Mockingbird Hill Cottage

Life in our little cottage in the country

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A Wee Bit of Spring Fever

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Thank you so much for your beautiful comments on Wednesday’s post. Oh, how lovely they were! Several brought tears to my eyes. You are so appreciated, my friends.

I’ve been a bit under the weather with… what? Sinus? Allergies? On Wednesday, I must have sneezed 40 times! I felt a tickle in one nostril all day long. Yesterday was a bit better, but there was still some sneezing. Anyway, the whole thing was odd and – given all the sneezing – exhausting. I hope today is sneeze-free.

Miranda was my comfort doll on Wednesday.

It’s been quite warm for this time of year – yesterday, the high was 51 degrees and today will be a bit warmer. It won’t last, of course, but yesterday was one of those days where I had a real bout of spring fever – that hopeful flutter inside that spring is on its way. That kind of ‘tease’ is wonderful, I think. Though you know spring is not on the way yet, for a moment, you allow yourself to believe it could be and everything seems hopeful and, somehow, lighter.

I just looked at the forecast and it’s going to be 59 tomorrow!

Of course, we’re due for a bit of snow on Tuesday, so there’s that.

I read first thing this morning, as I was behind on my reading of Wolf Hall. I needed a chunk of uninterrupted reading time. Now I’m all caught up. Hilary Mantel was a brilliant writer. I’m still reading The Poppy War  by R. F. Kuang, as well. And I have a couple of books on hold at the library – the much anticipated new book from Terry Hayes – The Year of the Locust. It’s a thriller. It was published on Tuesday and I think I’m first in the queue. And then, because we watched a documentary on fungi last night, I remembered a book that came out last year about the same subject – Entangled Life, how fungi make our worlds, change our minds, and shape our futures. I ordered that last night. I remember the author – Merlin Sheldrake – was referenced in Underland, a book I read last year.

Don has a gig this evening, north of here. He’s printing out his set list as I write this.

Stay safe.

Happy Friday.

Sorting, Walking, Curling, Reading

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Rest assured, it’s still gray out there. This was taken over a week ago on a rare sunny day.

I attacked that junk drawer with relish yesterday. Much was thrown in the trash, the rest was reorganized in a way that made sense. It is now a thing of beauty. I was in the mood to tackle it yesterday. If only I was in that mood on a daily basis! The result was very satisfying.

We haven’t done our walk since January 11th because of the weather. Lots of snow, bitter cold, high winds, lots of rain – that has been our weather for the past two weeks. Today, we have a rare dry day, so we’ll be back at it. Tomorrow, we have a rain/snow forecast, so we’ll see. After that, it should be relatively stable for the week. We have missed that daily walk at the library.

I’m reading The Poppy War  by R. F. Kuang and, though it’s very different than my usual fare, I’m quite enjoying it. And I just finished reading my required pages for this week in Wolf Hall.  I haven’t played with the girls much this week. I needed a break from my Blythe feed on Instagram. It can sometimes be a bit overwhelming – too much visual stimulation and too much buying and selling by people who have far more money than I. When that happens, I back off for a while.

Besides, little Shirley Temple needs my attention this week. The sponge rollers that I need for her hair arrived yesterday. The whole idea of sponge rollers sent me on a memory trip. I remember setting my hair with large pink sponge rollers. I’m not sure what I was trying to achieve with my straight hair, but that was what we did in those days. My mom used the bristly type of rollers that you stuck a pick into. Remember them? The women in our neighborhood – and Don tells me it was the same in his, as well – routinely put curlers in their, tied a scarf around them, and went shopping. Seeing anything like that nowadays is extremely rare. It took me years to finally accept the fact that I had fine, straight hair. It has a very slight wave when allowed to dry naturally, but basically it wasn’t going to do what I wanted it to do – whatever that was.

Stay safe, my friends.

Happy Saturday.

 

 

Sun, Cold, and Blooms

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Yesterday was very, very cold but the sun was shining its bright light all day long. There’s nothing prettier than sun bouncing off snow. The house was flooded with light.

Today, we will begin a warming trend; though as I write this, the weather app says it ‘feels like’ 2 degrees out there. I’ve been up for two hours and my hands are still cold.

The sansevieria/snake plant is blooming again. Every time I post a picture of the blooms, people say they have NEVER seen one bloom, as if I’m either mistaken about the plant identification or imagining things. But it does bloom and the scent is lovely. Don and I stop by the plant a couple of times a day to inhale the scent, which is rather like night-blooming jasmine. You know the story of this plant. It was my parents’ plant and I remember its early days in their home in Dearborn. Meredith has the other plant, purchased by my parents at the same time. We know they are now at least 50 years old. After my dad died, I loaded the pot in my car and brought it back to New York.

And yes, Meredith’s snake plant blooms, too.

I like to think it’s a little hello from my parents.

I’m all over the place in my reading. I spent part of the morning yesterday catching up on Wolf Hall, so that I would be ready for this week’s assigned pages. I’m also reading The Poppy War  by R. F. Kuang. And today, I opened a book of short stories by Kate Atkinson (a favorite author) entitled Normal Rules Don’t Apply. I’m normally not into short stories, but in this case, I’m very happy I decided to give it a go. I’ve read the first two stories and enjoyed them thoroughly. I checked it out from our library system. I’m pretty sure the book was published very recently.

Today, I have to package up another Etsy sale. I listed two more pieces of McCoy on Saturday. However, I’m fast running out of pieces I’m willing to sell!

Stay safe.

Happy Monday.

Lambs Like to Party

Lambs Like to Party

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