spring color

spring color

Egg drop

These two little eggs dropped from the tree this week. I've read that wood ducks can lay a clutch with up to 26 eggs. The Big D reminded me that the momma duck will throw non-viable eggs from her nest. I hope there are plenty more thriving in the nest. Go here to see the momma.

It's fairly amazing to see ducks in the city, even a city known for it's lakes and rivers. We have a big old elm tree in the back yard that must be at least 90 years old. Plenty big to home a number of creatures including squirrels and ducks and even a sleeping raccoon.

We haven't been woken by the momma duck in at least a week. I hope that she hasn't left because she lost two of her eggs. Maybe she's just quiet because she's busy with the business of incubating eggs. It's a lot of work!

Egg drop

These two little eggs dropped from the tree this week. I've read that wood ducks can lay a clutch with up to 26 eggs. The Big D reminded me that the momma duck will throw non-viable eggs from her nest. I hope there are plenty more thriving in the nest. Go here to see the momma.

It's fairly amazing to see ducks in the city, even a city known for it's lakes and rivers. We have a big old elm tree in the back yard that must be at least 90 years old. Plenty big to home a number of creatures including squirrels and ducks and even a sleeping raccoon.

We haven't been woken by the momma duck in at least a week. I hope that she hasn't left because she lost two of her eggs. Maybe she's just quiet because she's busy with the business of incubating eggs. It's a lot of work!

The rivers are rising

A sure sign of spring is the rise of the rivers. Along the border the St. Croix rises over the banks every spring. It's expected, but this year the river may rise higher than usual. In some years the water rises as high as the pavilion.




This last weekend the ice was still floating and there is rain and snow forecasted this entire week, so the water is just going to keep on rising.




Covering the walkways and the river road, and threatening the foundations of the bridge.




This is beautiful for me, but it is because I am a spectator, a visitor on my way over the border. I do not live on the banks of the river, my home and neighborhood is not in danger of being overtaken by the flood waters. Further north and west of me, the Red River is flooding at records levels. Sandbag operations are urgently trying to protect the homes, college and high schools kids are let out of school to help the community, volunteers from all over the state are rushing up to meet the rage of the river.




The river paddle-boats are still locked in the ice, yet nonetheless rising in their slips.




As the ice flowed down the river, it broke up against the cement column. It was an odd noise seeming to come out of nowhere. It took me a while to realize that the sound was created right in front of me. The Big D made some comment about jumping on the ice and floating down the river. This one was way too thin for such an adventure.




It was a beautiful day on the river last Saturday. Today, the news is full of the Red River flooding combined with blizzard like conditions. My prayers go out to those folks. I pray that they efforts are worthwhile and they can avoid the sort of disaster that hit the region over ten years ago.

The rivers are rising

A sure sign of spring is the rise of the rivers. Along the border the St. Croix rises over the banks every spring. It's expected, but this year the river may rise higher than usual. In some years the water rises as high as the pavilion.




This last weekend the ice was still floating and there is rain and snow forecasted this entire week, so the water is just going to keep on rising.




Covering the walkways and the river road, and threatening the foundations of the bridge.




This is beautiful for me, but it is because I am a spectator, a visitor on my way over the border. I do not live on the banks of the river, my home and neighborhood is not in danger of being overtaken by the flood waters. Further north and west of me, the Red River is flooding at records levels. Sandbag operations are urgently trying to protect the homes, college and high schools kids are let out of school to help the community, volunteers from all over the state are rushing up to meet the rage of the river.




The river paddle-boats are still locked in the ice, yet nonetheless rising in their slips.




As the ice flowed down the river, it broke up against the cement column. It was an odd noise seeming to come out of nowhere. It took me a while to realize that the sound was created right in front of me. The Big D made some comment about jumping on the ice and floating down the river. This one was way too thin for such an adventure.




It was a beautiful day on the river last Saturday. Today, the news is full of the Red River flooding combined with blizzard like conditions. My prayers go out to those folks. I pray that they efforts are worthwhile and they can avoid the sort of disaster that hit the region over ten years ago.

power to the people

I like DIY projects. A couple of years ago I started to make my own garden pavers with concrete molds. It started with Buddha head molds and a small bag of concrete.



[Oops! There's my toes in the bottom of the image. Hey, I think I like that shade of nail polish. I'll have to go find the bottle.]

Then when winter hit, the Big D took over the mold and made some frozen ice sculptures. Last year I discovered concrete poetry kits and started taking quotes and short poems and stringing them together, laying them out on patches of the lawn.

Could this be Art? Lawn Art? art with a capital 'A'? Or just a way to cover the front slope of the yard where the grass is withering away and being taken over by weeds? Whatever it is it sure makes people pause as they walk by our house.

Somehow I'd forgotten about these when they were covered in three feet of snow. This week as the temps rose into the 60's I saw again how people would pause in front of our house. I went out to check what the heck it was and delightfully found again my attempts at art. Ok, now I've decided that it is art with a lower-case 'a'.

It was nice to move on to a project that entailed physical labor - mixing the concrete, pouring into molds, etching letters into the bricks, and experimenting with concrete dyes to find swirly effects. I had spent ten years struggling with the mental labor required to complete my dissertation. Working with concrete brought balance to my life. Sweating out the toxins of stress with the exertion of physical labor was exactly what I needed as I contemplated what to do with my post-doc life. It literally brought joy to my life, something that was in short supply during the graduate school years.



And for me, this project on the front slope was a tribute to Obama and multicultural America. The experimentation with concrete dyes created a range of "skin colors" on the Buddha heads.



I thought that perhaps I would make poetry bricks to pave the path through my garden, or even the paths up at the woodland retreat in Wisconsin. And I made huge progress in making the bricks, but after I laid them out, I realized very quickly that they are very breakable. It only took one step to reveal the fragility. I don't know exactly what to do about making them stronger, less breakable. Maybe I need some different concrete, maybe they just need to weather and age before I walk over them.



See? I broke this one about one minute after I laid it out in the garden. I was pressing down with my foot to bury it down into the dirt. "Love as thou wilt" is the sacred precept from the Kushiel trilogy. Placing it here in the garden adds a new dimension as the garden wilts to its Autumn state of being.

As the weather warms, I wonder what happened with my plans to make lots of poetry bricks throughout the winter. It is a great hibernation project, but somehow that got away from me. I guess sub zero temps make the garden seem like a dream from long ago.

The garden is still a dream that won't come alive for at least another month. Now I will resume my plans. Hopefully it will fill that increasing need to dig in the garden, keep me occupied until Spring comes to stay.

power to the people

I like DIY projects. A couple of years ago I started to make my own garden pavers with concrete molds. It started with Buddha head molds and a small bag of concrete.



[Oops! There's my toes in the bottom of the image. Hey, I think I like that shade of nail polish. I'll have to go find the bottle.]

Then when winter hit, the Big D took over the mold and made some frozen ice sculptures. Last year I discovered concrete poetry kits and started taking quotes and short poems and stringing them together, laying them out on patches of the lawn.

Could this be Art? Lawn Art? art with a capital 'A'? Or just a way to cover the front slope of the yard where the grass is withering away and being taken over by weeds? Whatever it is it sure makes people pause as they walk by our house.

Somehow I'd forgotten about these when they were covered in three feet of snow. This week as the temps rose into the 60's I saw again how people would pause in front of our house. I went out to check what the heck it was and delightfully found again my attempts at art. Ok, now I've decided that it is art with a lower-case 'a'.

It was nice to move on to a project that entailed physical labor - mixing the concrete, pouring into molds, etching letters into the bricks, and experimenting with concrete dyes to find swirly effects. I had spent ten years struggling with the mental labor required to complete my dissertation. Working with concrete brought balance to my life. Sweating out the toxins of stress with the exertion of physical labor was exactly what I needed as I contemplated what to do with my post-doc life. It literally brought joy to my life, something that was in short supply during the graduate school years.



And for me, this project on the front slope was a tribute to Obama and multicultural America. The experimentation with concrete dyes created a range of "skin colors" on the Buddha heads.



I thought that perhaps I would make poetry bricks to pave the path through my garden, or even the paths up at the woodland retreat in Wisconsin. And I made huge progress in making the bricks, but after I laid them out, I realized very quickly that they are very breakable. It only took one step to reveal the fragility. I don't know exactly what to do about making them stronger, less breakable. Maybe I need some different concrete, maybe they just need to weather and age before I walk over them.



See? I broke this one about one minute after I laid it out in the garden. I was pressing down with my foot to bury it down into the dirt. "Love as thou wilt" is the sacred precept from the Kushiel trilogy. Placing it here in the garden adds a new dimension as the garden wilts to its Autumn state of being.

As the weather warms, I wonder what happened with my plans to make lots of poetry bricks throughout the winter. It is a great hibernation project, but somehow that got away from me. I guess sub zero temps make the garden seem like a dream from long ago.

The garden is still a dream that won't come alive for at least another month. Now I will resume my plans. Hopefully it will fill that increasing need to dig in the garden, keep me occupied until Spring comes to stay.