More on The Birds

When ah firs' took da dawgs out dis mornin', I heard a hammerin' noise in da trees, but ah couldn't find da source. Later, whilst sittin' on the sofa drinkin' cawfee, mah huzbund and ah saw Woody Woodpecker jus' a tearin' bark off a dead pahn tree next to da shore. It's a tree we been tawkin' 'bout cuttin' down 'fore it fawls down on da dawk or da boat.

My goodness. Writing in dialect is hard work. While watching Woody pull huge chunks of bark off the pine tree, we were amazed to notice how far he pulls his head back to slam it into the tree trunk. What protects a woodpecker's head from the vibration of all that hard slamming we wondered. They must have insulation surrounding their little brains to protect them. I must look that up.

Because Woody is mostly in silhouette, it's difficult to get a good look at his big red head and crest. He is a Pileated Woodpecker. They grow to seventeen inches and this feller must be at least that. He's a big boy!


At the same time, a Great Blue Heron landed on our dock rail. I just love these magnificent birds. What another glorious day for birdwatching, even if it is a dreary day. These beautiful creatures brighten up the sky and our lives. Okay. Enough sap. Just enjoy.

P.S.: The Kingfisher is pissed. He flew over to the dock railing to land only to find the Heron still sitting there and had to fly away. It's crowded out there today.

The Birds

Larry and I enjoy watching all the aviary activity on the lake these days. It is such an enjoyable and entertaining way to start the day. We keep the binoculars handy, and Jackson stands watch at the window begging us to go out constantly to chase them out of his yard.

These past couple of weeks, we've noticed all the Great Blue Heron in our cove. The most we counted at one time was seven. Last week we saw five. Why the odd numbers I wonder? Larry thinks it's too early for mating, although I do see pairs flying around; back and forth; in and out and around the cove. But he read that during the winter months down here they just tend to hang out in small groups.

These birds are so majestic in stature and so magical in flight. I admire their grace and feel so blessed to have them hanging out around us. We have an infrared, motion-detector camera mounted on a tree in the cove trying to capture the "phantom" beavers cutting down our trees. But we also had hoped to catch a Heron slowly walking around the water, taking off or landing. I fear we have had no success as yet, but remain ever hopeful. We keep moving the camera's angle and height.

The "Stars and Bars" flag on the largest dock across from us lets us know how windy it is outside and the direction it is blowing. Who needs technology when neighbors fly their politics and we can use it for our own purposes?

There is also a Kingfisher that visits us regularly. I have so enjoyed this handsome little bird, about the size of a Bluejay, sit on our dock railing. This morning, he flew to the top of the umbrella we have mounted behind our double-glider, for a nice high vantage point. Success! He is sitting on the rail now, with a little fish sideways in his mouth: flipping it around until he gets it head-down and swallows it whole. His catch is the size of a small minnow. He is just so cute!

Cardinals, Blue Jays, Doves, Black birds, Sparrows, Chicadees and many other small birds frequent our seed and suet feeders, and our concrete angel birdbath. What a blessing to have these lovely creatures visit us every day. When the Mallard ducks start arriving, which they have, Jackson has some real fun chasing them back into the water and proving once again: he is really a big dawg!

Back from the Holidays

We spent twelve days in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, visiting with my family and checking on our houses. Lexington is holding up well, and the contractors we hired to plow snow did their job. They didn't shovel the paths I requested, though, so I emailed them to do that for the coming snow this weekend. There will be another open house on Sunday.

Everyone likes the house, but price is an issue and we have received no offers. We have lowered the price one hundred thousand dollars already, and are unwilling to go lower. We'll just sit on it for as long as necessary. We already purchased three months of "vacant house insurance", and if we have to purchase three more months, so be it. We have plenty of people checking on it and feel confident that our buyer is out there somewhere. It's just a matter of when they show up. At this point, we will not make any money on the house to upgrade "The Lakehouse". We'll just be able to "break even". So be it. With the market the way it is right now, we have no choice and no control. We just have to get out from under. This house constitutes half our monthly expenses by itself. Enough already. We'll be on a fixed income in two weeks.

Since returning to "The Lakehouse" we haven't done much renovating or work. Lots of trees are down, and to save money, Larry now has time and his chainsaw to cut up felled trees rather than buying a cord of wood. He has been keeping up with the wood supply and is getting his exercise at the same time. Maintaining a nice fire not only takes the chill off our house, but warms our souls too. We have a great fireplace.

I got a cold, so I have been laying low and trying not to get what family and friends up north have gotten: bronchitis and sick for two weeks or more. It's been mild here. The temps are mostly in the low to mid 40's at night, and into the mid-50's during the day. So, I bundle up and walk around the yard when I let the puppies out just to move around. My butt hurts from all this sitting and my lower back is tight. I stretch it out, then sit again to read or lay down to nap. Larry's job right now is to take care of his sister, while I am a germ factory. Not a good thing to be around cancer people.

We got some rain last night and it is dark and cloudy today. This must be what we'll have when snow hits New England on Friday. I'm happy to be here.

We are busy making plans for Libby's surgery on Tuesday in Charleston, SC. Larry, Libby and her husband, Ed, will have to drive the two hours down there to a hotel Ed found so she can be in the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) at 6:00am on Tuesday. Ed found a hotel six miles from the hospital that has suites with a kitchenette for $179 per week. We discovered that the Ronald MacDonald Houses only take families of cancer patients nineteen years or younger. Otherwise, hotels with MUSC discounts are $75 per night. Not a good deal when we'll be there ten days or more. We hope she can be shipped back up to Lexington Medical Center, which is our hospital, and would make staying with her much easier and cheaper.


The beavers here at the lake felled another tree. We found it when we got back. It was one they had already chewed. They decided to chew lower down on the trunk and it finally fell over. They have also been continuing to enjoy the bark on top branches of the previously felled tree in the water. They do love their bark!

The camera we set up to capture their activity has been a huge bust. We haven't gotten any critter pictures, and are very disappointed. We'll keep trying, though. We're bound to get something sometime. We keep moving it around to what we think will be the best vantage point. We're bound to hit the mark sooner or later.

Beaver Love

On our last trip to "The Lakehouse", we discovered that beavers had begun weeding our forest. Actually, we discovered this in about the third year we owned this beautiful place. They felled two trees then, and we thought that was the end of their foray. But, NO!!! We found a "love carving" from the beavers this morning!

Last spring, we found another tree, whose base was left in a chewed hourglass shape, sans its bark. Apparently, beavers love to eat the inside meat of the bark first. That tree has now falled down, and they have moved onto the adjacent Maple. Beavers don't prefer pines; they like the hardwoods. We live in a pine forest and the Pine Beetle has begun eating them. We must get those trees proactively cut down to stem the damage from these insects.

Now, we have the beavers who want the hardwoods near to the shore. Not only do they like Maples, but they also enjoy Crepe Myrtle. Now that I know they are after my blooming trees, we have to figure out what to do. We don't know how many beavers we are hosting right now, but we learned that families can be up to eight members. The young tend to stay with the parents for up to two years after birth.


I brought Jackson and Mattie Grace to explore the cove this morning and capture the damage to show you here. They have been hearing the beavers down here at night, but we don't have a strong enough flashlight to go exploring. Since beavers in South Carolina can grow up to a whopping sixty pounds, our poor little ten-pound "poof" dogs, who think they're really country dawgs, will be outmatched with those long, sharp teeth and claws. We keep a close eye on our babies at night, especially Jackson. He loves to explore and is hardpressed to go to the beaver work area. He doesn't care about the darkness. He's a big boy, so he thinks.

Larry did a little research on the web and discovered there's a hard cloth or wire netting we can put around the base of trees to prevent the beavers from eating them. Also we plan to buy ourselves a motion-detector digital camera to mount on a tree nearby and capture those varmints with a flash. We sure would love to see them. Next we'll also buy a strong flashlight/spotlight for ourselves for Christmas. It'll be fun to try and catch the invaders at work.

They carried off the Crepe Myrtle branches, but we have not been able to find a dam or what looks like the beginnings of a lodge so far. We may take the boat out and check around the other side of the point for signs of a "build"

More on our beaver adventure in another blog. In the meantime, here's a link of interest. Enjoy! http://www.dnr.sc.gov/wildlife/beaver/beaver.html

Getting ready for Christmas

I have never not been in New England at Christmastime. Well, once since I've been married, we spent Christmas in South Carolina, and my son, Chris, flew down to join us. He hasn't been back since. "It's too dark and quiet", he said. We do live in the woods after all. I knew he was a "city kid" way back when he was a child, and we lived in the country of Blanchard, Louisiana. He likes noise.

My sister-in-law is not doing well, and today neither is my brother-in-law. Cancer is all pervasive in this family right now. I was experiencing such huge stress over what to do about going back "home", that a friend posted on Facebook: "You have a lot of stress in your life right now and the holidays make it worse. Stay in one place and hunker down." Another friend seconded that motion most enthusiastically. Reading those posts made me feel like God answered my prayers. So, we are staying put and hunkering down right here at "The Lakehouse". We bought a Frasier Fir tree at The Piggly Wiggly, that was already in water and standing up. It was fresher than the tree we had cut down right in front of us last year in Rhode Island! That wasn't a Frasier Fir, but so what?

We planted the potted baby Christmas tree we bought in WalMart down here two years ago, and it is huge now! Larry commented that it is getting "very sexy", meaning it is maturing and growing at a seemingly exponential rate. It was just one of those little potted trees you see in the store for $10 and think, why bother? But, look what it grows into if you plant it. It'll be a gorgeous pine one day. That's Mattie Grace sniffing the latest on her branches.

The day after Thanksgiving, we went to Libby's house and decorated it for Christmas. We hung festive lights outside and placed alternating lighted Santas and Frostys on her lawn. But, she remained in the hospital until a week later. She loves it. She decorated "The Lakehouse" every year since we bought this place, just so it would be homey and festive when we arrived, usually after Christmas. It was the least we could do for her.

So now that we're staying put, we've decorated "The Lakehouse" for Christmas and are content playing seasonal music while sipping eggnog with rum; trying to keep our Bichon, Jackson's, tongue out of our glasses. He really likes it we discovered. Geez.

And this morning, Larry saw a Bald Eagle flying around our cove. It landed in the pines and sat for a very long time looking for fish. He got some rather grainy, but reasonable pictures through the windows in our living room. I just saw it fly across the cove again with something in his/her talons before landing in a pine across the cove above the neighbor's cottage. This place is so magical sometimes. Everything feels like a gift.

Larry's outside wielding the chainsaw now. Last spring we had to cut down a dead pine and because Billy had the saw at his house and didn't return it, he's only just getting to cutting it up now. We have to get Billy's pontoon boat out of the water soon, and this time we want to move it further down towards "the point" and out of our view corridor. That downed tree is in the way. And, since we've been here a pine that has been in the water when the lake was up, and was leaning pretty heavily, finally fell over onto the boat ramp. That'll have to be cut up and removed before we can haul the boat onto the trailor. There's never a loss for work here.

We've decided to rest in the month we've been here, but today, Larry chose to get back to work. I'm missing my siblings right now. In choosing to stay here, I cannot attent a special lunch in honor of our brother, Paul, who died thirty-four years ago today. Paul was the second oldest after me, and would be sixty years old now. I will miss hearing all the stories my sibs will tell at lunch in Natick, Massachusetts (Jeanne's house that I sold to her. It was my first house that I bought myself). My only vivid memories are of us as children. I didn't "hang out" in the neighborhood like the rest, so I don't have any adult memories, except of sitting quietly together, watching TV. I wish I had thought earlier to suggest someone bringing a recorder to capture all those memories. God bless you, little brother.

It is a glorious day outside today: lots of sunshine and cool, but comfortable temperatures. We'll head over to Libby's house later to visit. For now, I think I'll put in the DVD I borrowed from her, "The Nativity". I just love this rendition of the Christmas story. Why don't they televise Christmas stories at Christmas? They always put them on leading up to Christmas Eve and Day, but never at the appropriate time. I guess the television moguls decided they just have to get us pumped up to shop and once we've done that, they've done their job. We just get left hangin'.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays from Dixie, Y'all! Have a wonderful, joyful and prosperous New Year too. Love, Me.

Thanksgiving at the lake.

This was our first Thanksgiving in "The Lakehouse". We hosted my husband's family and my sister-in-law's in-laws, for a total of fifteen adults and three children. Thank goodness our open-floorplan home provided plenty of space for both sitting around the table together enjoying the incredible array of food everyone made and lounging in tryptophan splendor afterwards. I am still full today.

The planning started last Friday night when we invited my sister-in-law, Libby, her family and inlaws to dinner. I made shrimp and grits for the first time. I almost screwed up the grits. Who can mess up grits you ask? Well, when you switch the volume of grits to water, it's easy. Luckily for me, my husband, Larry, saved them with lots of milk and butter. They actually were great. But, the true accomplishment was the shrimp dish. I found a Bobby Flay recipe on-line along with a "Gullah" recipe. I just recently found out about the Gullah culture on the South Carolina coast. The first freed-slaves from West Africa put down roots in Beaufort, near Charleston. They founded their own culture, Gullah, and have their own language.

I combined the best of both these recipes and added my own touches: good Applewood-smoked bacon and Andoille sausage, onion, roasted red peppers, chopped tomato(peeled and seeded so Libby could eat it), lemon juice, butter, shrimp and scallops. It was just delicious and my southern-born relatives raved about it. Yes, bloggers, a Yankee can cook Southern.

Anyway, Libby, her sister-in-law, Mary Pat, her husband, Ed, and I sat around the table after dinner and planned our Thanksgiving menu. Larry and I had already picked up a frozen turkey and honey, spiral-cut ham, so we just added the fixin's and who would make them. Oh, yes, we planned desserts as well. The result yesterday, was a mountain of food that almost made us feel guilty for all the starving children in the world our parents threatened us with if we didn't clean our plates as children ourselves. I learned that this threat has no geographic boundaries. Parents were the same everywhere. Are we still doing this one? I'm certainly not. I gave myself permission to not clean my plate and throw food away years ago. It felt bad at first, but I found myself defending it yesterday when little Amanda wanted permission to throw leftover desserts away with her paper plate. "If you take it, you have to eat it", was what her mother told her. I intervened, and said Amanda could go right ahead and throw it away. I also encouraged her mother to let it go.

The sad part of our day was that Libby, who is terminally ill with appendix cancer that has taken over her digestive organs, got impacted again and doubled over in pain. When she gets like this, there is no pain medication at home that will relieve it, so she was admitted to the hospital two days before Thanksgiving. It was very difficult to go ahead with our holiday celebration without her, but we took turns visiting before and after the day. And, we recorded the day on a video camera that Larry and I took to the hospital last night, so she could hear the songs we sang to Joe's guitar after dinner, and all the good wishes we sent her all day long. She and I sang along to the songs in her hospital room and she was much better. We heard from her brother's wife that in the morning, she was very emotionally upset. The first words out of her mouth when she was admitted to the hospital were, "I don't want to ruin Thanksgving!" I assured her she wouldn't and she didn't.

Before dinner, when the food was ready, we all stood around the kitchen holding hands while I said "the Blessing". I became overwhelmed with emotion as I began, and Mary Pat put her arm around my should for support while I continued to thank God for all our blessings. I asked for help for Libby and thanked Him for the time he gave us with her. Her brother, Billy (Larry's brother too), was also diagnosed with kidney cancer the same day Libby was admitted to the hospital this week. But, he learned that they detected it early and he could consider that "Divine intervention" must have come into play. The timing of his pain attack from gallstones, the lack of patients in the hospital at that particular moment, the area of the ER in which he received his examination all combined to mean he got the additional xray and tests he needed to find his kidney tumor. If the doctors and nurses were busier, they wouldn't have done them at all he was told. So, he should be okay if there are no surprises when they operate on December 15th. Kidney cancer cannot be treated with chemotherapy or radiation, so surgery is his only option. I prayed for him too.

When I was done, several people had tears in their eyes, but we all laughed and hunkered down to the tables joined end-to-end to make room for everyone and their heaping full plates. It was a wonderful meal and a wonderful day. Plus, we were blessed with a gloriously sunny day with temperatures in the low 70's. That in itself was a huge blessing. Thank you, God.

Back at the lake.

It's been a month since we last came to The Lakehouse for my sister-in-law, Libby's, birthday weekend. Since then, the mice have had a field day! The first thing I cleaned was poop off all the kitchen counters and the stove. It wasn't as bad as I've seen in the past, but melted mouse poop is the pits. Then I went into the renovated bathroom to find they pulled much of the woven bathmat cords out. I wonder where their beds are? Haven't found any yet, but you can be sure they are hiding somewhere in the house. Spider poop isn't bad this time, and otherwise, the house is in good shape.

We learned a week before coming here from Larry's brother, Bill, that our power was out. When he and Karan walked in the house after checking to make sure their pontoon boat was still secure, they could have sworn something died in the house. After searching for a carcass, they opened the refrigerator and gagged at the horrid smell. Bill said the once frozen chicken and other meat left in the freezer was liquid. They cleaned everything out of the fridge, after having to go buy trash bags because, of course, we were out. I left a note on my refrigerator magnet pad that we needed more trash bags and 9V batteries for the smoke alarms. Figures. I didn't have time to replenish before leaving the last time.

Once the refrigerator was empty, they hauled everything off to the dump and Karan did a wonderful job cleaning it out. It hasn't been that clean in years! They unplugged it and left the doors open as well as all the windows and ceiling fans to try and air the house out. In two days, Bill said he came back and the smell was gone. When we arrived, I wouldn't have known anything happened because there was no smell from this catastrophe at all. I am very grateful to them both for handling this incident for us.

The power company was very responsive and sent a crew to the house (on a Sunday) within an hour. Bill and Karan had just returned from dumping the refrigerator contents when they came upon the crew on their way out. The crew said vines had grown into the transformer and shorted it out. A road crew would be dispatched the next day to really clear away the vines. This crew merely cleared enough to get the power back on. It has been very warm here, apparently, and the power must have been out for three weeks. We have security cameras on the house, and when Larry couldn't see them, he just assumed his latest effort to make the router not change the IP address in a power outage didn't work again. Next time, we'll make a call to have someone check the house before weeks go by. Maintaining a house remotely is not easy.

Larry and I are both exhausted. I have been feeling a little down and very cranky. I am also feeling a little guilty for doing absolutely nothing except food shop so far this week. I know we deserve the rest and I'm pushing those little devil voices away while I rest on my hammock in seventy-five degree weather reading the lastest book by Richard Castle, Naked Heat. Larry is plunked in front of the TV, but I have to be outside with only birdsong in the background. Well, there are also hammering noises from construction around the lake. Sound travels on the water.

I didn't feel well yesterday. My stomach has been upset. Probably from all the overeating I've done lately. So I never left the couch. Today I got up, took a shower, and went for a walk around this country neighborhood with Jackson and Mattie Grace on their leashes. It felt good to get out and move. But, my mood didn't change. I stayed outside, away from my husband (to protect him from my awful mood), and feel better now that I've had a little lunch.

Tonight, we'll try a restaurant I read about in "South Carolina Living" magazine in Columbia called "Mac's on Main". The recommended dishes are shrimp and grits as well as peach cobbler for dessert. The owner, Mac, is also a jazz performer who is known to hop up on stage and play for the patrons. I hope he does tonight. I would love to hear some live jazz and eat "low country" cooking. Should be fun.

I also read about a Gullah cultural festival in Beaufort that intrigues me. Unfortunately, the ride is two hours fifty minutes one way, and after driving nine hundred fifty-four miles to get here just a couple of days ago, I'm not interested in driving that far so soon. Apparently, on St. Helena Island in Beaufort, near Charleston, is the site of the first freed slave school and the origination of the Gullah culture with its own language. Slaves mostly from Sierre Leone in West Africa and Native Americans mixed to create their own culture. I find this fascinating.

Actually, I am learning a lot more about the Civil War era living here in SC than I was taught in Massachusetts. Larry's family was actually displaced and rampaged by Union solders here. My sister-in-law, Libby, took me to Magnolia Plantation near Charleston several years ago, and I walked through Antebellum houses for the first time. I had never heard that word before. It was very interesting to see how slaves lived in those days. I remain intrigued to learn more as time goes by.

But, a trip to the low-country will have to wait for another time. Instead, Libby and I will go to the Christmas craft festival at the State Fairgrounds this weekend. It is my favorite craft festival. There are hundreds of vendors in several buildings and I always find good stuff there. I'm looking forward to spending some quality time with Libby as well. We'll stay as long as she has the energy.

She just got out of the hospital last week because she was impacted above her stomach peg and was in pain. Her oncologist has told her he has done everything he can for her. We'll see if she will continue with chemotherapy when she goes back to see him on Monday. He is trying to control her bad headaches right now with Lyrica. Her insurance company is still giving her a hard time about approving treatment and drugs to fight her cancer. This fact still amazes me. She only has one "last ditch' option available, and nobody thinks it will do much to help her: internal warm chemo wash at Duke University. She had this when they first removed the majority of her tumors, and the beginning is usually when this treatment works best. The trouble with her condition is that the surgeon was not able to remove all her "paint splatter" tumors, so they keep growing and spreading. They are mucinous tumors that are also difficult to see in a CAT scan. We will enjoy whatever time we can get with her for as long as we can.

Spending time with her is the majority of the reason we are here this month. We'll spend Thanksgiving here and return to Massachusetts on December 3rd. It is supposed to cool off a bit at the end of the week. Maybe a fire in the fireplace will be in order soon. The Lakehouse has a great fireplace.