Snow

It snowed here! I was starting to get jealous of all those places that have had so much snow already this winter that they're sick of it. My cat is sleeping in my lap as I type this, and we're pretty cozy with the ground outside all white.

This is a view from our back door, and another from the bottom of the pasture up toward the house and barn.


It was blowing hard! We took pity on Cleo the barn cat, hardy as she is, and let her come in for the night.


Here's Daddy in his very! bright! orange gloves.


The horses seemed fine. They were eager for some grain.


I thought this yellow warbler was super cute.


A walk down to the pond was very pretty!

Christmas 2010

We've had some lovely sunsets. In winter the air can be so clear, and the trees have lost their leaves and don't obstruct the horizon so much, so it's a great time for watching the sun go down. On the Solstice night, Daddy and I stayed up most of the night, going outside periodically to look at the total lunar eclipse. There was intermittent cloud cover, but we were able to see the moon often enough to track the progress of the eclipse.



On Christmas Eve, Allie and Layla, Charlie, Taylor and Alex came over and we had our Christmas celebration: gifts and a barbecued ribs dinner. Layla happily monopolized the camera, so most of the pictures are of her, but I'll include one short video Allie appeared in.

Layla played with the crocheted nativity set to dramatize the nativity story, then gloated over her pile of presents, which was "the biggest of anyone's!" Later, we opened crackers. (A British tradition -- you pull apart a wrapped paper tube that contains a firecracker, jokes, small toys, and a tissue paper crown. It's sort of a smaller, less violent piñata, I suppose.)





Text of Layla's story: "Once upon a time there was a beautiful butterfly. Then a hippo appeared. Then they were BFF. THE END"

Happy New Year; Christmas in the Wild

Happy New Year, folks! Let's see if I can do any better updating this year... maybe even once a month!

I'll start by reviewing last month. Early in December, I went to an event that the Zoo puts on annually. I think they called it Christmas in the Wild. The main attraction is Santa and Mrs. Claus parading around the zoo on a courtesy cart and stopping to throw wrapped gifts to the animals. The gifts contain food and toys, but for the most part I think it's the boxes and wrapping the animals found most exciting. (Just like babies and housecats!)

The zoo's penguin, Laura, came out for a brief visit in the cafe first. Then Santa tossed gifts to the lions. (All of these thumbnails are clickable if you want to see larger versions of the photos.)





A little later some children were "playing" with the male lion through the glass, and the lion seemed like he was enjoying scaring them.



The elephants were great. They let themselves be fitted with giant Santa hats, paraded around their enclosure, and then waited for a cue to start opening Santa's gifts. Then they posed with Santa and Mrs. Claus for photos.





The chimps were the most audibly excited. (You can see and listen to them in the short video here.) But the cutest thing was the baby, born last spring, playing in a cat litter bucket, then running to Mom when it became clear that something was up. They stayed together for quite awhile until things calmed down again.