talismans from summer past

our resident sandhill crane couple departed for warmer temps in october. but we are still finding mementos of their stay with us. both birds molted in late summer, and on some days the back yard looked as if it had a dusting of snow, because there were so many downy feathers everywhere. i suspect when the snow melts next spring, i will still be finding sandhill crane feathers. and by then, fingers crossed, our two will be back with us. supposedly, sandhills have “high nest fidelity”, which means they often come back to the same nesting grounds. fingers crossed. i cannot express the feeling of tranquility it brought to our house to have these two pre-historic beasts wandering contentedly in the yard all day. it was wondrous.

sandhill crane feather

oops!

i still have a fair number of dried leaves here and there about the house. in addition to the ones that flutter out of books and journal pages from time to time. this little guy was in the wrong place at the wrong time. oops! sorry little buddy.

unidentified crushed leaf

wonderful winter weeds

do any of you, in the north, take into account the appearance of your winter garden when you are doing your garden design and planning? is it a thing?  i don’t have planned gardens–my yard is too wooded and shady. but 10 years of doing STILL has given me a profound appreciation for winter stems. i love them so much i have begun calling them winter flowers because they are every bit as captivating as summer flowers in my opinion. someone tell me that northern winter garden design is a thing, it will make my day! and then tell me where the most magical winter gardens are, because i want to visit :-)

assorted winter weed stems: mullein, curly dock, milkweed, goldenrod, knapweed, hydrangea, goldenrod galls, 

fruit-share delivery day!

for the last year, steve and i have been keeping a pretty low profile. we are both working on books which takes enormous mental energy, and we also had our youngest, joseph, graduating from high school and doing the whole college selection thing, which takes enormous patience and emotional energy. and in addition, i am the primary care-giver for my 86 year old mom, who had one hell of a year medically. so…most nights, we are in bed by 9:30, and asleep by 10. woohoo!  anyway, i digress a bit. what i wanted to say, that while it was a fairly unremarkable year for us, one remarkable thing we did do was find a fruit-share truck that delivers fresh seasonal fruit, direct from the farmer, to the twin cities, every month. it has been such an enormous pleasure for our household. those of you living in california and florida may not be able to fully grasp what truly-fresh seasonal fruit in winter means to us northerns. some of you may be thinking “but don’t grocery stores have fruit all year long?” yes, yes they do. but that is often fruit was picked way too early, so it can hold up to extended shipping and storage, and then ripened artificially with with exposure to ethylene gas. which means…it generally lacks flavor. sometimes, it lacks so much flavor from not being able to ripen in the sun to maturity, that if you blindfolded yourself, you would be hard pressed to know what you were eating. any, i digress again. today, our fruit share arrived. it looked like this. it makes us enormously happy.

selection of winter fruits: star fruit, pears, apples, limes, kiwi, lemons, grapefruits, persimmons, oranges and tangerines, pomegranate, and blackberries

winter whites

the other day, my son was scrolling through some of my images (at my request) for the STILL book i am working on. he got to the end of the collection, and said very casually “wow, you clearly prefer photographing winter subjects more than summer.” boom! there it was. the naked truth.  several thoughts raced through my head: you’re right, i hate the humidity of summer that makes everything so limp and droopy, in summer have to work harder to soften my lighting, i don’t like how sweaty i get, i don’t like all the saturated primary colors of summer, i prefer the softened neutrals of winter, i love when winter white skies make my job easier, i like the challenge of finding subjects in winter when there is so little to pick from–it forces me to be more creative, i’m a minimalist at heart so the spare images of winter please me. once he said it, it was obvious to me. but what i hadn’t realized, was that it was obvious in my photos too. my son is particularly perceptive. always has been. he’s an observer. a dot connector. i admire his brain. and seek his opinion on just about anything he’s willing to discuss. but he is still a teenager, so his willingness comes in very short intervals. nevertheless, i will miss him inordinately when he leaves for college in january.

snow-covered pampas grasses