Frost Flowers

Looking out the window a few mornings ago, we saw bright white shimmers in the lower yard...

Frost flowers!

They happen when the ground is warm/not frozen but the air is very cold.  The sap in the plants expands in the freezing cold and comes out thru cracks in the plant stems.

They are incredibly delicate.

I've never seen them this tall.

The other name for them is "ice ribbons".  What a treat it was to see them in our own yard!

And The Sun Disappeared

Were you in the path of the eclipse... or travel to see it?

I was amazed and dubious at all the tourist predictions that were being touted for both Clarksville, TN (population about 150, 00 with a predicted 500,00 tourist) and my hometown in MO (population about 6200 with a predicted 90,000 tourist) which happened to be almost dead center.

Seriously??

A local highway sign.

In "the swath" residents were told to get their groceries early and STAY OFF THE ROADS on Monday.  You'd thought we were going to have an ice storm.  No... they are calmer for an ice storm.  

Driving past Clarksville hotels on Sunday night, the parking lots were mostly full.  But not completely full.  

The next morning I pulled up the C'ville street department traffic camera that are installed at major intersections.  Expecting to see the predicted bumper-to-bumper traffic I was surprised to see it was quieter than a Sunday morning.  So much for hoards of tourists.  Same with my home town in MO.

We were comfortably at home, sitting out on our deck.

Unfortunately, a bunch of drunken red-necks decided to park their boats right below our house.  They were wasted.  About halfway thru totality, as they partied hardy - one of them yelled "HEY!!  The sun is gone!!!"

Really??

I was extremely scientific in my eclipse photography... I held my viewing glasses over my camera lens!  It worked great.

Next time I'll have a better set up tho (next time being April 2024 in the SE Missouri area).

Moments before totality!

I love this photo!!

Beautiful corona and 'Bailey's Beads'.

And yes, the stars did come out.  (Actually, I think that was Jupiter...)

And with this ring... it was over.

Incredible.

As it disappeared Himself fixed up a viewing for us using his binoculars turned backwards.  WAY better than the pinhole cereal box.

See that dip?  That is the temperature drop during totality.

I didn't see or hear any odd animal behavior, except the katydids starting to chirp.  They quit when the sun came back out.  Otherwise birds continued to sing and the cicada kept trilling.  No dogs howled (and there are a lot around here).

Oh... wait... the red-necks did get quiet...

We Interrupt This Regularly Scheduled Blog Post...

... to announce the arrival of a new forest princess (or prince).

Yesterday afternoon "Mama" gave birth in our back yard to this little sweetie.  Her twins from last year kept watch.

It was so fun to watch the first wobbly steps.

But it wasn't long before she (I've decided it is a girl) was racing about and scrambling over Mama's back.

Venturing farther and farther away... but not too far.

Getting ready for another leap!

After a bit, she headed over to meet Big Brother (left) and Big Sister.  (Bro is looking scraggly because he's growing his first set of antlers.  Takes a lot out of a buck.)

Looking forward to watching this one grow up, as I did her siblings.

Sycamore Glow

Evening sunlight shining through the huge sycamore tree in our back yard.  I didn't realize how fuzzy the leaves are until I saw how the light made them glow.

Spring Visitors

Before I even get going here, I apologize for the photo quality.  I'm shooting fast (before they are gone) through a winter dirty window...and sometimes in low evening light.  

But I'm sharing anyway because they make me happy!

Tripod is back, along with her daughter 4-Runner.  Both are fat with this year's fawns.

The indigo buntings have returned.

Mrs. Bunting.

One of our cardinals is busy...

...with two hungry mouths (the egg hatched the next day).

The is an American Tree Sparrow.  They next in the arctic circle!!

And this pretty boy is a Rose-breasted Grosbeak.

I wonder what I will see next?

Beautiful

We had the most glorious sunset the other day.  I just had to share it.

Christmastime Full Moon

Western Lights

We had a rain front yesterday, bringing us more November-like temperatures.  As the sun was setting the front passed by... creating some of the more beautiful sunset moments.

These photos were taken over a 10 minute time frame.

Bambi in My Yard

Remember the buck deer who visited the beginning of last month?

One of them came back... and I had the camera ready this time!

Isn't he beautiful with his 9 points??  

The Bucks Stopped Here!

Yesterday morning Himself told me to grab my camera and look out the window... QUICKLY!

We had buck deer in our yard!

Here are two of the three big boys who were enjoying the mineral block.  The one on the left was probably a 6 point (didn't get a real good look at him) and the one on the right was an 8 point.

And here is the biggest boy of all... at least a 10 point!  They were so beautiful and very shy.

What a gift to look out and see!

(Sorry about the grainy photos.  Didn't have time to put the long range lens on...)

Seeing Spots

We had a special treat when we looked in the back yard the other day.  Tripod and her daughter brought their fawns for a bit of grazing.

There was this set of twins (assuming these are the sibling pair because of how close they stayed together).

And this single who liked browsing under the Bradford pear trees.

The trio stayed quite a while.

Then with a call from Mama, they headed on to other places.

They are so sweet now it is easy to forget that next year they will want to eat my plants!

The Gardens at The Sticks

We've finally gotten all the plants for our gardens into the ground.  What a wonderful feeling!  LOL  We have made several areas into 'culinary' planting beds.

The herb bed in front of the house is doing well.  That grey mess in front is the ground cloth for a gravel walkway we are putting in... as soon as our yard dude gets some free time to bring his bucket tractor over to move the gravel in place here and several other areas.

All three of the rosemary (far right) made it through the cold winter and I added another.  We use a lot of rosemary.  Next over is the chives, garlic, and on the back onions.  After those is my oregano.  The beast is trying to take over!  Laying low to the right of the oregano are my sprawling thyme plants.  Only one survived the winter so I added those two freebies.  The other beast of the herb bed is the sage which is getting cut back hard next week.   Next is my French tarragon.  One made it through winter and I have put in five more.  They have such a hard time with the hot TN summers.  

And finally at the end of the bed I have my basil.  It was at the beginning of the bed but we've put in something in that area (you'll see soon) so they went down to where the tomatoes used to be.

Or maybe I should say... where the tomato IS!  That little volunteer came up and we are letting it grow.  I look forward to seeing what we get from it.

The rhubarb is doing great!

I've planted 18 of those free parsley plants all around the rhubarb bed.  (I still have 15 parsley left!  I plan on giving them away to my Sunday School class.)

The rhubarb is starting to color!

Next up is our vegetable garden...

This area used to be our rose garden... but the Japanese beetles drove Himself buggy so the roses moved up to my Mom's garden where the beetles aren't.

(Man!  I'm seeing a half dozen or more projects I need to work on in this photo!)

Another view of the veggies.  We hadn't planned on the fence (Thank you Geri for the chicken wire!)

This is why we have fence!  Those ungrateful deer chewed up two tomatoes and my two poblano peppers.  Thankfully they will survive their maiming.

Looking down from the deck.  The eggplant are doing well (top of photo).  And the bright green leaves at the bottom of the photo are on my sweet bay tree.

I need to start tying up the tomatoes.

Oh... here are the varieties I planted.

Cucumbers are doing well too.  They are loving the rain we have gotten (two inches on Monday!).

On the left side of the garden we planted five freebie spearmint plants.  The area is very rough and I hope they completely take over and fill the area.

Finally are our two (bargain clearance) blueberry plants.  They are going to be a focal point in an upcoming project.

First harvest!  LOL

We are looking forward to much larger harvests!

This is the start of our gardening.  I plan to add at least one new culinary bed each year.