Winter walk

We had a surprising accumulation of snow this past Sunday. It was my favourite kind of snowfall–big flakes that come down steadily but without driving or blinding; the perfect kind of silent snowing that you see in picturesque scenes in movies–and it stuck around for days in an unusual stillness of weather. The following morning, … Read more

Enjoy the road traveled

I recently had a minor epiphany. Or perhaps not so minor. My wife is a teacher and has regular report cards due, which is always a slog in the household: She’s barely keeping her nose up out of the added work that’s on top of the plenty of work she normally has. It’s a couple … Read more

Beachy days

Like everyone else, my family has been in isolation mode for (he cites off the top of his head because he just happens to be keeping track of it and just happened to see what today’s number was) 161 days. That’s a lot of time to be jammed right close together for anyone. To those … Read more

Monarch emergence time lapse

My wife decided to try out her time lapse video option on a couple of monarch emergences today. It’s cool to watch it happen anyway, but in the time lapse you get a better view of watching the wings–super compressed and wrinkled at first–gradually straighten out to full size, pumped up (we think) from the … Read more

Pic pleasure

I don’t often get photos of the sun(set) or moon that I’m ever happy with–they never look as gorgeous as what I’m seeing, and in the case of the moon usually just end up looking like bright blobs–but this one from yesterday worked out really well. I’ve added the full size of it to my … Read more

Monarchs are imminent

Somewhere between about 8-15 days, the monarch chrysalis goes from green to blue to finally clear, like in the photo here. That stage means they’re going to emerge as full-on butterflies within a few hours. So cool.

Monarchs are cool

Off and on for a couple of years, we’ve raised monarch butterflies from eggs to first flight. It’s really cool to see. There’s something satisfying and heartwarming about seeing a monarch that you raised from a tiny egg finally crawl out of its chrysalis, dry out its wings and fly away. We just got some … Read more

Beauty is everywhere if you want to find it

The top of our front door has a window of combined frosted glass and triangular-cut glass pieces, the latter of which which make for unexpectedly nice prisms. When the sun is at the right point in the sky or reflecting off a car window, we sometimes get rainbows thrown onto our walls, but I think … Read more

Technology hates me and now grass does, too

I’ve long had a love/hate relationship with technology. By which I mean, I love it and it hates me. I need to clarify at this point to those who don’t know me, or don’t know about this side of me: I don’t mean that in some cutesy way like I’d put on a dating app … Read more