Love is like dew...

Love is like dew 

that falls on 

both nettles and lilies.  

~Swedish Proverb~

Be Fragrant...

Flowers never emit so sweet and strong

 a fragrance as before a storm. 

When a storm approaches thee, 

be as fragrant as a sweet-smelling flower.

 ~Jean Paul Richter~

Yesterday Was...

Lake Jacksonville

NATIONAL AUDUBON DAY.  My husband didn't have to work yesterday, so he said "let's go fishing!" I'd just crawled out of bed and was aching all over. Such a daunting adventure sounded insane at that moment --- I barely had my eyes open!
          But since most of the work (prepping the boat, hitching it up and pulling it out the the garage, and putting it in the lake and taking out it out, then driving it back home and putting it back in the garage) was his responsibility, I grumpily threw together a light lunch, my camera, some sun screen and Buggins, and Beary's necessities (yes, the dog was going fishing too...that's why we bought this used pontoon, so there'd be room to take the dog fishing too) and we set out for The Lake.
          It was a beautiful day, although a bit too windy!  It was also my and Beary's maiden voyage on the Crappie Cruiser. All in all, the put-in-went better than expected. Beary, normally a calm and quiet dog, goes bonkers when we say "You wanna go for a ride?" He'll jump at the door and whine, practically break his neck jumping into the van, and then set up an ear-deafening yapping once we get to our destination, wanting out. I had to walk him around while my husband put the boat in the water, and then we were off!
          We were worried if he wouldn't hurl himself overboard the first time geese went flying by us, honking. But he behaved very well in the boat, and we both enjoyed the cool breeze in our faces as the boat sped to the fishing coves. Yes, we caught fish: crappies a plenty (but too small to keep), and I got a bass and my husband caught a catfish. We fished all day and we had a blast! Getting the boat out of the lake was tricky, because by then there were more seasoned fisherman waiting to put in and watching the embarrassing antics of Beary, who set up his ridiculous yapping antics to get out of the boat and then dragged me to the van.
          I was too busy fishing to remember that I'd brought my camera. We saw geese fighting over their nesting platforms, noisy cranes flying over, and countless snapping turtles sunning on logs --- but it wasn't til we were leaving that I snapped this  shot of a pair of Canada geese paddling behind our boat: My Audubon Shot-of-the-Day.

[NOTE: Because I was so exhausted when we got home at 5 p,m., and I had my first F2F Book Club meeting at 7 (that's another story, found on My Book Blog), I fell soundly asleep as 8 p.m. and missed writing my blog post yesterday.  Drats! I hate when that happens!]

The Earth Delights...

A small brook near Wrenshall, Minnesota

 Forget not that the earth delights 

to feel your bare feet 

and the winds long 

to play with your hair.  

~Kahlil Gibran~

Love Tree

Here is a favorite picture of me with my Love Tree, growing in our back yard. It's a self-portrait from 1995. At the time the photo was taken, alas, the poor Love Tree was dying. So a few years later we had to cut it down.

Read & Follow

 

Today is READ ME DAY. You're supposed to wear something for people to read (a t-shirt or ball cap with a message, etc.) Here I am sporting my beat-up Marshall Applewhite t-shirt, which features the UFO cult-leader's face and his creepy message. Yes, I know it's bizarre, but all the more reason to "read me," right? 

Did anyone "read me" when I went to town? I don't know, some did, I guess. I, myself, didn't find anybody to "read".  Most people had plain t-shirts, and jackets because it's chilly and windy out. The only t-shirt I read was the one on the menu-board at Wendy's drive-up, when I went there to pick up a salad for lunch. There was a gorgeous young male model on the sign, advertising a Wendy's "Where's the Beef?" t-shirt for $20.  

I had a real hard time taking this picture. I can't find my camera's operation manual, so I didn't know how to set up for a timer self-portrait. I tried taking a picture of me in the mirror---DUH! --- the writing came out backwards! So I just had to hold the camera out as far as I could, pointed at me, and try to take my picture that way. Out of about 30 shots I finally got one where the t-shirt looked okay, but I didn't, so I cropped me out of it. 

This old t-shirt is due to be trashed anyway. You can see where I had to sew up a tear across the wording.   I hope you made it to the Next Level, dude.

Happy Earth Day

photo courtesy http://grin.hq.nasa.gov/

Happy Earth Day, fellow Earthlings!

Walk gently, observe joyfully,

Live responsibly and respectfully!

And a special Thank You to Home Depot for the free pine seedling!

Wish I Was There

  

I believe that there is a subtle magnetism in Nature, 

which, if we unconsciously yield to it, 

will direct us aright.  

~Henry David Thoreau~

Cool Breeze --- NOT!

          Sometimes you can't tell by a picture what's really going on. The temperature of the second floor of the historic Trempealeau Hotel on Independence Day weekend, 2006, must have been over 100 degrees F! That breeze blowing in the upstairs window was in the 90s for sure! It was "hotter than a firecracker on the 4th of July!
           This quaint lodging establish- ment was one of the few survivors of the town's 1888 fire. It has been preserved and run much as it was was back at the end of the 19th century. All rooms share a single bathroom. The website fails to mention that the hotel's upstairs rooms are not air-conditioned. But they warned me when I booked a two-night stay and said a fan would be provided. How bad could it be, right? I really wanted this unique lodging experience!

Whew! How I survived I'll never know! The very worse part was that my room was right above the kitchen, so I couldn't have my window open. The greasy smell of char-broiled steaks rising up from the kitchen exhaust fans made me sick to my stomach.

But it was an experience I'm glad I had and will never forget. The food in the dining room was great, and for the first time in my life I experienced a "smokeless" bar as I drank a few brewskies before the Saturday evening concert began. There's a whole other story about that:
http://theheartlanddaily.blogspot.com/2011/12/theres-story-here.html 

Hollyhock Walk to the River

Hollyhocks at the Trempealeau Hotel, 

Trempealeau, Wisconsin on the Mississippi River.

Lovely Luna

Luna Moth

Nature will bear the closest inspection. 

She invites us to lay our eye level with her smallest leaf, 

and take an insect view of its plain. 

 ~Henry David Thoreau~

School Days

Here is the outhouse at the one-room Lone Star Schoolhouse. The old school- house was originally located on the Schudel Farm west of Fieldon, Illinois.  A few years ago it was moved to the Jersey County Historical Society site on the grounds of the Cheney Mansion in Jerseyville, the county seat, and lovingly restored for tours. (I'm not sure, but the outhouse is probably a replica.)

God & Country

Dickeyville Grotto, Dickeyville, Wisconsin

I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just; 

that his justice cannot sleep forever.

~Thomas Jefferson~ 

Dang!

I missed a day! The first time this has happened since I started my daily blog in December.

Happy National Pecan Day!

Pecans are my MOST favorite nut. 

They rank even higher than almonds and English walnuts for me. Here's the scoop on the nuts 

(that I was able to glean from the Internet):

Calhoun County (Illinois) pecans alongside tiny store-bought ones.

The pecan is the only nut tree native to North America. 

It's name comes from the Algonquin, 

meaning "all nuts requiring a stone to crack". 

The largest pecan producing state in the United States is Georgia, with an average yield of 75 million pounds! 

The pecan capital of the U.S. is Albany, Georgia, 

which is home to more than 600,000 pecan trees. 

I love them eaten plain (out-of-hand), sugared, generously added to cookies and brownies, lavishly sprinkled on waffles, or in good old-fashioned pecan pie.

But I always think of nuts as a fall food.  

So why, I wondered, is Pecan Day celebrated in the spring?

Well, it seems that our friend Thomas Jefferson 

(whose birthday we celebrated yesterday) 

loved pecans and sent some to his buddy George Washington.  

This is the day that Washington 

first planted pecan trees at Mt. Vernon.

Hear! Hear!

In honor of the birthday of Thomas Jefferson (1743), 

our 3rd President of the United States 

and the principal author the The Declaration of Independence:

  http://totallyfreeimages.com/109819/

Jefferson Memorial, dedicated 1943 on the 200th anniversary of his birth. 

I predict future happiness for Americans 

if they can prevent the government 

from wasting the labors of the people 

under the pretense of taking care of them.

~Thomas Jefferson~

He Died Young in a Foreign Land

This was an interesting old gravestone I found in a country cemetery.  It reads:

GEORGE

Son of

Henry & Hannah

HAWKER 

of Deerhurst Walton

Gloucestershire Eng.

Died

Sep. 30, 1863

Aged 26 years

He left his native land in

1859 and spent the last 4

years of his life in the

service of Henry Oakes Esq

Reptile Love

Now here's something you don't see every day, nor maybe even at all in your life: two huge black snakes mating. 

My husband and I were in a small country cemetery. While I studied and photographed interesting headstones, he searched the wooded outskirts of the graveyards for mushrooms. He called me to come quick and showed me the snakes in the clutches of amor amid the branches of a tree. It was quite a fascinating spring spectacle.

Sacred Female Herb

The spring wildflower Trillium is easily identified by its three leaves and three flower petals. In medicinal folklore, Trillium was used to facilitate childbirth, and to treat other female problems by the women of many Native American tribes. The root was considered to be a sacred female herb and they only spoke of it to their medicine women.

Welcome Willow!

Willow is excited about mushroom hunting.  But she warns to be careful while splitting the morels in half when cleaning them. We've found all kinds of creepy-crawlies inside even the freshest ones: slugs, centipedes, spiders, troops of little ants, etc. So far, no baby snakes, though --- but anything's possible! It's all part of the natural world.


Don't let that put you off trying these easily identified and deliciously edible delicacies, though. They're scrumptious sauteed in butter or floured and fried.  Enjoy!


You can follow the occassional adventures of my new little friend, Willow Woodsprite, at
http://postcardsfromtheheartland.blogspot.com/

Happy Easter!

The Dickeyville Grotto, Dickeyville, Wisconsin

Happy Easter to All my Family & Friends!

Oak Bush

Here's an oddity of Nature in the corner of our meadow. When we moved here those 24 years ago and fenced in the meadow for our horses, there was a clump of oak saplings growing in a bunch. We decided to just let them grow, rather than cut them down. Over two and a half decades, they've grown to mature height, but they've merged into a single, short trunk unit, which I've named Oak Bush (Quercus cicii).

Bluebell Beauty

I remember how awestruck I was the first spring we lived here (24 years ago) and I discovered a small patch of bluebells in the woods while mushroom hunting. It was the first time I'd ever seen the lovely spring wildflowers, and I've enjoyed seeing them every year since.

Time flies...

"Bananas" 12"x12" acrylic SOLD

 

Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana.

~Groucho Marx~

http://postcardsfromtheheartland.blogspot.com/p/ccs-art-gallery.html 

Dutchman's Breeches

DUTCHMAN'S BREECHES
This small, spring woodland wildflower reminds me of somebody's white trousers hanging on a clothesline. It is one of many plants whose seeds are spread by ants when they carry the fleshy seed pods into their nests to eat.

Work in Progress...Still

Today is  DON’T GO TO WORK UNLESS IT’S FUN DAY. For people like me, who have no job, I suppose the logical thing to do is find something fun to do and WORK at it all day. 

This unfinished painting has been on my easel for months now. Which means I haven't done much painting for months. I've already frittered away my morning, so this afternoon --- I WILL GO TO WORK and it WILL be fun! 

PB&J Please!

c.2006 Godar Graphics

HAPPY 

NATIONAL 

PEANUT 

BUTTER 

& JELLY 

DAY!

Happy Boomer Day!

Photo courtesy http://pdphoto.org/  Thanks, Jon!

I'm a Boomer? 
Are you? 
If you were born 
between 
1946 and 1964, 
you are!
It's our day 
to be glad 
we're still around!

To all my Boomer friends out there, 

this beautiful song's for you:

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzXyoeKOcx4