Posts Tagged ‘images’
Sky Show
Cyndie and Delilah were down in the paddock with the horses last night and the sun was getting close to our horizon. I finished what I was doing and headed out to find them. It didn’t surprise me to find the sky taking on a strange hue, because the night before, our sunset was quite a sight through the plume of smoke passing over us from Canadian forest fires. I figured it was happening again.
Then I saw a streak of lightning in the distance. There was a bit of a straight-line rain”bow” appearing on the far side of some rain clouds stretched to the ground by the precipitation in the distance. We stood among the horses and watched nature’s grandeur for a good half-hour.
I did my best to capture a panoramic view with my phone. In truth, you really had to be there to experience how impressive it was, but this will give you a rough idea. Imagine the rest if you can.
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Hello June
What took you so long to get here, June? We’ve been waiting for you to arrive. Of course, the clematis vine climbing our trellis didn’t wait for you at all. The flowers on it seem more than happy with their situation (despite the recent threats of overnight frost that keep happening), and began blossoming some time ago.
June is a big birthday month around our house, and it is also when I gather with somewhere around 120 like-minded bicyclists for a week of riding and tent camping. Oh, and eating. We do a lot of eating.
I was able to get out on Saturday for a warmup bike ride of 43-miles with Julie and Anand, both of whom I will see again in 12 days when our week of riding begins. Other than one annoying click from somewhere in the drive train of my bike that appeared during the second half of our excursion, my bicycle seems ready for the journey.
My body, on the other hand, is a little more of a question. I’m hoping that just getting that one preliminary day of significant mileage will help me to feel somewhat prepared for the adventure ahead. It’s certainly better than nothing.
The only thing left to do is prepare my appetite for the trip. Do you think I need to do any work on that? No, that won’t be necessary. How early can you start the carbo-loading routine before a big event?
Come on, June, bring it on! Despite my surprise that you arrive today, I’m ready to dive in to whatever it is that you have in store.
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Wonderful Wetness
We have received several days of light-to-moderate precipitation which is soaking in more than running off, and the plants around here seem pretty thrilled with the conditions. The grass sure is growing fast.
Hopefully, the horses have properly adjusted to all the greenery available for grazing, as we are now leaving the gate to the back pasture open 24/7 again. They don’t seem to like the noise made by rain on the metal roof of the barn, so when precipitation is falling, they move away, either to the bottom of the paddock or way out in the pasture.
I was in the city working yesterday, and when I got home in the afternoon, Delilah was laying in the gate area of her kennel, which is beyond the tarp that covers the main area, so she was soaking wet. Silly dog.
We walked down to feed the horses, but they didn’t show any interest in coming in from the far side of the pasture. Since it was raining steadily, I didn’t wait around for them, taking Delilah on an abbreviated walk back toward the house.
After having just mowed last Saturday, there are places where it already looks like it needs cutting again, just 3 days later. On our way in, I stopped to empty the rain gauge, which had 2 inches of rain in it since Saturday.
Before going to the horses, we had stopped by the labyrinth to see that the maple tree looked okay (hard to tell exactly when the leaves are drooping from the wetness), and the trillium in the woods was looking very good.
I’m grateful for the rain not coming all at once in a gully-washing downpour, but instead has soaked in enough to help fuel growth in everything around here. It’s making things a sloppy mess in some places, but overall, it is a wonderful wetness.
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How To
This is how you take advantage of the day after workday on the opening weekend of the summer vacation season up at the lake.
Rain started slowly and gently mid-to-late afternoon and turned the rest of the day wet, but in the hours prior, there was some basketball played, a group of very motivated and brave young adventurers went tubing behind the speedboat (that lake is still very cold), and some people took a nap.
I went for a stroll, did some observing, and visited with a few people I don’t get to see as often as I’d like anymore. I had to try several different times to stop thinking about the projects I should be working on at home, in order to pay proper attention to the here and now.
It was good to be up at my favorite getaway with Cyndie’s family again. We received messages that all is well at home. Horses, dog, and cat are getting along well with our guest caretakers. That goes a long way toward helping me relax and enjoy our time here.
Today is Memorial Day holiday in the US, when we pause to remember and honor those who have died in active military service. It appears as though I may be spending a few hours of the day in a line of cars returning to their homes, since the soaking rain continues to fall and will likely inspire folks to hit the road earlier than they otherwise might on the last day of a 3-day weekend.
If I could, I’d prefer to be spending that time curled up under a comforter in a hammock on a hill above the lake.
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Greener Side
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It is quite possible that sometimes the reason it seems greener on the other side of the fence is because, it is.
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Flower Blossoms
Our crab apple tree is fuzzy with flowers today, and the giant allium beneath it is making its way to spectacular. The changes at this time of year are noticeable almost by the hour. A little rain, followed by warm sunshine, and growth practically explodes in every direction.
At the same time, I am discovering that we have a few late-blooming trees, maples, I believe, that look dead next to others that have already leafed out completely. This is our third spring here, and I am becoming aware of more and more about our property that escaped my attention the first two years, due to my being overwhelmed by it all. Does that imply I am becoming dulled to some of the glories of this place? That would be sad.
No, I don’t think that is the case, although there are certain aspects of managing 20-acres that tend to take less mental space when you gain the experience of a couple years. Even though I’ve seen trees die every year, I’ve seen so many more sprout, some of them at a surprising rate of growth. I am less inclined to fret over individual incidents now that I have gained the perspective of a few cycles of the growing seasons.
Even the snapping branches during previous storms, which caused me significant trauma to witness at the time, has been revealed to me to be a common and often recoverable situation. I have come across trees in our woods that look to have been severely damaged years ago, but which have simply sprouted new growth off the fractured limb and although funky looking, are functioning as much like a normal tree as all the other damage-free trees around them.
Our late-blooming maple trees are sporting buds now and will catch up in a blink. I don’t have to worry about them, which allows me to better absorb the beauty and wonder of all the blossoms decorating or fields and forest this year.
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Life Giving
Despite the recent trend of precipitation missing us as waves of disjointed showers and thunderstorms have been flowing over our region, yesterday evening we finally received rain, but in the form of a dramatic gully washer. It poured as if from a pitcher, and then stopped as quick as if the pitcher had returned to upright. Just as I was beginning to consider a trip outside to tend to the horses, the downpour resumed in full gusto.
The sound of such heavy bursts of rain is dramatic enough on its own, but we also had a few booms of thunder which served to amp up the excitement. On top of that, Delilah felt the need to run to and fro, barking her 2-cents worth toward the storm. My decision to remain calm and collected despite it all made no visible impact on her confidence over our relative safety in the moment.
After the third or fourth wave of heavy rain, we received a sign that I could venture outside. The setting sun popped out from behind clouds, creating an irresistible invitation to go outside, even though some residual rain at our location was still dripping from the clouds overhead.
I chose to override my better judgement and wandered around with Delilah tethered closely to me as the lightning and thunder on the backside of this storm continued overhead, preventing Delilah from reaching anything close to calm and secure during this particular walk.
The air had the fresh smell of recent lightning strikes and the copious amount of water that fell in a surprisingly short amount of time was now rushing through our drainage swale. I felt a sense of appreciation for the much-needed moisture that was providing a life-giving treat to all our growing things.
The giant double rainbow that was filling the sky to the east served as an exclamation point to the whole sensational event. From where I stood, it shone down on the horses clustered close together in the paddock to ride out the storm.
I took Delilah into the paddock with me to open a gate that allowed the horses into the back pasture for the night, then headed back toward the house to check the rain gauge.
We had received 1.75 inches of rain in about 45-minutes time. I hope more of it soaked in than flowed away in the runoff. It just might have been a case where we got too much of a good thing.
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Creatively Repurposed
We lost 8 long-needle pines in the last couple of years due to a combination of dry summers that sandwiched one long and very harsh winter. It was pretty obvious last fall that they were beyond recovery, but I just didn’t have the heart to take them down until this spring.
When the time came to finally face that chore, I decided to see if I couldn’t find some creative way to honor the memory of the pines. It just didn’t feel right to cut them all off at the ground. Of course, I have some history with this ploy of not cutting a tree to the ground and then using the remaining stump for something new.
At our home in Eden Prairie, I saved the 2-3 inch diameter trunks of a cluster of 3 choke cherry trees that had sprouted in an unwelcome spot of our yard, and then balanced rocks on them to create an interesting visual display. I liked the results enough to resurrect the concept again. In this instance, however, I have one item that will be more functional than a rock. It’s a birdhouse (Thank you, Mel & Greg!).
We have some really nice rocks here, so putting a few up on tree stumps is irresistible to me. While I was cutting down this tree which was leaning significantly, I discovered a twiggy young oak tree growing beside it. If that oak survives the abuse that some critter has enacted on the bark of its skinny little trunk, someday it may tower over the end of our house beside our bedroom in the spot where this pine was unable to survive.
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Relative Something 