Dogwood climbers

This Red Dogwood tree was planted about 50 years ago. Last month, I drove to my parents' house with my niece & her 2 children. Rowan couldn't wait to climb the tree that she remembered from her last visit. Here she is-as happy as...a kid in a tree.
Later, her 2 cousins, Rebecca & Liam came over & joined her in the tree.

In the top of the tree is Rowan's big brother , Rubin. Just after this picture, a dead branch broke sending him plummeting towards the ground. His legs caught on a limb just long enough to flip him upside down & he landed on his face. Poor kid. The next day he had a black eye & a scraped & swollen cheek.

Animal self portraits-bear & deer

I think that we finally found a bear who knows how to take pictures. Of course, I did need to wade through many butt pictures to get this one, but it's the best picture so far. Mona Lisa eat your heart out. It looks like we also have a Cinnamon Bear-a not too common color variation on the black bear. We think 4-5 different bears visit our camp. (That's why I have a potty chair for night use.)
Here's a deer who is beginning to get the hang of photography.

A bear with a halo?

More game cam pictures:

He looks like a regular black bear, but...
Wait, is that a halo?
Or is Scotty beaming him up?
We got a lot of pictures like this. I guess the food was too close to the camera.

More game cam pics

We set the camera up near our cabin. Look, I'm a turkey farmer.
This guy would like to eat my turkeys. He's either a large gray fox or a coyote.


This looks like a "deer in the headlights". Check the extra set of eyes on the left.

This picture brought tears to my eyes. It looks like our dearly departed Al. He's been gone for almost 2 years, but we still miss him. He's buried about 50 feet from where the picture was taken. We've been calling this a picture of Al's ghost. Al loved the cabin. We always called it his happy hunting grounds.

Kitty tent & snow

It's very hard to get a good picture of Bill Bailey in her tent. She moves away from it when I open the door. This is a picture through the storm door which had some condensation on it. I made this tent with waxed nylon on the outside, 1" foam rubber for the middle layer & wool on the inside. For the cold weather, I added an old heated kitty bed that we had bought for Boney's arthritis. She sleeps in it at night when it's cold, but this was the first time that we saw her in the tent during the daytime. With 6+ inches of snow on the ground, she decided to skip her normal daytime routine. Snow in the back yard.

Birthday card

I made this as a birthday card for my friend & teacher, Pamela Allen. She is known for carrying a fan for hot flashes. On the back, the card reads "Happy birthday from one of your fans. The front of the quilt is all Dupioni silk. It's 10" x 15".

More dinner guests

Bill Bailey hasn't been around for 2 days, but we've had other visitors. We call this guy Tiger Bob. He's got great camoflage.

This is the best picture so far of Uncle Smiley. I believe that he's Bill Bailey's brother & his white markings make a smile. He's another one who usually runs if he see's us looking out the window. In the last 2 days, he's visited the food about a dozen times. It's no wonder he looks so well fed.

Game camera

I got my Valentine's day gift from Charlie a little early. It's a game camera. The idea is to set it up where you are going to hunt & leave it there for a while. It has infra red detection & if it sees a warm object moving, it takes a picture. I guess the snakes can just slither past unphotographed. I decided to set it up on the porch where I feed my feral kitties (& anything that wants to eat cat food & can get up on the porch railing-sorry little doggies-you will have to go home to eat or eat bread in the back yard.) Here's the best 3 pictures from the past day & 1/2: This is Billie Jo Bailey, my feral that I try to feed. Looking out the window are Junior (named because she looks just like her mommy, Billie) & Ashley.
Oops, I didn't mean to feed him. Look at that grin! He knows that he's getting away with something.
I just named this cat, Bear. If you cover his head, he looks like a black bear. It looks like he's tailless. He runs if he see's me looking out the window.

The camera took 96 pictures in 36 hours-lots of Bill Bailey& a lot with no animals at all. I think that birds flying past are triggering it, but it's not a problem because I've got a 2 gig sd card in it.

more rugs

Junior in an afgan & a rug in progress. Isn't she as cute as a bug?...Huh? bugs aren't cute!
This is the latest completed rug. I wasn't crazy about it as I was working on it, but when I put it on the floor & looked at the whole thing, I decided that I like it. It's 23" X 34"-about as big as I want to do.

sewing machine problems