After Christmas, before New Year's Day

All around the wee church is a deep drifted blanket of snow at 7 this morning. The wind is just high enough to blow snow off the roof and onto the car, and fill in the front stoop.

The dogs are in heaven. They believe, I'm sure, that snow is God's creation just for them. They snorkle through it, investigate overnight visitors' scent and smells and roll around as if in ecstasy. Well perhaps it really is ecstasy for them. I will enjoy it later when I'm well dressed for it, but it wasn't too cold when we went out to fill the feeder and pour seed onto the deck and under the trees.

We won't be going much further today - snow still coming down and it looks as if it will be so all day long. I will be enjoying the remains of turkey and treats from an incredibly bountiful Christmas day spent with my sons and dogs up in Muskoka. We had a peaceful time, a warm and loving visit. We enjoyed walking with the dogs in the bush, watching a deer bound away in the opposite direction from the one the dogs had chosen to inspect, slipping through the trees and snowy hillocks, as the dogs raced over a hill an eventually returned panting and smiling.

Today I will begin my pledge to myself to resume writing daily, either the blog, the books, a journal. I will also read some books that have been sitting on my shelves, never opened by me.  A book with an inscription on the flyleaf dated 1923 - to my mother, a gift from her friend Helen. Fairy stories and myths from around the world, it's oldness catches my attention. As does that of another book Wood's Popular Natural History, a gold embossed cover with a bear imprinted in gold and black, caribou and whales, birds, flies and butterflies and a hugely horned wild plunging sheep...Inside this flyleaf it reads in very explicit and careful handwriting  "David H. Boddington's Book: Given him by his Father, July 19th 1893." What? I've never looked inside either of these books before. David Boddington was my grandfather, a gentle man who loved nature. I will really enjoy both these books and will describe them later. that is if you're as curious as I am.

In this photo the dogs check out sounds earlier.

They've been outside frequently since, loving what this morning is bringing.






Me? I'm still in my pajamas. I'm loving the morning as well.

And so the mourning doves join the sparrows on the deck, a first. The cardinal was in earlier to choose a few select seeds. Jays have feasted at another feeder, as have finches, nuthatches and the cheerful chickadees.
May you have a wonderful day today, in between the two big end/beginning of season celebrations. May your day and the rest of this year be filled with things, people and experiences that you love or enjoy (hopefully both). And I hope too that you head into a new year filled with excitement, anticipation and a sense of fun and adventure.

Mini horses in the snow

Nearby there is a small herd of mini horses. Yesterday after shopping, I saw a couple of them playing near the electric fence that runs along the edge of the field that fronts on the road home. It's likely that one or more of the mares is ready to breed and some of the action resulted from that. (This entire video is 46 seconds long, but cuts in and out around 37 or seconds - I'm so not a great videographer.)

The rest of the activity was because I had stopped and was standing at the edge of the road. At first the dogs barked  in the car as the horses came along to investigate and the radio was playing loudly... I turned that down and quieted the dogs, but cars continued to drive past, wondering I'm sure what the dickens I was doing.

It was fun to watch the minis all gather, from distant parts of the field. Usually they stick to the pathways they create around the edges, digging down and nibbling the grass underneath the snow which is nearly up to their bellies. But yesterday some of them ran across the field to investigate.

They were a quiet bunch, moving along the edge of the field after figuring out I didn't have any treats for them and wasn't very interesting after all. One went to another and nudged it, nosing around and keeping its head close to the other's - so sweet. And after all this? Fun to try and get a video and practice with my new plaything.

Please note if the video doesn't play for you and you've received the blog through email, go directly to the website http://primarilypets.blogspot.com and you should be able to make it work. It only works through email if I send it as an attachment not if it's imbedded in the blog for some reason.

Oh - and thanks for stopping by - hope my Ontario friends enjoy a happy family day!