Grumpy About Graupel

 No, we didn't just spill a whole bag of styrene pellets across the yard ...

These horrid little white balls came plummeting from the sky!

April is really testing us this year. I felt good about crushing some just to get my frustration out!

Container Tales

We were all ready for our container pickup this morning, with our own personal team of four additional helpers, when a disappointing call from the movers forced us to reschedule our week. They couldn't get our container loaded and on its way to us because a crane was malfunctioning.

Look at how ready and organized we were:

Packed and labeled, ready and waiting, waiting, waiting ... our pickup has been rescheduled for Wednesday, 2 days hence. Our helpers, one of whom was wearing a new engagement ring (yes! Linus and Rachael got engaged last night), changed gear and used their time with us to work on other physical tasks still undone.

Dale and Dan had some time together in our bedroom watching the bed compress into its shipping package. Tom joined them later and made quite an impression!

We're keeping our fingers crossed that Wednesday will really be IT, but we shall see. Delays really are disappointing

How We're Rolling

We're packing up our household goods, including pots, pans, plates, mugs, glasses and cutlery. We planned to use second hand items of crockery and cutlery from our local Swap Shed in the interim, instead of using disposable paper and plastic goods. 

This satisfies my recycling and resourceful side. Once we're done with all the borrowed kitchenware, we'll return it to the Swap Shed.

I'm also rinsing out jam jars, yogurt containers and coffee canisters to use now that I'm packing away my food canisters. No need for disposables yet ...

We've been using up all kinds of dry goods and condiments found at the back of our pantry shelf and at the bottom of our chest freezer. Quite interesting to have unexpected condiments. I find myself being brave and resourceful, substituting things I wouldn't' normally dream of has yielded some okay results. Daring myself not to throw food away, I created a pasta 'sauce' using a combination of Woodstock organic jalapeno relish, Mark's left-behind salsa, sour cream and cheese. We quite enjoyed it!

Prejudice

The backdrop for this thought-provoking quote is actually a photo of my fridge, with the kitchen LED light strips reflected on the stainless steel door, creating long streaks. Weird! This is what you see when you do some night walking.

Mud Tube Gallery

 I was so excited to find these mud tubes made by subterranean insects (ants or termites) between two pieces of vertical slate. 

They create these tubes to keep themselves in the dark and moist when foraging for food and leaving the nest. What intriguing routes and patterns they create!

 

Leaf Peeper

I came across this beautiful specimen whilst working in my flower bed. It was sluggish and calm amongst the leaves.

Photo: D. Schultz

It tolerated both of us approaching and watching it - this is the Northern water snake (Nerodia sipedon), a non venomous native.

Photo: D. Schultz

I love how jagged its outline looks, since each scale is ridged, or keeled, making it appear more rough-edged, not sleek-looking.

Photo: D. Schultz

We spent a fair amount of time watching it, and when it eventually uncoiled, it did so without slithering off and away. We decided to walk away and leave it in peace to warm up in the spring sunshine.

Negative Space

Guest post: Dale Schultz

Little blocks of snow

A trellis patisserie

Fleeting enjoyment

Shapely Ice

This is what we were greeted with the morning after we switched on our garden sprinkler! Still below freezing overnight, despite the warm days.

Grumpy, yet Gorgeous

April delivered a shock last week - a snow shower that had an accumulation of about 2 inches. It made me feel so bad-tempered and grumpy that everything had become white again, but it looked gorgeous despite my dissatisfaction with this little setback!

Dale even had to take shelter in the carport to get his handyman jobs done, and traipse back and forth through snow. Spring flakes always seem to be large, easily captured mistakenly in photos:

And here I was, busy painting with a color called Spring Hill on this cruel day!

Dragon Horns

I was delighted to find this beautiful green lichen amongst the moss last week - I think it's possibly dragon's horn lichen (Claydonia squamosa). It has the scaly, pointy spires covered in scales. 

It's in the same genus as the very colorful British soldier lichen, and very moss-like. I love this shade of green - it reminds me of smoky sea glass or the foamy green of the ocean when waves break.

To give an indication of how teeny and delicate these threads (dragon horns!) are, I included my thumb for scale

Spring!

Wood ducks have returned!

Mallards squawk their loud presence

Sleek mergansers dive ...

Pedestals

Pedestals of ice

Decorate my melting cove

Different each day

Spring Drops

I was intrigued by what looked like glassy buds on this shrub at Hannaford's - turned out to be drops of spring rain clinging onto last years' nubs!

Empty Spaces

Our house is looking so empty as we take down pictures, coathooks and wallmounts, and remove scatter rugs.

 Without posters and pictures, spaces echo if you sneeze!

Our living room has become so much bigger without all the trimmings and decor.

And gosh, am I tired of opening paint cans and cleaning up after the seemingly continual 'touch ups'.

and all the while, the days are slipping by ...