All posts by laurahinnj

Garden, Pond, Seasons, Whatever

Festive frog

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This frog perched pondside is the extent of our outdoor decorating this year – I like it, but worry that it might be keeping the fish awake! My husband loves outdoor decorations and would have the yard filled with obnoxious stuff if I let him have his way. He came home with this gem following an unsupervised shopping excursion with his brother a few weeks ago. It makes me laugh when I see it there in the middle of the dark yard, so it can stay.

We’re just about ready for company tomorrow; the house is mostly clean, the gifts are wrapped and under the tree, and my husband is out doing the traditional *cookie run* to our friends. In good years we bake; the last few we’ve bought delicious trays of the best Italian cookies we can find to give as gifts for neighbors and coworkers. I have some cooking to do still and then plan to spend the rest of the night staring at our pretty tree from the couch.

Seasons

Happy Winter!

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“Thus the beginnings of a solemn festival of peace and hope and understanding in which nations the world over join this week. A festival of life newborn when the year is at its nadir, of faith and hope in the midst of Winter dark. A festival of lights and greens and gifts and prayers, for its symbols and its ceremonies are many and diverse among the nations. But everywhere a festival of peace and goodwill, vigorous and verdant as the greens we gather now.” – Hal Borland, Sundial of the Seasons

Books

Just the thing

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The past week at work has been crazy with holiday parties, cookies and fattening goodies everywhere you look, and coworkers bearing gifts for one another. In the midst of so many distractions I’ve been trying to get my desk cleaned up so that I can have a week’s vacation without feeling too much anxiety about the state of affairs I will return to after New Year’s. So far I haven’t made very much progress, but I hope at least that my office phone won’t be ringing off the hook the whole time I’m away from my desk.

The small group of people that I work directly with has a gift-giving routine of one sort or another each year. Some years we do a grab bag, but the last few years we’ve been doing a Secret Santa where each person draws a name and buys a gift for a particular person. This year each of us included a wish list to help with purchases and that seemed to make everyone happier about the gifts they received.

Some of us also exchange gifts more privately, and that’s the point of what I want to write about tonight. I bought Julie Zickefoose’s book, Letters from Eden, for two of my coworkers. For Anna, I thought it might be something of a stretch; a gift given more to reflect my interests and share some of the passion that I feel for nature. For Kathy, I knew it was just the thing. Or at least I had hoped so.

I’m really terrible at buying gifts for people and struggle to come up with ideas. But this gift, this book, is perfect for her and I knew it as I watched her flipping through the pages this morning when I gave it to her. She was admiring the artwork and kept returning to this page and the illustration of the bullfrog and hummingbird. That was sort of a surprise because I had expected to see her pouring over the turkey vulture drawings because she thinks of tv’s as her totem, but no; it was this page and an opossum in another essay that caught her eye.

I wish that I knew more people that I could share this book with, it is just so beautiful. I say that without even having really allowed myself to read it yet. The artwork is so wonderful and lovingly drawn. It was just the thing my friend needed this day.

Thank you, Julie, for putting a smile on my friend’s face.

Birds, Whatever

Christmas tree bird count

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Birdchick wondered if anyone had any fun bird ornaments, so I thought I’d post a few pics of some of the ones that grace our tree. We used just the glass ornaments to decorate this year, so the really *fun* ones stayed tucked away in the attic. If you’re a bird lover, I’m sure you have lots of *fun* bird ornaments that people have given you over the years. I’m not talking about nice ornaments; I mean the cheesy ones that people grab because they have a bird somewhere on them. I’ve got quite a few of those (that don’t resemble any natural bird I’ve ever seen) – mostly given by my SIL. And Kevin, not your wife, you know which SIL I’m talking about here! The type of ornaments that make you hesitant to admit to a hobby, for fear of what you might find wrapped beneath the tree with your name written on the tag.
Junior wanna-be?
Sometime before Christmas I need to learn how to take in-focus photos of the tree and ornaments.
Had I wanted to be cruel, I’d have posted fuzzy pictures of the not-quite-accurate, but still pretty ornaments and asked you to identify them.
These may be hard enough to ID without a good imagination. In addition to birds on our tree, we have lots of butterflies, dragonflies, and many other insects and animals thanks to the NWF catalog. They make nice sets and have new designs each year. My husband is a good customer.
The last few years they’ve offered lots of owls and herons, but only this eagle and no other hawks. I’d like a red-tail or maybe a handsome kestral.
We have a few ducks, mostly some variety of mallard, but this wood duck is a favorite. What’s on your tree?
Remembering

First trip to the Adirondacks

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My first visit to the Adirondacks was on our honeymoon. We spent most of the week in Lake Placid NY and I fell in love with the mountains and all the trees. It snowed day after day during our stay. Neither of us are skiers, but we took advantage of the weather with lots of snowball fights, ice-skating, and evenings by a warm fire. We moved from one bed and breakfast to another, getting a sampling of what each had to offer. Two were rustic-type ski lodges, and the third was a fancy Victorian style place that made us a fabulous dinner on Christmas Eve.

Being away from home at Christmas was actually really nice because we were removed from all the usual hustle and bustle. Christmas night was a little lonely and we had to struggle to find a place that was open for dinner; if I remember right, I think we found an Italian place and had dinner early – traditional lasagna, of course.

I’ve been back to Lake Placid and Whiteface Mountain (pictured at right) many times since, but always in early summer when the fields are covered with blooming orange hawkweed and the sound of a running stream is somewhere in the distance. The Adirondacks are beautiful then, but seeing it for the first time, so stark and white and cold, is something I will always remember. I have dreams of moving there, when we’re old and gray, to live beside some quiet lake in the middle of nowhere. When I imagine that day in the future, it’s always a winter’s day with snow falling and a view of the ice on the lake outside my front window.

Remembering

Anniversary day

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Today is our wedding anniversary – 13 years ago I was at the most expensive party I barely remember! I picked out a few of my favorite photos to share – bear with me as I reminisce. It was so cold on that Friday night when we were married.
I arrived at the church in the traditional way, but my husband and his groomsmen came on the back of a firetruck – too bad there’s no pics of that!
Our church was gorgeous – a friend of mine says that to this day it was the most beautiful wedding she has ever been to. There were candles burning in the windows and the pews were decorated with sprigs of pine and gold bows that a friend from work made for me. We also had the church bell-ringers playing carols while the guests waited for the show to start.
Detail of my flowers (white roses, stephanotis, and holly with just a few red berries) and dress (off the rack on sale!) and beautiful wedding rings. I remember being totally surpised by the cold and people tossing rice at us as we left the church – this is one of my favorite pics of the day.

In the neighborhood, Seasons

The Christmas Church

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While out and about to do some shopping today, my husband and I visited a church in the neighborhood where I grew up. It’s always been a favorite of mine because of its Christmas ministries and their beautiful candlelight service on Christmas Eve.

I tried getting a nice pic of the poinsettia star in the sanctuary, but even climbing up the stairs to the balcony didn’t help much. The star is about 15 feet across and made up of hundreds of plants – really very pretty. Part of why my husband and I chose Christmastime for our wedding is because churches are so beauitiful at this time of year that we didn’t need to spend any extra money on flowers to decorate with.

The church also has a few displays that tell the story of Christmas and of the life and ministry of Jesus. I wasn’t able to photograph either, but there is a reproduction of Herod’s Temple and a Putz. The Putz is a sound and light show that brings the story of the nativity to life with a 40 foot model of Israel and the three main cities of the Christmas Story.

Outside the church is a creche with donkeys, sheep, and goats – which of course is my favorite of all the displays. The church has been doing this for more than 50 years and it draws a lot of people to the site who then wander inside the church and maybe learn a bit more of the meaning of our Christmas celebration. The creche was what first brought me to visit this church as a teenager, and I have nice memories of attending services on Christmas Eve and then stopping by the creche to see the animals in the quiet after midnight on Christmas Eve.

I was a little bothered by signs on the fence letting the public know that the church has the animals checked out by a veterinarian and the SPCA and reminding us that they are farm animals and able to withstand our *frigid* NJ winters and are well-supplied with food. Apparently they’ve had a hard time with people worrying over the welfare of these animals! That didn’t stop a lady from feeding them two loaves of white bread, despite the signs asking that the public not feed them, never mind the hay strewn about everywhere for the animals to eat. Some people just can’t help being silly, I guess.

Uncategorized

I’d rather be…

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I gave my final exam last night and am desperate now to get them marked and final grades done. I’d much rather be doing anything else. I’m trying so hard to concentrate, but keep getting distracted by the lights on the tree, the funny stories you all share on your blogs, the bunnies scampering about, you name it!

I’m glad to see this semester coming to an end and will be glad for the break from students until mid-January when I’ll start all over again. This semester has been the least enjoyable and least rewarding in the 5 years I’ve been teaching at the college, mostly due to the change in curriculum that was implemented by my department. It’s not working for my students and their final exams make that fact all too obvious.

Anyway… don’t mean for this to turn into a rant… back to that stack of papers. Have a great night!

Bunnies

12/14/06 Mid-week bunny fix

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For the past couple of years I’ve done a Christmas Card Swap with other members of the PetBunny email group; most years there are about 40 people who exchange cards. Most often the cards have *bunnies* as a theme, but as you can imagine these are hard to come by at Christmastime, so instead some people make beautiful handmade cards or send photos. Sometimes people will also send along a little gift with the card.

This year I decided to send refrigerator magnets with my cards. I made the mosaic above from some favorite pics on Flickr and asked a friend of my husband’s (who owns a sign shop) to print up the magnets for me. We got them tonight and they turned out beautifully, plus he did them for free! Now I just need to find some nice bunny cards to mail them in.

The card swap is one of my favorite things about the PetBunny list – most of the members are total strangers to me, but we all share a fondness for pet rabbits. Each Christmas the bunnies here get more cards than my husband and I do!