his end at some point. We are surrounded by a gun club and while he probably won't get it this year, one of these days he'll be worthy of a hunter's sights. I understand the need for venison, but we've grown quite attached to this daily visitor.

We acquired 5 ducks about a month ago and they've been in the pen that surrounds the chicken coop. They stay in the coop at night with the roosters. I've been filling small tub with water for them a few times a day, but it was becoming increasingly clear that we needed to relocate them to the pond behind the church. We finally decided to do it yesterday afternoon. Emily, of course, was sad to let them go. She is afraid that they are going to fly away and we won't see them again. We had toyed with getting their wings clipped, but to be honest, I felt that they would be happier if they could live like they would if we didn't have them. So we are taking our chances. They headed straight to the water. I've never seen such happy ducks! The best part was at the end of the day they came waddling back across the yard and right into the coop! That was what I was hoping they would do because I know they will be safe there at night.

There is a little deck off my sewing room where I will sit in the morning and have my quiet time. I was sitting there reading the other day and I kept hearing this gnawing sound. I finally looked over at the tree near the house and this little guy was sitting there working at getting the hickory nut open. He made sure that he was keeping one eye on me too in case I made any sudden moves. I wonder if he is the rascal that somehow has made its way up and under the siding of the house. I hear it every now and then as it scampers in the ceiling of my living room. If so, I feel sorry for him as he is soon to meet an untimely end. He is cute when he stays where he belongs - OUTSIDE!

One thing I've noticed is that animals seem to play a central theme in most of my adventures. I seem to attract them like flies to honey. Yet, it's always in the most bizarre way! As I've mentioned we were without power for 12 hours yesterday. Dan put the gas grill up on the front porch so we would have it available if we needed it. About mid-afternoon I decided to try and boil some water on it for tea. I pulled the cover off the grill and opened the lid. It was then that I noticed a pile of grass in the corner under the grate. Well, I know that I can't start a fire in the grill with dry grass in it so I pulled off the grate and lifted up the pile of grass. Out runs a field mouse who was in the MIDDLE of nursing four babies! The mother with two of the babies still attached to her and two other babies are now running around the inside of the grill. All the while, I'm yelping and jumping up and down. Stephen & Emily came to my rescue with glo...

Emily wants to be a veterinarian when she gets older and I think she would be great at it. Wherever she goes, animals follow her. She cares for them. She feeds them. She loves them and they love her in return. The only problem is she is allergic to just about everything there is - cats, dogs, hamsters, feathers, horses. That doesn't seem to stop her though. She is definitely a natural.