The Mountain Thymes

Embrace frayed edges,worn pages, and laugh lines.  True beauty lies in imperfection. I haven't practiced New year's resolutions in years because I've never been successful for more than two weeks.  It's exciting and renewing at first to anticipate changing old habits at the start of a new year but then boredom sets in and I fall back into the old habits.  I'm more successful if I just make a plan of attack and do it right away no matter what month I'm in. I also love it when I read an article that justifies something that I am already doing.  Recently, in my Whole Living, body and soul in balance magazine, I came across an article entitled "Wabi Sabi You Life."  When my eyes first scanned the title, I avoided the article and continued looking for new healthy recipes to try on Cliff or DYI instructions to a new project that I could tackle.  Then one day as I sat sipping my warm lemongrass tea in one of Grandma Still's old English tea cups, th...

Today turned out to be just gorgeous.  Funny how 43 degrees with bright sun feels glorious on your face and arms.  It's all relative.  Maxine and I sat out on the side porch for awhile in the sun.  There is still a peaceful hush here only interrupted by the sound of melting snow clumps falling from the trees.   I see spots in the woods where the snow has melted and dead leaves are visible. Observing and listening to winter melt brought to mind My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George.  I loved that novel every year I read it with my fifth graders.  It has more meaning now. This gives a whole new meaning to taking the trash out!  We walked down the road this morning just to get out of the house for awhile and the walk is good exercise.  We saw lots of fresh wildlife tracks and were fortunate to catch sight of  six deer as they came down the mountain, paused and looked at us then continued down into the woods. Had lunch at our...

What a difference gravel makes! Had to hitch up the horse and buggy this morning and mosey into town. We walked down the mountain road to the car this morning to see if we could get out to the store.  It was an emergency.  I ran out of coffee creamer!!  The walk was actually very peaceful and serene.  Deer tracks with long strides show where the deer had run down the side of the mountain and we saw some large fat paw prints.  Maybe bobcat, maybe bear. Walking in the woods after a snowfall reveals the activities of nocturnal creatures.   Temperature is in the mid 30's, a few clouds now with the sun warming the ground.  It'll still be a few days though, before we can drive up and down here due to the road conditions.  The paved roads are clear and some are dry.  Once you get off Boulder Creek, the going is good.   We stopped at the diner and ordered a BLT and coffee, went to Lowe's, then picked up milk and a large container of coffee cr...

 Santa forgot to take him when he left our gifts.  Max got a new play cube.  John and Carolyn sent my favorite Kansas wines.  We visited Somerset Vineyards when we out there and did some wine tasting. Good gifts......warm winter hat and gloves.  What a Christmas!  There's always someone worse off than what you're going through and this morning it's blizzard conditions in New England.  This was Christmas day as the snow quieted the woods.   Early in the day, Mark drove his rental down to the bottom of Boulder Creek and left it so he could get out Sunday and try to make his flight back to MO.  Cliff drove him back up but later brought the red car down and left it so we could get out when the main roads cleared.  If Mark had brought his winter boots, we would have walked the road and enjoyed the quiet and peace that comes with a new snowfall.  He doesn't mind this and often walks the parks out in MO after a snowfall....

That's what spectators yell at a rodeo performance when a cowgirl is thrown and stands up even if all her bones are broken!  Our power returned at 10:32 PM.  We had just gone to bed with layers of clothes on in anticipation of a long heatless night. Cliff ran the generator and the kerosene heater until 10 which made life bearable for the three of us.  Just having lights and warmth kept the spirits up.  This morning we have hot coffee and can flush toilets.  What more could a person need?

We've been without power since 1:30 PM.  So how am I blogging, you ask???????  Cliff hooked up something to another thing that connected to a router that is connected to the battery backup on the side of the house from the power company.  Got that?  So I'm typing quickly before the house battery dies. It's 6:30 PM now. Just as I took the turkey out of the oven the power dropped and was gone.   Luckily, the potatoes and winter squash were done.  The turkey should have been done because it had been cooking for 4 1/2 hours.......but it wasn't.  Not sure if the dozen flickers of power confused the oven elements or not.  So our dinner was a bread dressing, a new recipe that I tried and don't like, squash, cranberry sauce, and a baked potato, pumpkin pie and whipped cream.  We have a fire in the fireplace and a few minutes ago Cliff fired up the generator that he just repaired last week!  We're able to read and I can use the internet as long...

Mark arrived safely early Thursday afternoon . Friday we all went to the gym for an hour and burned a few calories, then mingled in with the last minute shoppers weaving our cart through the flow of people.  After working up an appetite from our strenuous morning , we headed to the Japanese buffet at the Tin Loon in Blue Ridge, GA.  We took Mark to Mercier's Orchard but we were all too full to eat fried pie with ice-cream .  Gives us something to look forward to on his net trip out.   It's been snowing all morning and we probably have 6 inches on the ground now at 12:30 .  The turkey, potatoes, and dressing are still cooking.  Electricity has been flickering for about the last hour.  We're hoping to get the diner cooked before we lose power. If not we'll have to eat candy, fudge, pistachios, and cashews.......good food groups.  I'll be back with more pictures...........