Wednesday

One storm down, another before us. It may become "just" a snowstorm, or it may turn into a full scale blizzard. A blizzard would be awkward. So, I'm tracking the system and hoping for something that wont unravel my plans for the weekend.

 

 

In the meantime, it is really pretty outside! The winds have (temporarily) stopped and the wet snow is clinging to every available surface. Were I a truly dedicated photographer, I'd spend the morning tracking down the loveliest images. As it is, you get a handful of morning walk pictures. Good enough, no??

I am monitoring the comings and goings of our barn cats. Several of them are refusing to leave the farmhouse because of the snow. That would be fine were it not for the fact that their digestive system demands an occasional potty run. I'm giving them the evil eye: one accident in the farmhouse and I am going to pick them up and dump them into a snowbank! Consider yourselves warned!

Breakfast? We eat after we clear the paths and driveway. Well, I just do the farmhouse path. Ed blows out the rest.

And now is the time to take out the skis. First time this winter! We drive to our park down the road.

 

 

 

We had hoped that they would pack down the trails early in the day, but they didn't, so we just follow the foot tracks of those giants who have come before us.

Beautiful stuff! But tough going. When there is a level surface, you're pushing yourself forward as if in snowshoes. Hardly the speed and facility of a glide. Still, we are happy. The forest on a winter day does that to you. 

In the afternoon, the kids come home with me. 

You'd guess that they want to play in the snow, but the fact is, they've each had two snow filled recesses and what they really need is a period of R&R. Cozy, inside, with lots of reading and snacking. And a few mice on skis.

And in the evening I make chili. Of course. You cannot imagine a better night for it.

with love...

snowy Tuesday

 

 

It was expected. The only question hanging over us is how much? Surely enough to ski, though of course, there are greater concerns: enough to disrupt the power grid? Enough to knock out the internet? Enough to back up air travel? 

For us, so long as we have power, a snow day is beautiful. It's a moment to exhale, because the kids are home with the parents. A disruption for them, as work demands pile up and kids get antsy, but for us, it's a moment to take stock and catch up. And appreciate the sheer beauty of a snow covered landscape.

 

Breakfast scores high points on the cozy scale. I have leftover croissants with my cherry bourbon jam from the farmers market, my paper white bulbs are blooming, the milky coffee is exquisite (or so it seems -- everything in the kitchen seems exquisite on a snowy day).

(cats at play)

The snow continues all day long and the winds kick in to make it rather fierce out there. Should we go out? We opt for walking the paved blocks of the development to the back of the farmette lands. It's gutsy and gusty and we get wet and our cheeks feel are pummeled by horizontally falling snow.

(looking at the back of the farmette lands...)

In the afternoon I watch the snow, and I organize the household to withstand some comings and goings later in the week. I've learned what I need to do before I take off anywhere if I'm to have smooth transitions on the departure and on the return. I set to it.

And the cats complain about the snow, and the walkway needs constant clearing, and the dusk comes quickly to our household.

My heart is with my good friend tonight. We all struggle with the tough milestones in life, but at the moment hers are at peak levels. Still, I'm reminded of a comment posted to as article in the NYTimes today, responding to the idea that January is the best month because it's full of quiet moments and low expectations after the tumult of December. The commenter noted -- I'm in my 70s and for people my age, every month is the best month! So true. We don't distinguish anymore. To be here with people we love -- this is what makes each day so good...

Monday

This I know for sure: tomorrow the kids will not go to school. Tomorrow there will be statewide closures. Tomorrow we may lose electricity and internet. We have been warned: tomorrow we're getting our big snowstorm of the season.

And today? Today I'm thinking about sports. You may love watching them. Me, not so much the watching, but I've always had a love for doing sports recreationally. Ever since I was a kid, I'd want to give any and every sport a try. Early childhood was limited for me to biking in the Polish village where I spent my summers, and winter skating in the city. With a very occasional ski episode thrown in. Then came the real sampling. At the university in Warsaw, my friends and I plunged into skiing. Of the kind where you side step your way up the hill and go down and then repeat that for maybe 100 times. (Not much by way of ski lifts in postwar Poland). When I moved to the US at age 19,  I reveled in the skiing possibilities that were suddenly before me.  East coast, west coast, Europe -- I loved all mountains everywhere. But, by mid twenties, I was settled into a married life with a guy who hated the cold and, too, we lived in the Midwest and none of our friends skied and we had no money for it anyway, so there closed that door. Were there other sports? In grade school in NY I was a good basketball player, but then I moved back to Poland and no one was playing basketball -- they were all keen volley ball players. I had to hustle to learn and honestly, I never caught up to the good players. Ed got me going on tennis, but I was nearly a senior then, so again, I'd say that no advanced tennis player would ever ask me to be on their team. 

The point is, that to be good at a sport, it's best to start young and to keep at it. Therefore, despite the fact that I was a so called "tomboy" growing up, very athletic, very in love with the great outdoors, all that moving between Poland and the US, all those changes of friends, of geographical spaces, of cultures meant that I never stayed with anything for long and thus I became excellent at none of it.

But is this so awful? One could argue that being a little good at many things is better than being a lot good at just one, or two. Dabbling -- my specialty! -- allows you to sample a culture, even if you are never quite a member of the select club of experts. You can feel comfortable in many homes. You don't feel lost and out of place. You've tried it. You know the basics. I could pass around a volley ball if pushed to do so. Or dribble a basketball, or swat a tennis ball. I could certainly whizz down a ski slope at dizzying speeds, even if my technique is on the side of wild rather than refined.

You could say that I'm at peace with my very many imperfections!

All this is in my head because today my daughter asked me to deliver Snowdrop for her first evening class of volley ball. 

To date, Snowdrop has had lessons in tennis (meh....), skating (me as coach; she loves it, but doesn't do it enough to be really good), softball (loves it, but there are friends who play, so that may be the motivating factor), swimming (coached by me, infrequently, so she isn't nearly as good as her swimming friends), soccer (double meh...), and now this -- volley ball. A distant friend does it and so she wanted to join her. I'm thinking she's on track to imitate me: many things, but none of them have really sucked her in big time. And that's okay, though I'm hoping that something will draw her in so that she will rise to a level where she can say -- I'm good because I've been doing this forever, since I was a kid...

This is all evening stuff. I do have a morning and an afternoon and they're both busy. The usual...

And the less usual for this day: breakfast with my friend who is having the kind of life's worries most of us do not ever have to face. All I can do is listen and balance our meetups with more lighthearted stories which perhaps is a good distraction, but maybe, too, a little too trite and trivial considering what she is facing. 

Then (after all my luggage deliberations!) I return my new suitcase (too small). And pick up Snowdrop. 

Here is the issue: her mom and I have been trying to coax her into a haircut. I've said to her that not a single child in her school has hair as long as hers, thinking that perhaps peer comparisons will sway her. Her hair is so difficult to manage, and made more difficult by the fact that she hates tying it back. But, she wanted to grow it out ("all the way to my butt!") and no one wants to be firm about something that is seemingly so important for her. Until this December, when, armed with parental support, I finally told her that at some point, she has to get it cut. Not until after my birthday! -- was her reply. So I made an appointment. For today.

I have a lifetime of trying to be firm with the kids, at the same time that I know I'm a terrible pushover and they can pretty much talk me into anything reasonable. So leaving me with a girl who does not want that hair cut was doomed from the get-go. Indeed, she got it trimmed by three inches (according to her, by a whole foot!), but it will make little difference. It is still very long. And it still will hang down and get tangled and not stay out of her face. Bottom line -- she's unhappy about the shortness of it and I'm unhappy about my own failure to accomplish what I set out to do -- get it to a reasonable length.

Back to the farmhouse now.

Snowdrop has had quite the ride in the past few weeks -- the never ending holiday celebrations, the birthday stuff -- all great highs. I do think she needs some recovery time and today we try to do stuff slowly. To read, to eat well, to go easy on life.

And at 6, I take her to her volleyball lesson. (Pony tail needed for that one!)

 

 

 

I have no idea how that went. I did not stick around to watch. May she find joy in that game, in some game, in being with friends, in feeling herself grow competent at many, many things.

Me, I go back and reheat some soup for us. It's been a long day!

with love...

Sunday

The calm before the storm. Ha! Be careful what you wish for -- we may get walloped by snow twice over this week! If there is one time I do not want a snow event it's this week, toward the end of it, when I'm supposed to be traveling. Ah, January. It's never boring, although some would argue that it's awfully long. Indeed, I keep thinking we're halfway through it and we're still on the first week. 

So we wait for see what happens next. Blizzard? School closures? Or, as sometimes happens, will it all blow over and fizzle to a few flakes? In the meantime, there is that stillness that so often preceded big weather events.

(red combs on hens, red chair)

Ed is late for breakfast. Meaning, all is ready and then he gets a phone call. The cat and I are patient, but only so much. The coffee has to be hot or else the hygge elements are lost. (What we play to keep ourselves happy in the winter!)

Okay, we're all at the table now and the subject of discussion is cats. There was a brawl outside and the newest interloper here -- Pancake -- got beaten up by one of the pack from the shed. At least this is Ed's reconstruction of events that took place outside at 4 a.m. It was loud enough that he went to investigate. His presence broke things up quickly enough, but we can tell that Pancake is scuffed up a bit. We're hoping that the territorial order is set for a while. I truly dislike these animals squabbles even as I understand that this is how they sort things out among themselves.

 

Unexpectedly, I have a free day today as the young family is otherwise occupied tonight. This is on balance good: I have much to take care of at home and, too, Ed coaxes us out for a walk in the afternoon -- so needed after all that couch sitting! Everything about our walks is always grand... Even the views from the car coming and going.

And still, I keep checking the weather. Storm number one -- Tuesday. Storm number two -- maybe Friday. Oh, the excitement of this season! 

What we need (for supper) is a big pot of hot soup. I'm on it!

with love.

snow day party day

It's pretty, it's unexpected, it's wet, there's not much of it. The cats hate it anyway.

We wake up to a gentle cover of snow.

Oh, the possibilities that snow offers! Can we ski? Can we play? Can we stay inside and just admire the loveliness of a white landscape?

I have to say that the push-pull here is tremendous. On the one hand, a deep snow would unquestionably lure us outside to ski. We haven't done it since last winter and we're both itching to be out there gliding again. Me with my new knee! (So I better not tumble because I'm not quite sure if getting up will be as easy as it was before.) But when we step out, the snow feels too clumpy, the cover -- insufficient. So, should we go for a hike in the forest? When the warm house feels so toasty pleasant and there is all that good reading before us? And trip planning and spring plant searching?

We go. Getting out of the winter lazies is a huge challenge for us and if we indulge those lazies on a day that's actually quite pretty, well then we're doomed!

And in fact, we love the quiet of the forest on a snowy day! All of it is fabulous! Why do we always hesitate?!

But by early afternoon I have to scoot off to the Human Society. Snowdrop is having her friend birthday party there and I'm not only the photographer for the event, but, too, the ice cream cake that we purchased yesterday is in my freezer. And I'm eager to see the girl herself: she got the gift she really wanted today -- pierced ears!

There are a lot of lively third-graders at the party and it really is great to put faces to at least some of the names I hear about after a day in school. They are a solid, fun bunch. And her two brothers. Who are at once able to fit right in, and then at other times, a little on their own. 

The Humane Society is a beloved place for Snowdrop -- she is your typical animal lover -- and she was thrilled that they actually offered a party venue for kids. It's a structured program where they learn about some of the animal care there, they make toys for cats, then they visit and view the pets for adoption and finally -- and perhaps this is the best part, aside from the cake -- they get to pet hamsters and rats, and hold a snake. 

Fun, right? 

(Sparrow passes on the holding/petting of rodents and reptiles, but Sandpiper has no reservations...)

Happy Birthday, dear Snowdrop, happy birthday to you!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dinner at home is very late. If Ed and I felt lazy about the hike, we surely succumbed to the super lazies by evening time. Eventually I scrambled some eggs. And threw some mushrooms and asparagus into the oven. That's it. I'll get my motivation rolling again. Tomorrow. Maybe.

And there you have it! A beautiful winter Saturday. I hope you had a fine one as well!

Friday, the 5th

Are you awake? This from Ed. Early. Like way before dawn. He wants to show me what the person he hired in Argentina, a woman who is an origami expert, came up with in terms of shape folding. (He's been working on ways to cut and fold sheet metal to needed specifications and he decided he could use some artistic expertise.) She charges $10 an hour and she came up with not one but four ways to create the shape we need!

It is impressive how much you can collaborate with persons in remote corners of the world on various projects. Still, it is also very early in the morning. And now the cats are up and the house is no longer in slumber mode.

I go outside. It's icy cold, but not as cold as it will be by the middle of the month. And that cold is much needed! You skip the deep freeze one year and bugs that should not survive here in Wisconsin ravage the summer landscape. We depend on our super cold weather. My one gripe this year is that we haven't the snow to make it a fun kind of cold.

Breakfast. 

And now I am busy, extremely busy because to you it may be Friday, but to one of my grandchildren it is the 5th! Snowdrop turns 9 today. So I have to bake a cake, per her specification: it must be chocolate, with chocolate frosting, but not only. She requested dabs of lemon frosting decoration and candied violets throughout. It's actually sweet that she remembers bits of this fancy work that I'd brought to cakes in the past. I get to work.

Too, they're all coming here for a dinner celebration. (Her instructions: crunchy chicken and spaghetti pasta and roasted asparagus with lemon, no, maybe corn after all, please!) And of course, I need to pick them up at school, and, too, we have a balloon errand to run and my daughter to pick up, oh, and an ice cream cake to buy for tomorrow's party -- I tell you, it's a busy set of hours!

 (pick up)

 

(paper/balloon store)

(ice cream and ice cream cakes)

at the farmhouse

(Sandpiper comes!)

(dinner!)

(the cake)

(with mommy)

Amazing girl! Smiled all day long! Happy happy day indeed!

With so much love...

Thursday

You wont believe what is going through my head: I am suddenly immersed in thoughts about growing flowers.

It's January! Everyone knows that this is when you put together the outline of your spring garden. This is when you case out nurseries (online) to see what their stock is like. It's when you think about structural changes to your flower beds. There's no better time for it, especially if you live in Wisconsin and you're totally bummed by the cold, gray, snowless winter outside.

(the sun on my morning walk again lasts only for a few minutes...)

(I drive to the bakery to restock on croissants (for everyone) and cookies (for Sparrow and Ed). The lake is still completely unfrozen! It's cold, but there have been warmer days as well. Last year we were bouncing around on the ice already. We'd put in several days on skis. This year? Cold but without the good stuff!)

(happy to be back here!)

I've messed around with plants inside for a few weeks now. I have four pots of forced bulbs going right now, one which I brought to the breakfast table today.

They're lovely but fleeting. Still, I'm learning how to grow these in a house that hasn't the requisite temperatures (they need cooler air or else they topple), nor the needed hours of sunlight (we have some, but not enough).

So I hit the catalogues, just to look, to consider, to think about the next season that is if not around the corner, then pretty darn close anyway!

And in the afternoon I am back to picking up the two older kids at school.

We had good routines going before winter break and I imagined (not incorrectly) that we would need a little while to click back into that rhythm. Still, the kids surprise me: within an hour we are back on track, everyone happy, in their groove, moving splendidly through the afternoon.

Evening: only now does it feel like December is behind us and we have moved forward. Kid pick up at school, me cutting up fruits for their afternoon snack, reading that heart wrenching book about the evacuated children of London during World War II (where did we leave off? no, gaga, we read that chapter! next one! And from Sparrow - gaga, your voice sounds better, but it's still a little weird...), cranking up the heat, letting the terrified cats out (the children are back? run for your life!!)... All normal, all as before, even though it's 2024.