March 10th

Sunday, March 10th, 2019

Photographically, there have been some pretty cool situations I’ve found myself in.

Anytime I see our Barred Owl time seems to stand still, coming upon our resident doe standing just off our driveway munching on the thistle, unconcerned of our presence, the time I went over to the neighbors to photograph their blooming apple trees and a skunk was happily rooting around too (skunks are pretty cool, they get a bad rap), the time the turkey was standing on our front porch, and looked in the window at me.

Despite all of those times I felt lucky, like I was in the right place, right time, today blows those out of the water.

Paul and I had watched an otter slide on his belly to the lake earlier this morning, which is a rare sight out here, so we knew he was around, but we expected that to be the last time we would see him.

So, with that expectation, there may have been a lot of excited yelling in our house as I ran for my camera after I looked out our kitchen window to this:

“HE IS COMING UP OUR DRIVEWAY!”

I ran out onto our porch for a better look, and sure enough, here he came.

This otter came up our driveway and all the way up onto our cement pad in front of our garage.

And if that isn’t magical enough, he stopped and looked at me long enough for me to get a good picture of him (main image).

Then just as quickly as he came, he turned to his left (away from me), hopped the snowbank on the side of our house, and slid through our backyard and down through the field onto the lake.

I was dumbstruck.

He was mere feet away from me, at my house. On a snowy Sunday morning.

March 3rd

Sunday, March 3rd, 2019

It’s really cold again.

So cold that the only critters out and about today were these two crows, digging through the inches of snow to the pile of corn Paul threw out into the field a couple weeks ago.

Speaking of Paul, it’s his birthday today!

I know you’ll read this (because you always read my blog you overachiever), so Happy birthday, sweet heart. I love you!

March 2nd

Saturday, March 2nd, 2019

How many of you took a few extra minutes admiring the frozen beauty out your window this morning? If you know me, you know that Hoar Frost is one of my favorite wintertime weather phenomenons, so I know I sure did!

But you know what I like even better? Green grass. 😉

February 20th

Wednesday, February 20th, 2019

Seven and one half inches later, the system has officially moved through.

I love a good snowstorm, especially when I can plan for it and not have to leave my house. Today’s storm was nearly perfect; little wind, large fluffy flakes, and even amounts throughout the day. I was able to go out and shovel out the chicken’s run periodically throughout the day and keep up on it which is always helpful.

Even still, having a driveway a third of a mile long is close to impossible to shovel.

Luckily, I have a super neat dad that brings his tractor over to plow us out. With the amount of snow over the past few weeks, dad loaded the blower on the back of the tractor to try and throw the snow out into the fields surrounding our house (and theirs) to help keep our snow piles at a manageable size.

Thanks, dad!

February 19th

Tuesday, February 19th, 2019

Large shadowy blobs in trees always make me stop for  a better look.

More often than not, they’re large birds. To me, a bird worth photographing.

Sitting in my office this morning, I saw a blob in one of our trees out front. It’s a tree that doesn’t often have birds that sit in it, so my interest was more peaked than normal.

This blob shifted in the tree, and the light hit it – a rooster pheasant!

I should’ve known – the pheasants always come out before a big snowstorm. Time to buckle down!

February 15th

Friday, February 15th, 2019

If you clicked into this post instead of just viewing the image from my main page, you’re in for a treat.

I saved some of my best images for those who fully committed to this post 😉

When Paul’s February schedule came out, we were first disappointed when we saw that Paul worked Valentine’s Day. That feeling quickly changed to excitement when we realized that although Paul was working, he would fly into Helena, Montana that night and not fly back out until Saturday – a thirty hour layover!

Loads were perfect, so I joined him on his flight here last night, where we picked up our rental truck and went to the hotel for the night.

We got up early this morning ready for our mini road trip! It was snowing, and in Montana it’s common for roads to stay snow packed all winter, so we threw the truck into four high and hit the road.

We had picked up a Montana road map last night, so looked it over and picked a direction that would bring us to a ghost town and started there.

Inches of snow still covered the mountain roads, and admittedly I was slightly terrified, but it was breathtaking.

We finally made it to Marysville, and pulled onto “Main Street” – which was covered in at least a foot of snow. In the picture of Paul above, he’s standing in out truck’s track.

Although very snowy, it was beautiful! It provided a lot of perspective on how tough those who originally lived here were.

After that little adventure, we came back down off the mountain and kept moving toward the town of Lincoln.

It was still snowing, and visibility wasn’t great, but when we saw large, dark shapes on the road ahead I was PUMPED.

AN ELK HERD!!!

As we approached, half the herd hustled across the road (and jumped over fences effortlessly!), while the other half moved back to the originating side of the road.

It was probably the highlight of the day for me. I had seen elk in Yellowstone when we went for our Honeymoon, but this herd wasn’t habituated to people. Truly amazing.

We pushed on and eventually stopped snowing. After passing through Lincoln, we found other friends along the way.

There was wildlife everywhere – I was in heaven! Many of them weren’t close enough to photograph, but there was so much life everywhere!

After moving out of mountain country, we found ourselves in ranchign country and while very different, it was just as beautiful.

This area was called Avon Valley, and they’re known for being “old school” out there. It proved to be true when driving around we say hay stacks.

Not stacks of hay bales – legit piles of loose hay. Hay stacks.

Traditonal and admirable.

February 12th

Tuesday, February 12th, 2019

Paul and went back to the farm to dig out our north facing barn door this morning and Henna was in a state of euphoria.

Snow. Snow. Snow. Snow. Snow.

Sweet wonderul powdery snow.

Up and down the snow piles, racing around the buildings, hurdling snow drifts… she was in a form of Henna heaven.

The most hilarious? The extent in which she went to “catch” the snow we were shoveling. No one would’ve believed the acrobatics, so I stopped to photograph her.

Seriously, her athleticism is astounding. She was four, five feet off the ground flipping, whipping, and twisting.

I think by the time we left she was actually worn out.

February 10th

Sunday, February 10th, 2019

I usually hate driving on snowy roads, but today was the exception.

LOOK AT HOW GORGEOUS IT ALL IS!

The sun had just started to come back out, so the snowy landscape gained some dimension and the snow was still so clean. Pristine.

It was like a snow globe; a winter wonderland.

Here’s looking at you for giving us some incredible beauty, God.

February 8th

Friday, February 8th, 2019

The sun rose over the snowy landscape this morning, and it was breathtaking.

With Paul’s job we could live anywhere, and have seriously considered many different places around the country to call home (just to name a few: Wyoming, South Dakota, Georgia, Tennessee, Northern Arizona, back to Grand Forks if you can believe that…). And before any of you freak out thinking that we’re moving tomorrow, take a deep breath – it’s fun to dream!

But this morning looking out my window, I was reminded just why we haven’t left.

While the cold tends to wear on a person, the beauty of fresh snow on a calm (albeit cold) morning is the most peaceful thing I’ve ever experienced.

So peaceful that the wind hasn’t blown the snow from the trees.

So peaceful that the snow remains clear of any tracks.

So peaceful that you can almost hear the sun rise.

It’s simply marvelous, and there’s nothing else like it.

 

February 7th

Thursday, February 7th, 2019

It’s snowy in my little part of the world today. A few inches of snow have already fallen, and a few more are expected.

Because I’m Minnesotan, we automatically default to talking about the weather – so, on Facebook and Instagram today I posed the question – what’s the weather like in your part of the world? Or if you yourself are Minnesotan, how do you feel about the snow?

This post was probably one of my favorites I’ve ever posted – and it was a picture of myself (go figure that would be the way it worked out, ha).

I thought most of my followers were fellow Minnesotans, but I was thrilled when people from around the country started chiming in:

“Snow/ice here in central Iowa!”

“Well it was nearly 80° here in Texas yesterday. Then this morning it was thunderstorms and now it’s 45° and dropping.”

“It’s like yours, just a little farther south. I think we’re at 5 with a high of 11 and blustery winds blowing out of, well, Minnesota.” (From Omaha)

“-15 this morning dropping off my son at school poor kiddos haven’t been outside to play in over a week but here in good ole Dickinson we don’t miss school for anything!”

“Super WINDY in New Mexico today! But the sun is shining and it isn’t freezing, so I’m happy with that.”

“High of 59 here in Burbank, CA today. Rain finally stopped! Not missing MN weather!”

“It’s 75 here…” (Houston, TX)

If you took time to chime in, thank you! I had SO MUCH fun with this! Social Media isn’t my favorite thing (I’d be fine if it all went away), but in today’s instance, it brought friends a little bit closer together, and made the world feel just a little smaller. 🙂

February 6th

Wednesday, February 6th, 2019

If you’re a consistent follower of my blog and/or have been to my house in the winter, you know about our pheasants.

Yes, our resident Ringneck Pheasants.

We have dozens of hens and roosters that live around our house, and thanks to the open farm fields, in the wintertime their presence is a daily occurrence (Which I absolutely love!).

Well, this morning’s story was this guy. He flew in to our front field and came right up to the edge of our front yard. It’s a bit of a drop off into the field, and for twenty minutes I watched him disappear when he put his head down to eat and then comically pop back up – so naturally, I had to share ☺️

After the cold we had last week, I’m happy to see them all out and about again!

January 30th

Wednesday, January 30th, 2019

While it’s easy to complain about the weather, yesterday morning I found a positive when I looked out our back window and saw many of these beautiful wind-drawn waves in the snow – Nature’s Calligraphy!

That being said, like many of you, I’m thankful to be coming out of this cold snap in one piece. With our chickens and horses at home, it’s been quite the week for everyone making sure waters are thawed, food plentiful, and housing as warm as possible.

After having to hang a heat lamp in the coop yesterday as an additional heat source for the girls, I lost quite a bit of sleep overnight getting up every hour checking our coop thermometer reading worrying about those darn girls. 

And being the safety shark I am, I was paranoid about the risk of fire with that heat lamp. Luckily all was fine, and the coop stayed a balmy 7 degrees overnight which was over thirty degrees warmer than outside.

We’re almost out of it – keep staying warm, friends! We’ll be seeing thirty degrees in 48 hours!