Sun Dogs

On the way home from work Friday night Andrew pointed out to me that the sun was flanked on either side by "sun dogs". "Sun dogs are bright bursts of light that are formed when sunlight passes through ice crystals at the proper angle". They are primarily a winter phenomenon and occur, usually in pairs, on either side of the sun when it is low in the sky and cirrus clouds are present. Click here for more info.

Stinky Pig

Daisy loves her pig puppet. It's a great interactive entertainment designed to wear her out so we can get a whole night's sleep. For whatever reason she is totally fascinated by this toy, which has been around for years. The reason we call it Stinky Pig is because after she slobbers all over it-it naturally smells like her breath which is just not all that fresh. LOLThe opponents face off

And its every man for himself

Get him Daisy

All done!

Editors Note: There just isn't all that much going on around here with it being 40 below and snowing outside. hehe

Horray for Snow

We've got about 5 inches and it's still coming down. I love snow!
Daisy went outside and promptly put her face in the snow. She loves it too!

We shoveled the sidewalks on our entire walking route. That was about a 400 calorie burn.

Dog Stories Part II

Last fall in Dog Stories Happy & Sad I wrote about our neighbor losing his 12 year old Westie, Courtney. Last night I was walking Daisy in the "soup" and met up with Bob and his new companion Sugar, whom he adopted about 2 months ago. She is a little spitfire at age 2 and Bob is happy again. Daisy is not sure what to make of Sugar, who is a little has a little too much puppy still going for her taste. Daisy apprehensively greeting Sugar. (She acts like they've never seen each other when in fact they walk together a couple night a week when the weather is nice.)

More Tracks in the Snow

Deer Mouse tracks; note the interconnection of the tracks caused by the tail dragging in the snow.

close up of tracks

Redwood Bowl

Back in November you might recall that I mentioned that we stopped at a kitschy souvenir stand located on the Avenue of the Giants when we were in California. Besides having a variety of finished redwood products for sale-bird houses and other assorted yard decor-they had 6 x 6 x 4 chunks of wood for sale. Andrew bought one and drug it home in his suitcase with the intention of making a hand turned bowl. Tonight he made the bowl and it turned out really nice. Below are photos of the process.Redwood in the rough

On the lathe in the process of being shaped

Rounding off the edges

and scooping out the inside

Adding a fluted edge

Removing the bowl from the lathe

The finished product. Beautiful wood grain!

Predators

Aren't they cute?  Just kidding. These are some of the dragonfly larva that live in aquariums in our garage. Their life cycle is being studied and thus they get to have their picture taken at various stages of their development. Incidentally they have been voraciously eating over the past few weeks.  The two on the left are swamp darners, the 3rd is a cyrano darner and the 4th, which we fondly named James (some of you will get this), is a springtime darner.  Absolutely fascinating if you ask me.