Winter scenery

I thought I should come back and let you know I'm still alive. I don't have any new sewing projects to show you (Christmas kinda got in the way there), but I am now working on a couple of things. Courtney finished a project that I forgot to post about, however I'm going to see if I can get her to write a guest post about that. She didn't come here yesterday because she was home sick, so maybe next week we can get caught up.

Our winter weather's been crazier than usual this year! We had a very warm November, which boasted these lovely mushrooms on the 28th!

Two days later, it looked like this around here.

It was a bit hard to take after being so spoiled with the warmth, but it did make for some pretty photographs. Minor compensation.

Then we had an extremely cold December, with the temp going down farther than -20°F one night, which produced lovely frosty decorations on the windows.

I had posted the photo below on Instagram, and someone who works for ABC TV asked permission to use my photo on TV! I said yes, of course, but whether it got used or not, I'll probably never know, because I didn't see it. Anybody remember seeing this?

Here are some more frosty pretties.

Believe it or not, we had heavy RAIN on Christmas Day! It was also very windy and near freezing, which resulted in a power outage for a couple hours or so.

We've also had some colorful skies, like this sunrise on December 30th...

... and plummeting temps brought these sun dogs a few days later (I had to take the pics from two different windows, so I spliced them together)...

... with this amazing scene that evening after the sun had just set!

The cold is good for something nice to look at, if nothing else!

One more scene, not so nice to look at...

... was these persistent turkeys sneaking across our backyard. Ugh. This was the first time we've had them during the winter. NOT my favorite birds! ;-Þ

Mushrooms?

Do you know what's an edible mushroom and what isn't? I don't. But we often get clumps of them at the base of our hackberry tree, for some reason. Here's our first clump of the year:

Haily graciously offered to give you some size reference:

A little closer look:

And a couple of VERY close looks (via the Easy-Macro lens, of course):

Unfortunately, I didn't think to get the iPad camera out there until the next day, and they were already starting to dry up and lose their color, but they made for cool shots, anyway.

Soooo.... would YOU eat them?

This promises to be a VERY busy week for me, so the blog may get neglected some. I have a bunch of random photos, though, and may just post one a day or something, depending on how much time I have. But if I disappear entirely, don't worry... I'll be back!

Marshroom... or mushmallow?

With all the rains we've had this summer, we've also had plenty of these in our lawn. I couldn't help thinking of a marshmallow when I saw this one:

Here it is from another side. It even looks like it's starting to get a toasted. See that little tan spot on its right?

Below is what it looked like the next day, just before sunset. The little tan spot was raised a bit, just like a toasting marshmallow bubbling up. :)

So whaddya think... marshroom or mushmallow??? ;)

Here's a little different one. Looks more like a button or a bottlecap. Isn't there actually a "button mushroom"? I don't know my mushrooms very well. I'm not very fond of them.

They're now gone. I mowed them off. That first one was a tough little thing and resisted the mower blades quite well. I had to go over it twice!

Close-ups

After I'd taken the first turkey photos I showed you yesterday, I noticed a weird-looking thing on the floor of the machine shed. From a distance, it sort of looked like a coconut half that had been cracked open. Upon closer observation, here's what I saw:

It was big, probably at least 3 inches across.

Yep, it was a mushroom (toadstool?). I thought it made for a cool macro (very close-up, as in me down on my knees) picture.

Here's a different look that I got by using the flash:

Also on the floor of the shed was this:

It's the white-tipped toes on the back foot of an otherwise all-black cat named Climber. :)

Yesterday's sightings

I took my camera outside yesterday when I went to meet Courtney at the bus. Below is what I saw. The lilacs are just beginning to bloom. And smell wonderful!

Last week on the way to meeting Courtney at the bus, I discovered this robin's nest, but I didn't have the camera along, and I never got around to going back out there with it. It had 3 eggs in it.

Yesterday I peeked in again, and two of the eggs had just hatched. These little birdies were still pretty weak, but one had its head up with mouth open wide right after Mama hopped off the nest. Unfortunately, by the time I got the camera focused, it wouldn't do it again. So new and fragile.

Then Courtney arrived and immediately decided to pick Grandma a bouquet of dandelions. Notice that she's still using the backpack I made her a couple of years ago. She usually has it loaded with a LOT of stuff, and it has really held up well! The only place showing any wear at all is the corners of the blue outside pocket, and it's minimal. Tough fabric! And it was well worth my time making it.

She found one of very few (so far) dandelion puffs and tried blowing the seeds off as she made a wish. Everything is so soggy from all the wet weather we've had, though, that they didn't blow very well. I'm afraid she's not going to get her wish for a "Kit" American Girl doll (not sure if she wants her own Kit, or mine!).

As we got back to the house, we discovered all these mushrooms (toadstools?) at the base of our hackberry tree.

Quite a crop here. I don't think I'll be harvesting any, though. ;)

That's all the pics I took yesterday. We did visit the kittens, who are just getting cuter every day, but we didn't take time for a photo shoot. Maybe next time!

Mushrooms, anyone?

With all the rain and humidity we've had lately, mushrooms have begun springing up all over our lawn. I found a lot of these tiny ones this morning. They're only about a half inch across.

Then again, maybe they're toadstools. I did also notice a lot of tiny toads when I mowed on Monday. :-)