New Years Day!

The new year is here, how quickly 2010 passed by! I walked in the muddy yard/garden this morning and found a Crocus speciosus had bloomed. I think I planted 24 of these and 4-5 of them bloomed in fall, see my last crocus post. We still have a little snow on the ground from last weekend, it is going to be a high of 60 degrees today! Who knows if the sun would come out we might see a butterfly.

The camera was fogging up when I shot this, but it made a nice effect. Notice my new copyright for 2011.

Been wanting to share these photos taken in August of 2006, they were featured on my old blog that nobody was able to find. I had a small pile of left over lumber that grew into the weeds along a project I was working on. This happens doesn't it a mess that grows into the landscape? Anyway I decided to clean it up and lifted up this scrap of 2 x 6 about a foot long and found a Five-lined Skink, Eumeces fasciatus nest with eggs. I placed it back to let her nest in peace. Everyday afternoon I would check quietly to see if the eggs hatched, after 2 weeks here is what I found!

Two skink babies, notice the mothers tail for a size comparison.

Newborn skink struggling to exit the egg.

The mother skink protecting her newborn babies, some are still hatching.

What is new for this year? Well I have found a dead Eastern Red Cedar tree on our property and we are cutting it down and making it a bottle tree! I have gathered somewhere around 40 blue bottles and think that 20 or so blue bottles would be better displayed entirely on a bottle tree than inside the bottle wall we are going to build. My hope is to have no two bottles alike on the tree.

We bought a wood stove, something that was on the renovation plans when we remodeled but omitted it due to budget restraints. Meg will be very happy when and if the power goes out we will have heat and it does have a cook top also. This house is pretty green anyway.