A little bit of snow...

Before our light snow+++

A look at the old trail that heads down towards our creek and valley. Dusty and brown.

Out on the edge of a field, I found a lone milkweed pod that still had some seeds on it. This plant was about 3 feet from the forest and probably protected from the winter winds.
 

We got snow. Not much. Not even enough to have the town plows hit the gravel roads. But still, it is moisture and hopefully it will eventually melt into the ground.

A little bit of snow does change the looks of things and these barberries stood out with their bright red berries in the forest. I stayed as much as possible in the forest because getting out where the wind was blowing was very cold.

This next shot is probably only interesting to me. It is of an old oak stump cut down when this area was logged 28 years ago. Probably not interesting to others though. It's texture with snow on it created something interesting to my eye. Too bad we couldn't see it in 3D.

It snowed a bit on and off for the rest of the afternoon and evening so I went out this morning to the summer pasture to get to some shots of the sparkly snow and some shadows. We only received perhaps an inch and a half in total, but it was a nice change from the browns of the day before.

The trail at the top of the hill was much prettier. Plus there were no tracks yet from the critters other than a lone coyote.

The summer pasture did have some pretty spots. I tried so hard to get the snow 'diamonds'. Dad used to call the snow sparkles 'diamonds'. They were there, but so tiny!

The sun was SO bright it hurt my eyes! I had to squint. The temperature was 3 F [-16C]. The sun was shining and I was out of the wind so I did feel just fine.

I think the hardest thing to do with such bright white snow is try to get the exposure spot on. But this was just a little wander around the summer pasture and how it looked with a little bit of fresh snow on it.

In places where the wind had blown, the grasses showed through the snow quiet well.

The shadows of the plants and the textures of the snow were so fascinating.

Of course, Mini Me and Charlie had to check it out too.

According to NOAA [which I hope is not de-funded], we are to get up to 5 inches of snow Friday afternoon and night!

Temperatures will be super frigid come Sunday night.

...oh... parting shot through a window with a screen on it...

The Redheaded Sisters snoozing this morning with their snow blankets on.

Plans for Valentine's Day? None here. Every day is full of ❤️ in our house.

Hiemal and Apricity & heaters

[see the little black doggy in the far 

left side of the photo?]

Hiemal:
of or relating to Winter

Apricity:
the warmth of the Winter Sun

These odd words are pretty accurate at describing my latest hiking adventures. While in the woods and out of the wind, I can appreciate Apricity.

When moving into the deep valleys I enjoy Hiemal temperatures in the shaded part. 

However, Olive and I found a rather warm area next to one of the large caves we found. She basked in sun.

We trekked along the bluffs to find the large bluff rock with a 'hole' in it.

The orange arrow points to where I was...

I did NOT venture out on the rock. The top of it was covered in ice... even Charlie didn't venture any further.

We headed up along a hogback ridge and found a spot to sit and have snacks and take a breather. 

My goal this month was to find out if one could get to the top of that bluff. 

I sure felt humbled by finding that spot and observing the river from 80 feet above it.

Now to return when the ice is gone and explore the narrow and very steep valley below it. Will it give me an entrance to that 'hole'? I don't know yet.

Olive said this is what she had needed before her work week. She needed to get the cobwebs out of her head and fresh air into her lungs. 
She likened our little adventure to Lewis and Clark.

I laughed and said that it was better to be Lewis and Clark than Thelma & Louise -- because that relationship ended badly!

Heaters ~~~

When I got home I found out that the motor and fan on our heater was screaming and misbehaving. It screeched and groaned and made the awful-ist noises. It had been getting worse over the all week.

At 8PM, Olive showed up with 3 large space heaters. I turned off the offensive heater and we temporarily solved the problem with one space heater. 

Now to go on and start with phone calls to replace this heater.
Photo from 2016 when the Cabin Heater was installed. Direct Vent LP heater. For our Tiny Home we use about 200 gallons of LP per winter. So it has done a great job so far. Our last heater of the same kind lasted 15 years before we replaced it.

Of course this week promises to be fraught with horrible winter weather all week. So any chance of fixing our heat right away may be an issue.

This morning I made some phone calls. Now I wait for someone to get back to me.