New Year Wishes

This is circulating on the internet. Being the animal lover I am I had to put it on the blog. Happy New Year Everyone! (My favorite is the dog having fun.)

Here are my 2012 wishes for YOU.

May you ALWAYS make the right move

May your cup runneth over with love

MAY YOU ALWAYS FIND SHELTER FROM ANY STORM

May you remain good looking and looking good.

May you find the perfect diet for your body and your soul.

May you find perfect balance in the company you keep.

May you have as much fun as you can before someone makes you stop.

May the worst thing that happens to you come in slobbery pink and furry TAN.

May  you  manage  to  MAKE  time  for  Time Out!


  May all the new folks you meet be interesting and kind.

May you always know when to walk away... and when to RUN!

 

AND MAY YOUR FRIENDS & FAMILY ALWAYS BRING YOU JOY

 

 

May the New Year only hold good health, success, growth, wealth and happiness for u and your loved ones!  

May God bless you and your loved ones every day!!

Gray

This is winter in Harney County this year. No snow. A study in gray. Normally, we'd be under about three feet of the stuff. It's cloudy today and rains off and on. The day time temperatures are in the forties. Very unusual for this time of year. I'm not complaining. It's nice not to have to shovel my way out to the chicken shed.  There's a lot of winter yet to go.

Happy Fifth Day of Christmas

This is the manger scene my Mother and Dad made one year for Christmas for their kids and grandkids. They made 12 of them. I loaned mine to our church to use during the Christmas season. The painting behind the creche is of St. Andrew's Episcopal church before it burned to the ground in 1967. 

Merry Christmas

From our house to yours, we wish you a very Merry Christmas.  Tex, the chicken in this photo, flew in in a box of gifts from our friends Marlis and Ralph in Texas. He's a welcome addition to our flock, but he can't do a thing with those feathers.

Wild Things Christmas Tree

Here's a Cat Spring, Texas approach to a Christmas. It's a backyard tree for wild critters. But celery?

Santa Visits the December Meeting of the Harney County Hams

Who is that Santa, really?

Christmas Potluck at St. Andrew's Episcopal and Peace Lutheran Church

A good time was had by all.

Freezing Fog

It was 6 degrees this morning and we awoke to freezing fog.  Yoda has a ridge of frozen fog on her mane. The ducks sit on their feet (actually they tuck their feet up into their feathers and sit on their bellies). The chickens stand on one leg, the other tucked into their belly feathers. The horses seem oblivious. They wear thick fur coats.

Homegrown

Eggs frying on a winter morning. Slices of lemons incredibly juicy, thin skinned and almost sweet from our lemon tree for the morning cup of tea. Only one lemon left. Sigh. The hens are still laying enough for us.

The Forty Column Castle

I've been very busy this last month editing, proof reading and formatting a novel I wrote that the New York publishing gods never bought. So I decided to publish it myself for ereaders because I like the book a lot and wanted it to share it with others. The cost of entry is relatively low in electronic publishing if you do a lot of the work yourself. So I jumped in, kicking and screaming, to the world of digital publishing. I wanted to be writing, but actually the process helped me to improve my writing and control the artistic quality of my work.  Bookbaby did the conversion to epub software and they did the cover art which is in this photo. The book will be available next week end on Amazon Kindle and iBooks. It will be available later on Sony and Nook.  I do not have plans now to publish a print edition.  All the marketing, which I handle myself, will be online.  Some people are stuck in the world of print books. I was, too.  But my dear friend, Marlis, gave me her old (a mere three years old) Kindle and I started using it and got hooked.  E Books will not go away. You might as well wade in.  Ask Santa for one. Kindle Fires are $199 on Amazon and there are cheaper versions. The IPad is more.  The Nook is about the same range as the Kindle.  For more information on The Forty Column Castle, check out my new (just published this week) web site:  www.MarjorieThelen.com. I'm also on Facebook.  Happy reading!

Community Concert

The Harney County community concert was last Sunday afternoon, December 4.  Bell ringers, orchestra and chorus sing and play. John and I are in the chorus and I forgot to ask someone to take a photo. This is the orchestra made up of community members of all ages. No auditions required. Anyone can join and make music. There are some really fine musicians in this county. And there is always a fabulous cookie reception after, coordinated by the ladies of a local church. The concert takes place in the Church of the Nazarene which has good acoustics. We had standing room only this year because there was no snow and it was sunny.  The chorus sang the Hallelujah chorus, and the audience rose to their feet for the whole thing. It was very moving. If you ever have the chance to sing the Hallelujah chorus in a choir, do it!

St. Andrews Episcopal/Peace Lutheran Church Decorated for Christmas

We decorated last Sunday. Our Christmas potluck is this Saturday evening.

Cat communion

Lemons again

In this photo you can see how very brown it is now.  But no snow!  We've had great, sunny weather up into the 40s during the day, single digits at night.  We are now harvesting our five lemons. They are so sweet, very juicy and very thin skins.  They smell almost like evergreens.  We only have two left.  Boo Hoo. It is a Meyer Dwarf Lemon Tree and took three years to produce but well worth it.  I got mine from Gurney's catalog. I'd recommend trying to grow your own lemons.  The other plants basking in the sun are basil I brought in from outside. I made basil pesto last week. Almost as good a chive pesto.

Thanksgiving friends

Here's the group we had over for Thanksgiving Day. We served parts of our roasted home grown turkey and our very own red potatoes went into the mash potatoes. Real turkey does taste better. The second group we had over Saturday evening for turkey casserole was The Band. We were having so much fun playing and singing I forgot to take a photo. We had two guitars, mandolin, flute, accordion (moi), spoons and whistling.  And lots of singing, not always on key.  We played mainly bluegrass, cowboy and Christmas songs.

Another honey photo

I just love the color of our honey. The bees shared about 100 pounds of honey with us and they still have about 65 pounds each hive to make it through the winter. Hopefully. John put up the window windbreak this week. 

A Turkey Point of View

Happy Turkey Day

Happy Thanksgiving from our turkey to yours.

Honey is Here

John has been busy extracting honey at our beekeeper mentor's honey shed.  This is the first round. We estimate this is about 60 pounds of honey.  There's 29 jars in this group. John thinks he may extract about 40 more pounds today. The main flower source is alfalfa and rabbit brush.  Wow, is it good!

Chorus Practice

Here's the very lively Harney County Chamber Music Society Chorus in a state of panic at practice because the recital is 12 days away and we aren't ready.  We are singing the Hallelujah Chorus, Do You Hear What I Hear, For Us A Child Is Born, Eager Shepherds on Their Way and There is No Rose. Recital is Sunday, December 4 at 3 PM at the Church of the Nazarene. Somehow it all comes together at show time and everyone always says we sound pretty good. The community orchestra and the bell swingers play in the same recital.  It's an annual tradition. No auditions required, and if you make mistakes no one hardly notices.

Butts in the Wind

Horses will stand with their butts to the source of the wind. Great weather vanes. The wind is blowing pretty lively out of the southwest on this one.

Diana and her cookstoves

Diana, another neighbor on Palomino Lane, is a master of restoration. She found two old cook stoves which she will restore. Who knows?  She might even cook on them.  She has her sights on another and among three she might be able to put together one working stove.  This is one of her winter projects. (Snowing and blowing here today.) 

More Uses for Bailing Twine

Dorset Sheep

Here's another snap of Jane's beloved Dorset sheep.  They came over to check out Pierce the Bull.

Pierce the Bull Arrives

Our neighbors on Palomino Lane, Jane and Bill, rented a bull and he arrived this week. He banged around a lot in the trailer, not happy with his situation.  So John helped Jane unload him into a corral. Pierce lunged out of the trailer and immediately headed for the hay. Smart bull.  However, the vet had to check him out for fertility and STDs so he can't be in with the ladies yet. There are twenty of them. Rosebud, a very sweet cow, came to check out the new arrival. Jane and Bill's cows calve in the fall, so now is the time for Pierce to be on the job for next year's calves. 

Bailing Twine

I love bailing twine. Garrison Keillor even wrote a song about how useful it is.  Here we have a Harney County gate designed and built by John Thelen.  And there is good old bailing twine acting as the closure.  I carry it with me all the time and collect it. We have a bailing twine box in the garage. It comes in colors and a local lady even crochets door mats with it. Now there is a good Christmas gift idea.