not quite there yet

I've been moving since November. There is some progress: I can cook and bathe and dress and do laundry without wondering where things are. The books are shelved. But there are a lot of things still lying around, and it's not all here yet. 

This is what the office looks like now, compared to what it looked like in December.

redbud in bud

I didn't take the real camera when I walked down to the creek this afternoon because it was raining, so you'll have to imagine you can see bits of pink on the branches of the tree in the foreground. The phone camera isn't very good, and I couldn't get any closer without falling down a steep hill. It's a sign that spring is here. Redbud winter is the first of the five "winters"--the cold spells between the first day of spring and the safe frost free date. It's going down to freezing tonight, and when it warms up later in the week all the redbuds will bloom. 

Books. On shelves. Where they belong.

This is a pictureless post because my connection has been even slower than usual, and gets dropped at random. I want to celebrate getting all the books unpacked and shelved. (Or all of mine, at least. There are still some to bring over here from my parents' basement, but I expect those will stay in boxes for a few years.)

I brought the last of the fabric from my old house today. With all the books and all the fabric and almost all the tools moved I can quit worrying too much about all the odds and ends that are left. I have to get it moved, but I'm not worried about it getting damaged. 

I picked some daffodils while I was there. The early daffodils are over and some of the not-yellow ones are beginning to open. When they've finished blooming I have to move them. I will get it all finished, I know. 

root cellar?

I went looking for spring this afternoon, and I found it.

 I walked down to the creek to see if the daffodils at the old house were blooming yet, and they are.

 I also took advantage of the blackberries not having woken up yet (nor the snakes, I hoped) to walk back into the tangle and look at the stone structure that is probably a root cellar.  

This is what's left of the house foundation.

There aren't any shelves or shelf ledges in there, but that doesn't prove anything. I'm wondering if it could have been a spring house, because the floor was muddy when all the ground elsewhere is dry and hard, but if so there isn't an outlet. 

Here's the back view from the "road."

Looking in the door.

Then I went on down to the creek and found daffodils down there, too, which I didn't remember. 

On the way back I put the camera away and picked a lot. Spring really got here. I'm encouraging it to hurry north. 

why you should use a fireproof ash container ; )

We all know the wood-burning safety rules, like always removing ashes in a metal container. (I didn't actually remove any tonight.) I try to alternate between the kitchen and the living room stove, and tonight (just before sunset--solar heat adequate on this nice sunny day) I went to start a fire in the living room. The last time I had one in there, this enormous knotty chunk of oak refused to do anything but smoulder, and when I got up the next morning a lot of it was still there, but the stove felt cold. Tonight I thought "That stubborn piece burned down more than I thought" and then I reached in to rearrange it as a base for another log and felt warmth. More than a day and a half after the stove felt cold, the wood was still warm to the touch, though not hot. It wasn't burning enough that I could have started another fire without a match, but it amazed me nevertheless. 

meeting a neighbor

Today I met the only one of my near neighbors I had not already met. I'd met her dogs before, and waved to her horses. Her young lurcher thinks that I only drive along my driveway so she can chase me, and today, taking the garbage container back to the house in the back of the car with the seats down, she followed me all the way and wouldn't go home when her mama called. So I met my neighbor, who was appalled to get here and find her Very Large Puppy in the back of my car refusing to get out. ; )

I did not have a chance to take pictures (I'm sure the sight of a camera would have chased Lucy right out) but try to imagine this eight month old lurcher, not quite full grown, but nearly thirty inches at the withers, wandering around the back of a small hatchback car with its back seats folded up. She could stand up only if she hunched her head down, but she didn't want to get out, she wanted a ride!

When you're in the middle of the road...

the grass is greener on both sides.

On my way to pack some more at my father's house, I came across a cow in the middle of the road. She wandered from one side to the other, snatching a bite. The people in the other lane had stopped, and one woman got out, talking into her cell phone, so I hoped she knew who the owners might be. (It struck me that although I've driven along that road all my life, I have no idea who owns the farms around there, not even who would have owned them in my grandparents' day.) Eventually the cow picked a side, and we all drove off. 

(Weather note: yesterday 74F; today barely above freezing and as I post this it's snowing again.)

Proof

Spring is advancing northwards, folks. I picked these today at my old house when I went for another car load of boxes.

J

So Bag Lady handed me the letter J, and the very first word that came into my head was

Justice

not Jelly or Java or even June, all lovely things that I'm fond of. It reminds me of the time someone asked me what if I could have whatever I wanted without any restrictions at all and the first thing that popped into my head was World Peace, which, I told them, made me sound a great deal more high-minded and selfless than I really am.

Jazz is one of my favorite kinds of music, second only to classical (can I count the Jupiter symphony?), but although I love to dance the Jitterbug is either too formal or too informal to be at the top of my list.

In honor of spring I will agree to call daffodils Jonquils this once. And I love my Journal, which I have been keeping since I was twelve. Since I love words, I especially love Jargon. I can't think of any fruits or vegetables that begin with j, and every time I've been near any Jambalaya I've been allergic to some of the ingredients. Although I love some kinds of exercise I certainly don't love Jogging, and I haven't tried Judo, so I'm going to reach pretty far and say I love the [Lexington] Junior League Horse Show, as well as many other horsy events.

creek

This is the creek in October without much water in it. It's the southern boundary of this property. As the daughter of someone who grew up on a creek bank having this creek is such a good feeling, but it's kind of frustrating. Because it's the boundary, it's useless as a water source for the bottom land which is the biggest piece of pasture I've got. (Several owners ago it was in tobacco.) When it rains a lot it gets to be several feet deep, but when it's been dry, it's more of a trickle, so I doubt it's a source of fish, either. 

encouraging sign

I walked down to the creek this afternoon (not quite all the way, because the last bit is very steep, and my joints didn't want to tackle the way back up) past the old house. I think it's interesting that I had started calling the foundations of the old house and most of the root cellar "the old house" not "the old house site" before I heard some of the people who've lived in this area call it "the old house." It has quite a strong presence. 

Because it was a house, of course there are tough perennials left: iris, daylilies, and daffodils. I wanted to check on the daffodils. Good news. They're not an early variety, and the woods have grown up so they're not in full sun, but they're at least six inches above ground, and the early ones at my old house in full sun were that high only two weeks ago. Things will be blooming around here soon.