Posts Tagged With: nature

Monochromatic

At Tiny House Ontario, the forest floor is crisp and white with snow and the trees are simply grey scale.  At night, the moon has been large and round in the sky drawing shadows across the smooth white surface.  It is lovely.  This morning when I woke it was snowing it was so breathtakingly lovely that I curled myself into a ball on the plush brown blanket and rested my head on my arm, simply watching the snow fall.   It is absolutely monochromatic here except the house which is, of course, the colour of chocolate.

I realized when my tummy started grumbling that I had been there three full hours.  I don’t know how the time got away on me, really… I felt as though I were there for just a moment.

The good news is: now I can snowshoe!  Woot!

 

Categories: Forest, Nature, Ontario, Open your eyes, Simple living, Tiny House Ontario, View | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment

Wichtelhütte

Wichtelhütten Ontario

A message came through via email yesterday.  Richard, a friend from Germany, was hoping to get a photo from Canada.  The photo is for some sort of a competition.  Although it is not clear exactly what it is about he needed an image from as far away geographically from Germany as possible and the photo has to have the word Wichtelhütte in it.

Wichtelhütte means gnome house or little people house.  The irony that I live (~half the year) in a Tiny House with a bunch of Gnomes placed in the surrounding forest was not lost on me.  How could I resist?

I enjoyed a wonderful Solstice at my Wichtelhütte, a Norse Yule with friends in Kingston, Christmas with my sister and her family in the countryside, and today a smooth trip back to Hamilton to have a further holiday celebration with family here.

My days are currently filled with fun stuff to do with people who hold great meaning to me, and lots of wonderful things to eat too.  Life is great!

No matter how you choose to spend the last days of December 2012 I hope that you have enjoyed days as wonderful as those I have shared with my loved ones.

Wichtelhütten

Categories: Off Grid, Ontario, Open your eyes, Simple living, Tiny House Ontario, View | Tags: , | 12 Comments

THO gets painted…

I have been painting like a mad woman since yesterday morning.  There are many changes that have taken place on the THO painting since yesterday, so I thought I would share for anyone who is interested.  It is quite insane how much paint it takes to cover such a huge painting.

I am going to let it dry now before I make the colours all muddy.  Plus, I must stand under warm water and I have to prepare for tonight’s writer’s meeting.

Tiny Roots in progress

Categories: Art, Original Art work of Laura Moreland | Tags: , | 5 Comments

Feeding the Birds

Last year I purchased two bird feeders that were on sale for $5.  The first time it rained, I realized why they were so cheap.  The bases filled with water and the food on the bottom absorbed the water and turned into sticky goo which I had to dig out.  Gross!  Sadly too, pretty useless unless you have a covered patio, which I don’t… you know… rain happens.

This year because of the earlier drought I know that the birds suffer and will continue to suffer unless there is food put out for them because not enough stuff germinated and created seeds.  I had been thinking about buying a different feeder because I hate to throw the seeds out on the ground when we live so close to a feral colony here in Hamilton.  A while back, my friend O and I were at a greenhouse where I was admiring the practicality of $90 bird feeders and telling her about my terrible feeders.  She suggested that I buy a plastic bowl from the dollar store to cover them and drill a hole in the top (they have to be flexible plastic).  Yesterday, I finally got around to buying and preparing them and I already have a hundred sparrows chattering happily outside.  I am not sure if the bowls are large enough but  rain is coming so, I guess I will know soon enough if their food will stay dry.

DIY Covered bird feeders

Categories: Nature, Open your eyes, Simple living | Tags: , , | 7 Comments

The Sensual Stars

Don’t you just love to read in bed on a cold day?  Particularly, if it is damp and rainy?  I do.

The cold outside made the windows all fog over, after I added a little heating.  This meant, I did not have much of a view upstairs, but even so, it was certainly bright enough to read.

Frosty window

It is always warmer in the loft than it is on the main level, heat rises.  Still it is nice to get right in bed and roll up cozy in layers of blankets on a lazy afternoon.

David's gift

The book is The Starry Room, a gift from my friend D, who is also a writer as well as an off-grid and Tiny House enthusiast. He thought I would enjoy the book in the quiet of THO’s forest and he was right.   The Author Fred Schaaf words are intuitive and sensual, as well as very much in tune with the sky and the ebb and flow of nature.  He writes,”we should not forget ourselves in our role as appreciators in these heavens we study.  There is no feeling of insignificance or meaninglessness for anyone who is an active participant in this appreciation, which not only involves us in the cosmos but makes us intimate with it as only friends or lovers can be.  And only through the medium of not just our senses, thought, and feeling but also through a sky we can have this involvement.”

He is not quite so lyrical as my hero Erazim Kohák, but even so he speaks to the issue of bonds and connections that we humans can can attain if we take a little time to understand.  I like this about the book, very much.  Connection to life, matters a lot to me.

“There is creative reading as well as creative writing.” ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Categories: Art, Forest, Nature, Open your eyes, Simple living | Tags: , , , | 2 Comments