A Funny thing happened...

So like a lot of women I used to like going to the same person all of the time for cutting my hair. She had an idea what it should look like and usually followed my instructions. I've enjoyed her cuts for many years but as time goes on and on, getting an appointment with her is like pulling teeth.

Weeks out! Sorry hun, can't fit you in. I was a shaggy mess of nasty flopped over unruly outgrown short hair. 

I was desperate. I told her I might have to go to Great Clips where I could walk in. My hair girl gasped over the phone as I chuckled. My hair gal suggested I plan ahead and make appointments ahead of time. I laughed as she knows me much better than that. I am a spur of the moment person on many things.

I thought about taking offense to that, but she knows I wouldn't take offense to that...but I kinda did in a small way.

Our town has quite a few beauty salons that I could choose from, but all of them are over the top expensive.

I mulled that all over after that phone call while waiting for Danny the Farrier to arrive.

Danny showed up late which is never his fault when the appointment before me added two horses to be shoed instead of the two that were scheduled.

Here he is trimming Sundance [yeah, I have to trim her mane and take out the briars!] Sundance had just rolled in the mud so she'd be beautiful for Danny.

Siera showed some stretching of the white line, we are hoping that it is showing up from her episode this spring. 

Since her bout earlier this year, she has been pretty good unless I let her out into a lush pasture. So she is on crap pasture and is doing fine. 

We'll keep an eye on that line and see if it starts to heal or get worse. I'm optimistic, the fall pastures will be less full of sugar and with a winter of hay rations, she should lose more weight and I'll be better prepared to not only exercise her, but to keep her on a lot where I can control what she eats.

Danny and I finished up and I set up another date so we can keep her on a schedule where he can asses her progress. She was an honest to goodness perfect mule for trimming and walked off as if she had no issues or pain. Siera is 23 year old.

When we were done we visited and then I made a decision. I was going for a drive and I was getting a hair cut. Not one like my regular gal wanted which is so classic of haircuts for over 70 ladies.

I went to Great Clips. I walked in and waited for the first available person. Apparently you can make appts with certain hair stylists. All of these gals were young and so full of energy! Happy, pleasant...and cheerful.

The girl put a wrap around me and said, "What do you want to do?"

I said short short. She asked a bunch of questions and she was curious about how much off. 

"Lots and get that back like...almost shaved off."

She was so surprised and then began to chop chop snip snip. 

"How's this for the back? I can use a size 16 clipper and make it a bit shorter or ... what?"

"Let's go with that," I replied, "My hair does seem to keep growing back. Besides I don't want to mess with that mess in the back. I hike, I work out, I'm in the woods, hair is the least of my worries!"

She laughed and went at it with the clippers.

I was soooooo happy with the cut. Happier than I've been with hair cuts for the past few years! My old hairdresser's gasp of horror was obviously not warranted.

When I went to check out she gave me the total of $22 and then said, "You're not a Senior are you?"

I chuckled and asked if 70 was considered being Senior. 

"Well you don't look Senior." 

She adjusted a discount for the haircut. I handed her a nice tip because, well, I had a blast and she did a great job. 

Plus she behaved like I wasn't an OLD person! [A nice little lie, but it worked!]

I don't want to fuss with my hair. I've had it long, medium long, short, very short, long short, and everything in between. I wanted different and I got it.

It will work well with my baseball caps, riding helmet, and winter hats. After all most of the time, I wear a hat to keep the sun out of my eyes.

Oh I can smile. I just rarely do it for selfies because my smiles can be crooked looking. There I am feeling so relieved of all that messy hair.

I used to be a free wheeler and more of an adventurer pre Rich. Then I became a homebody because he needed me.

I took off on a whim and that felt quite nice. Today, I'm taking the pups to Kristi's while I ride with her then we scoot off to LaCrosse for the appointment for my car. Subaru and dogs.

My dogs love visiting the Dealership. Afterwards we may go explore a hiking trail or go to Pet Smart for some fun.

More off the cuff adventuring for fun coming later this week.

Someone took the chain and ball off my feet!

Nice Holiday

For once our weather was ideal. It was not hot, it was not muggy, even though the morning started out foggy, it ended up being the perfect weather for a Holiday.

I decided I was going to take a Holiday too. Why not?

The dogs convinced me to take a day off from working.  

So we did.

I grabbed a book and we walked out to the campground and I hung out in the hammock and read a book and looked a the Mushroom Book I have.

The dogs found vole or mole runs and decided to enjoy hunting them.
They don't do this in the yard and I let them do

it in the forest as much as they want.

To them, this is a playground of things to dig and 

smell.

It is their internet and playground.

We spent hours. I read, they sometimes jumped up on the hammock to join me and sometimes ran off a ways in the meadow to find what scents enticed them.

I felt like camping but didn't feel like putting up the tent and taking it down Tuesday [heavy rain]. So I did the next best thing.

I shoved the camp cot against the bench and made a wide bed for us on the porch. 

We piled up blankets and pillows and settled down to watch the day fade away and the first stars come out.

This is called Dusking: The purpose is to intentionally watch the day fade away and clear your mind with no electronics, internet, or cell phones.

I've done this before, but sitting on a hard bench isn't that comfortable, so we did it from the camp bed under the porch roof.

By the time the stars actually started to dot the sky, my brain was in chill mode and the warm bodies of dogs hugged me.

We fell asleep probably early as the sun sets now around 7:30. We watched the sky fade from blue to a darker blue very slowly. 
The hoot owls called out.

The crickets sang, some quite loud somewhere on the porch I assume.

I counted stars as they appeared and was up to 10 when I must have dozed off.

A lone coyote barked in the distance west of us. Soon a chorus of coyotes started their nightly hunt east of us in the neighbor's woods. They were loud and sounded much closer than they really were. Their voices echo off the hillsides surrounding us. Hannah and Charlie were silent.

Those noises faded away as we drifted back into sleep.

I woke up slowly, it seemed still dark, but it also seemed as if it were brighter. I checked my watch and was surprised to see that it was after 6AM and the dogs were still quiet. Hannah wasn't nagging me for her 5AM or earlier breakfast.

I felt more rested than I had in days.

According to the Garmin watch thingy, I slept 8 1/2 hrs but it was light sleep with a few times awakening. [Garmin doesn't feel I had 'good' sleep, but I feel like I did. So there Miss Garmin!]

As daylight started to creep in, I laid there comfortably, cuddled by my two buddies. I wondered why sleeping without proverbial walls seem to be so much nicer for me.

Maybe I just have gypsy heritage, though that is not confirmed as far as I know. I wonder what it would feel like on a colder night? 

I got up and bundled up the blankets and pillows and tossed the slightly damp ones in the dryer for a few minutes. The dogs were not impressed by me whisking things away and breaking things down.

We are due for some heavy rain along with thunderstorms today. Let it happen. I had a good night.

I'm ready to get going on my short 'work' week.

I leave you with my favorite spider, the Garden Spider or the Orb Weaver or Banded Garden Spider. She is absolutely stunning.

Busy is a busy does

I've been working with a magnet, a rake, and a broom to clean up the concrete slab and the small bits of metal that are in the dirt around it. The 'good stuff' that was hidden in the garage included old rusted coffee cans full of old rusted nails of every size one could think of.

I do know that Rich's father also collected nails, even straight used ones. My Grandparents' generation never threw out things that could be re purposed or reused. My mom was the same way as was Rich's folks and Rich. For those that lived through very hard times, repurposing was not a fad but a necessity.

So, if the garage had never been crushed or inundated with water, most of those nails could have been useful to build something with the lumber that is in the dry confines of our machine shed.

Unfortunately, the clean up dropped a LOT of nails and chunks of miscellaneous metals all around the all garage. This weekend, I filled two 5 gallon buckets with pieces of metal, glass, and nails. 

Patrick will be back to do some more work this coming week in the meantime, I am looking for broken glass, metals, and sharp things along with metals. A good magnet on a handle is a great helper.

The dogs check on the progress and then go lay down on the porch. It is too tiring to watch me work.

I did manage to take some 'fun' time for me. On our morning hike/walk with my 4 legged pals, I took some toys.

Hannah is still learning to not always nose over toys while I am photographing. Charlie has that down pat.

The two shots below were done with a deep foggy morning and very little sunlight. I knew the fungi wouldn't stick around once the sun came out so I grabbed my 1:87 HO Scale mountain climbers and thought...this could be fun!

It turned out to be fun. Twice I dropped the tiny guy in the blue shirt. Thankfully it wasn't in a bunch of flowers and it was in the mulch where I could find him easily.

 I believe the fungi/mushroom is called Pleated Inky Caps. I find them often in the flowerbed mulch. They are doing a job enriching the soil and breaking down the mulch so I just admire them.

On the dog hike, I brought Qilin, the Mythical Creature from Lego. I built this not because I like the kid series Monkey Boy, but because the creature is posable and delightfully colorful.

I know that Qilin and the Ninjango character I acquired years ago seemed to just go together.

I carefully carried it out to the meadow. [Carefully, I didn't want to lose any pieces of this mythical creature!]

I think Lego missed the point in putting these characters in different toy stories. Definitely this guy and the dragon match in glowing and bright wonderful colors.

no dogs knocked this down!

I left the Mythical Creature at the campsite and followed the dogs deep into the woods. I let them be my guides. I should do that more often.

I found dozens of sights in my forest with Indian Pipes aka Monotropa Uniflora. I like the names: Ghost Plants and Indian Pipes better.

What an amazing background a group of them would make alongside a deer trail for my Princess Sara and her faithful bodyguard Joan of Knight.

Yes, Princess Sara rides a horse and carries her faithful stick horse which I am assuming has magical powers. She also has the little red dragon with her. They are on a mission and a journey to defeat some evil in the world.

After an early morning of tromping through the woods and getting soaked by the dew, we returned home to continue working on the cleaning the old garage site.

By late afternoon, I decided I'd had enough back breaking bending over work and charged up the mower to trim the yard. Over the week we had another half inch of rain along with humidity and heat so the grass decided to really get with the growing program again.

Now that it is out of the way, I don't have to deal with it until next week [hopefully].

I went to bed early. The dogs were exhausted from supervising all day.

But when I woke up around midnight, I couldn't help but stay up a bit longer to admire the Milky Way from the porch.

Looks like a busy short week ahead. 

I am planning this weekend to be joyful. With a celebration of my husband's life. Of course it will be bittersweet, but I carry him in my heart always.

Deconstruction Day

We started out with a foggy and rainy morning that promises to be wet, rainy, and humid. The mules were out in the south pasture fog just doing there thing until....

Patrick showed up.
 

2 hours later:

One of the huge surprises was that the concrete floor of the garage is not chipped, broken, or heaved.

In fact the trees that grew in there grew from dirt and leaves that had accumulated in piles. So I could have a nice parking spot, I could make it a patio, I could put up a gazebo, or even one of those premade little sheds. 

I always wanted to put up a tiny shed with windows in it for my own private studio. What a great dream that would be. 

Probably too...$$$.

A craft area. But heat and cooling would be an issues. Just tossing ideas out there. 

Maybe even a little outdoor fireplace.

Anything is better than looking at the garbage filled old smashed up garage. 

My husband fought me for 13 years on tearing this building down. But now, I'm happy to say I took the dive to pay for a demo and cleanup. 

I'm sorry Rich, but I had to do it for my own sanity. Almost most everything in there was totally destroyed by years of neglect. Now? Let's rejoice for having some more beauty put back in our land.

10:43 He is cleaning up what he can fit into his truck. 

This will open things up and not make the house feel crowded by an old crushed garage. Filling his truck and taking the trips took more time than the demolition did.
But he got the job done as he said he would. He will return after the dumpster is picked up and do the rest of the work in that area.

The video 6 seconds of an 8 hour job.

He estimated one dumpster would do the trick. The garage had more unusable 'stuff' in it than he thought. He filled the dumpster and had to fill his truck 3 times and take it to the landfill. [Extra costs, I'm sure]

He picked up the metal pieces and delivered them to the Scrapper that had been out here earlier this year.

What next?

Landscaping and seeding along with cleaning up the piles of dirt.

I'll have a nice concrete pad.

I don't know what I'll do next....

I could.....do something like this....

Probably not practical, but it would be cute. Annoying visitors could sleep there too. 

Possibilities. But for now, we continue the clean up.

PS. Blogger is not publishing comments for me at this point in time. 😔

And so this....

Take a good look at this mess. It may well be a memory by this weekend. 

I got a text from Patrick on Monday saying the Dumpster will be delivered on Wednesday. I was momentarily confused as he'd planned the work for much later. He had the time and is getting right with the program. 

Color me very very impressed.

The engine hoist stays, that is how I lift the mower and clean it out. It may be placed in a less conspicuous place.

September 2026

March 2026

Most of the 'stuff' that was piled around the garage has been cleaned up, but there is stuff in the weeds that I can't get to and don't want. Hopefully those small things will get cleaned up also. I am not allowing the scrappers back to search in this building, it is a hazard at this point.

June 2012

The deconstruction and this week's work will keep me from getting out to another Fungi search at least until Sunday. 

Stay tuned! I may set up my trail cam to take a time lapse of the de-construction.

---

My Grand daughter will be spending Saturday with me and she is not a forest person at all.

Looks like a busy week for me and no fun fungi marches!

However, I can add to what I did find last Sunday.

---

Below is a photo of the end of the bluff where the trail dead ends looking over the Kickapoo River.

Below are some very odd looking mushrooms!

Elfin Saddle or White Saddle and Scientific name:

Helvella Crispa

I almost passed these up because they had such bizarre shapes. I thought perhaps they had been stepped on and deformed. However, saw too many of them to be that.

These beauties below...well maybe not beautiful to

the casual observer...

Amanita Panther 

Poisonous!

I couldn't help but think of Ailie who is an action figure I have. She would chop one of these down and dry it. If you got on her bad side I imagine she'd slip some Amanita Powder in your drink. Be nice. 😋

 I didn't know what this might be until I got out my reference books.

The common name for this beauty is a Cauliflower Mushroom.

I think it could be called a Sparassis americana or spathulata. This is the first time I've found one and spent quite a bit checking it out.

I found so many of these growing, tiny little Boletes beginning to come up all over.

That is the end of my fungi/mushroom tour on the Wintergreen Trail. I can't wait for another trip out along the bluffs of the Kickapoo River.

Busy days ahead.

Sunday morning coming down....

I checked the weather when I got up and stepped outside in the predawn. It was cool, but humid. A low fog drifted across the south pasture where Siera and Sundance were snoozing in the sandy area.

I checked my to do list for Sunday and decided to take my canine hiking as soon as chores and breakfast was done. 

We'd beat the midday heat and have the trails to ourselves if we went early.

It was August 30th. A year exactly to the date when Nurse Tim told me that Rich was going on the Actively Dying List.

We headed out and when we got to the trail head at the Visitor's Center, we were the only vehicle. I parked, attached the lines to the dogs [they don't need to be leashed but I keep lines on them in case I need to grab them].

We were going Fungi Hunting.

The recent rain and humidity was prime for mushrooms to start popping along the bluffs of the river.

Even though we'd had a dry week, the nights and mornings had been wet with heavy dew and fog.

A perfect climate for mushroom hunting.

We were not disappointed. We found huge mushrooms! 

We found such an amazing variety of mushrooms that I was just blown away.

I also found a flowering plant that I'd never seen before:

Great Plains Ladies' Tresses aka the scientific name: 

Spiranthes magnicamporum

I included a link because I felt they were so special and I've never run across them before. It is  MN wildflower link. I'm going to add it to my 'discovered' wildflowers!

I headed down the Wintergreen Trail because in years' past, I've found a single Indigo Ink Cap mushroom. Back then, someone had kicked it over instead of walking around it. 

Each August-September I retrace my steps to look for this beautiful mushroom.

This year I hit the motherlode.

I found at least a dozen or more of them. Below is a photo of Charlie standing in a spot where I counted 6 of them!

Ever see a 70 yr old lady doing the happy dance on a bluff in the forest? Yep, I was doing a jig and trying to avoid stepping on the pretty blue fungi.

So, just to let you know why my dogs wear beeper collars. I get so engrossed in looking at the little things that I ignore the puppers. They stay close, but I can push a button and call them in close.

Dogs here can be off leash. But I don't want to lose them in the 8,900 acres of forest that surrounds the Reserve.

I did some Toy Photography [of course!]

We'd gone so early that no one else would be around on this particular trail.

First shot with Hannah in the background.

Patience. Hannah moved on ...

...and then we hit the area where a little bit of water flows from the ice caves in the winter and some little dog had a total brain explosion of happiness with muddy zoomies... 6 seconds of unbridled puppy joy.

This is the ice caves in the winter. I can't wait to take Hannah here this winter!

I have so many items that we found. A two mile walk took us over 2 hours because I stopped and sat on the ground to explore and look at the mushrooms, fungi, and slime molds that presented themselves along the trail.

I'm that weird person who gets excited by the unusual slime mold, plants, or mushrooms. I stop, I look, and I explore.

My cohorts and I spent time sitting quietly at the end of the Wintergreen Trail. They had treats, I had a protein bar. 

Eventually we headed back. We could hear the traffic increase on Highway 131. The motorcycles were headed to LaFarge for the Chicken Q dinners at Rockton Bar.

It was time to evacuate the area and return home.

More fungi will come in the next posts. But I might be out exploring in the mornings this week. It is supposed to be unseasonably hot and humid. Perfect for fungi/mushroom hunting.

The dogs were silent on the way home and took long afternoon naps. I think they are ready for bed too.

It was a good Sunday morning.