Sweet House Guest

We're delighted to have Miss P-A with us for a short stint, while her owner takes a vacation. She's a welcome distraction from the humdrum task of packing and sorting and tossing

She's finding so much dirt and fluff!

She has sea glass eyes and the softest fur ever!

Melt

Melt is happening

Ice slowly disintegrates

One drop at a time

Doesn't this look like the hands and forearms of someone doing push-ups?

Slice of Ice

I've been watching this strange slice of ice crystals for a few days now, and have been curious about its unusual shape. 

I think snow/ice accumulated along the channel between the glass and frame of the storm door, and as the temperatures warmed, the snow edges drooped downwards from the frame, leaving this distinctive shape.

Gorgeous Patterns

Look at the beautiful rust and water marks on this piece of paper found at the bottom of our metal camping chest - pretty neat!

The patterns and sinuous lines are gorgeous

Did you Guess Right?

 The close up, cropped piece of photo came from this - a glass of beer on my windowsill with trees, snow and sunset in the background.

Can you Guess?

I've taken this element of the photo right out of context ... any ideas what it might be?

I'll let you stew on this till tomorrow

A Flour Emergency

We've run out of flour! This must be a first ... I never thought I'd see the day! So, no home-made pizza tonight, nor banana bread with those over-ripe bananas. And, at least it was flour we ran out of and not wine!

This is of course, part of my plan to use up all my dry goods groceries before I move. So from now on, no more storage, just packet to packet, day to day. 

Snow White

In an attempt to celebrate not having to "appreciate" snow again in my life after this season's over, I took some pics of pristine, white snow. There are always interesting new shapes and textures to discover!

This is to help me remember what I won't be missing when I'm in rainy Wales.

We Escaped Unscathed

The Monster Blizzard we were expecting became instead a loud, windy night with only about 3 inches of new snow (and I'm glad). I really hate having to listen to the wind doing its thing out there.

We didn't get hammered, and didn't lose power! It looked awfully bleak for a while, and today the sun is shining again. So much bluster!

Serpentine Snow

Serpentine snow trails

Creep along our pergola:

Amazing patterns

Back to Square One

No, it's not spring, despite what I thought ... we had about 4 days of above- freezing temperatures, and now back to this! It's killing me!

Where's the sun?

A Vast Emptiness

This is the state of our move ... enveloping emptiness all around!

Of course, the emptiness of these spaces fills up others - my recycling bin, the trash can, my car, our packing crates ... it's a very messy business.

What We Stumble Across

The process of relocating to another country (again), stirs up many memories and so much nostalgia, especially when you start sorting through old photos and such ... So please forgive my indulgence here as I share this little "booklet" I created to prepare my then 2.5 year old and 11 month old for the journey from South Africa to the U.S. 32 years ago. Dale was already in the U.S., having started his job, found us an apartment, and bought a new car, so we flew across to reunite with him. I read the 'book' before, and during, the journey to help prepare them (my 2.5 year old particularly) for the changes and procedures that we'd have to endure along the way. I kept it!

Lucy was in the baby sling (as seen in most drawings) and Linus walked and held my hand, while cuddling his favorite stuffed animal, Pookie. Notice in my drawing that I was naïve enough to think I'd be able to sit back and read a book during our layover! My little toddler didn't sleep at all and ended up having a meltdown on the last leg of the journey to Boston. A very kind passenger offered to hold my sleeping infant so that I could deal with my toddler's crisis. How thoughtful! 

As it turns out, I was off by a whole day on the anticipated arrival date, but thankfully Dale realized it himself and was waiting for us at the airport a day earlier than expected. Phew! Thank goodness for analytical people! We all burst into tears at being together again, and Lucy did the honors of christening our first new car by throwing up on the way home! All in all, a very memorable journey.

Here's the story, presented in 2 columns, each row to be read from left to right (I forgot to number them!)

Wanting More

Here's an interesting perspective from the confessional poet, Sylvia Plath:

"Perhaps when we find ourselves wanting everything, it is because we are dangerously close to wanting nothing."

To me, it's similar to the idiom "the more you have, the more you WANT," yet it goes further by suggesting that more won't fill the hollowness we might feel. The desire to want and have things is not satisfied by MORE, because you likely already have everything you need and don't realize that having things is NOT what satisfies or makes a good life. The emptiness inside doesn't go away by acquiring more things to fill that space.

Ice for Posterity

Okay, so ice formations don't last forever, but I hope that by having captured its fragility here, it will be stored for posterity, to be appreciated at any time (especially seeing as I won't be spending another winter in New England).

The thin, delicate edges are beautifully rounded, like icy fern leaves

How beautiful!

Spring Yet?

We still have a lot of snow in our yard, but the light is stronger and longer and warmer already ...

And there's some compaction of the snow layer, too.

And some melting! The birds seem to be happy and active, too.

Inventorying

Ah, me! For our Transfer of Residence form, we have to inventory all that we want to bring into our new country - how much crockery, cutlery, toiletries, stationery, computers, tools, chairs, rugs etc to show we're taking only enough for a household, and are not importing things to sell. Ugh, what a job - it obviously forces us to make decisions, sort and evaluate quicker, but do I really need to count how many knives, forks, spoons and mugs I have? Should I multiply each fork by 4, and cake forks by 3 since they have a different number of tines? Okay, so I'm being facetious, but really! I guess I should simply say, 2 x 12 place settings or some such.

How many screws, bolts, pictures, or towels? Needles, nuts and nails? How many pens and pencils? Come on! These are parts of the re-locating process one doesn't anticipate - it's tedious and time-consuming.

We've scheduled the container company to come and collect our house contents during the week of April 20, so we're working furiously towards that goal.

Gnawing Teeth

 

Winter's icy teeth

Gnaw into my bones and soul

Endurance gets old.

Green Ice

 Sea ice cyanobacteria

Wow, fascinating observations! Just had to share from the Phys Org site

January 28, 2026
Surprising green ice on Lake Lipno: Cyanobacteria bloom in mid-winter
by Biology Centre of the Czech Academy of Sciences
edited by Sadie Harley, reviewed by Robert Egan

An unusual natural phenomenon appeared on Lake Lipno in South Bohemia, the Czech Republic, at the end of 2025. Large amounts of accumulated cyanobacteria in the water caused the ice to turn green. The phenomenon was thoroughly documented by hydrobiologists from the Biology Center of the Czech Academy of Sciences, who also collected and analyzed water samples.

Green ice on Lake Lipno caused by cyanobacteria in December 2025. Credit: Petr Znachor, BC CAS

As there are very few scientific records of this phenomenon worldwide, the green ice on Lake Lipno will rank among the best-documented cases globally. The event confirms that Lake Lipno has long been burdened by an excess of nutrients in the water (so-called eutrophication) and is also affected by ongoing climate warming, with ecological changes occurring even outside the traditional summer season.

Microscopic analysis of the collected samples confirmed that the organism responsible was the common cyanobacterium Woronichinia naegeliana, which also dominates Lake Lipno during summer and autumn. The primary driver of cyanobacterial growth is an excess of nutrients in the water, especially phosphorus, which largely results from human activities.

While on most Czech reservoirs cyanobacterial blooms gradually disappear with the onset of autumn and usually vanish by the end of September, Lake Lipno is an exception in this respect. Long-term data show that cyanobacteria often dominate here until November and can occur in smaller amounts even during December and January.

Green ice on Lake Lipno caused by cyanobacteria. Credit: Petr Znachor, BC CAS

Green ice reflects long-term environmental change

At the end of 2025, cyanobacterial biomass remained near the water surface for an unusually long time, from autumn until the reservoir froze over, most likely due to a combination of calm weather, weak winds, and a long duration of sunshine. Beneath the thin and locally very transparent ice cover, the accumulated cyanobacteria formed striking green patches visible both from the shore and in aerial photographs.

The green ice was most pronounced during a temporary warming around Christmas Eve. After refreezing, a particularly distinctive feature was the formation of so-called "cyanobacterial eyes"—areas of clear ice above dark cyanobacterial aggregates caused by differences in the absorption of solar radiation. The phenomenon persisted until the end of the year and likely ended only after heavy snowfall reduced light penetration beneath the ice.

"Green ice on Lake Lipno fits into the long-term changes we observe here in connection with eutrophication and ongoing climate change. It suggests that we may witness similar surprises more frequently in the future," says hydrobiologist Petr Znachor from the Biology Center of the Czech Academy of Sciences.

A close-up view of cyanobacteria frozen in ice with bubbles of produced oxygen confirms that photosynthesis was taking place. Credit: Petr Znachor, BC CAS

Under-ice occurrences of cyanobacteria are rare worldwide and have so far been documented only in a limited number of cases. The recent observations at Lake Lipno, therefore, rank among the best-described records and also show that even common cyanobacterial species can exhibit atypical behavior under certain conditions.

Crushing It

 Some leftover wintergreen candy canes, unwanted. I crushed them ...

and then stirred some into a cheesecake, with the remainder sprinkled on top. Not too bad, it just tasted a little bit like mouthwash!