My Mommy loves me so much…
…and that makes me purr.
Mommy loves my soft white bib. She says it feels softer than the rest of my fur. My sister Vivian’s white fur is softer too.
Mom read online that pigment makes fur feel rougher and is a characteristic of many cats, though not all of them.
Thanks for looking at my snaps! 💕
Photo Challenge: Soft
#2019picoftheweek
Winter afternoon
peace and quiet so serene
clear and cold and blue
– but I’m never blue with you
in our home beside the sea.
***
The Japanese tanka is a 31-syllable poem.
Tanka translates as ‘short song’ and is known for its 5-line, 5/7/5/7/7 syllable count form.
Last Sunday, I shared photos from our beautiful but cold sunny walk on January 1st.
The very next day, everything changed when a blizzard moved in and left our little town without power.
The lights – and heat! – went out at suppertime while our macaroni and cheese casserole was still baking. That was okay, because it was almost done and there was enough heat in the oven to finish it up. So we ate by candlelight in the living room.
With no other heat source and before the room cooled off completely, hubs and I covered ourselves in bathrobes, throws and blankets and decided to read to each other from my Kindle. We chose Treasure Island, which I’d forgotten I had, and read alternating chapters until we got too cold to continue.
We found out online that the power wouldn’t be back until morning at the earliest because of the ongoing blizzard. So we got the idea to go to the small spare room upstairs, light as many candles as we could find, and hopefully stay warm that way until bedtime.
It worked! We set up a game of Scrabble and the candles on my writing desk, poured some wine, and played while listening to digital music. You wouldn’t believe how much heat comes from candles in a small area! We were toasty warm until it was time to blow them out and turn in – cats and all, of course.
Who won the game, you may be wondering? Hubs was in the lead the entire time, but my last play of all seven remaining letters clinched a win for me!
Neither one of us can remember what the word was – probably because of the wine. 😉
A couple of nights ago we took up Treasure Island again and read some more to each other. No, the power wasn’t gone, but we thought it was fun enough to continue reading it that way.
Have you ever come up with fun ways to enjoy a winter power outage?
Do tell!
Dear WordPress bloggers, fellow writers, followers and friends,
December 31, 2018 marked my seven-year blogging anniversary.
Yikes! I’m into the eighth year! Who knew that when I published my first post, Follow the Yellow Brick Road on New Year’s Eve of 2011, my blog would still be active in 2019? I genuinely hope I’m not wearing out my welcome here and that you continue to let me into your in-boxes, your readers, and your lives for my brief visits once or twice a week. 🙂
I’m not one to get hung up on blog statistics, as I value quality of interaction over quantity any day, but I’d like to share a few highlights from my 70 posts of 2018.
I’ve set aside statistics on my About Me and Author Page to concentrate on regular posts.
The three most-liked posts of last year:
Beach Love
When your address is Sandy Beach Avenue and you live near one of the longest beaches in the province, posts like these are bound to show up regularly. These photos taken at Lumsden North Beach grabbed the most likes of 2018.
Winter Morning Haiku
Summery beaches didn’t get all the love.
A haiku poem with one of my best-loved winter photos,
taken from my back yard.
Book Review – Encounters: Relationships in Conflict by Fred Rohn
So happy to see the traffic this one generated.
I loved this book and I love my book friends.
Rest in peace, Mr. Rohn.
The three most-commented:
Imagination
Kids with coffee filters.
How could one possibly resist a click?
Morning Coffee
(Again with coffee?)
No surprise – this beverage is a vital part of the day for many of us.
Even some of you who prefer tea were moved to give your two cents worth!
Blog Hop: Born in a Treacherous Time by Jacqui Murray
Once again, I’m delighted to share news from my author colleagues.
I loved this book of the prehistoric fiction genre.
So much so, it got me reading the Earth’s Children series by Jean M. Auel.
I look forward to Murray’s next novel in her Man vs. Nature saga.
***
2018 was a special year all around, but it didn’t exceed previous records set by my blog.
January 18, 2016 still holds the favored position as the day that generated the most views thus far, when I introduced the ever-popular Newfoundland and Labrador page…
…and the individual post that has scored the most views to date under that Newfoundland banner is Berg Watching, originally shared on June 2, 2015.
Springtime in Iceberg Alley at its beautiful best.
The Sunday Snap series has gained in popularity since its inception in August 2017, and my new addition for 2018, Friday Fiction, has met with positive reviews as well.
Many thanks to everyone who visits my blog. However long I continue, I appreciate all the follows, likes, comments, and shares. Love to you all, and blog on!
Sincerely yours,
Jennifer
P.S. to bloggers: Have a favourite post from your own blog I may have missed or you’d like to highlight? Don’t be shy – share a link with me in the comments below. 🙂
“Photography is the art of frozen time …
the ability to store emotion and feelings within a frame.”
– Meshack Otieno
Photos were taken on the first of January while out for an afternoon walk.
Our faces felt frozen but our bodies stayed toasty warm.
Time to bundle up on those walks, my northern friends.
Happy New Year to all!
I’m taking a mini-break from blogging over the Christmas season.
Happy Holidays, and I’ll see you again in 2019. (Wow! Seriously – where did that year go??)
Nico was our one and only grand-puppy. He was a Golden Doodle who had the sweetest, most loving temperament I’ve ever witnessed in a dog. We only had Nico in our lives for five short years before he tragically left us, but he will always live on in a special corner of my heart.
Even though it’s been over a year since he passed, I still miss him when I visit my daughter and her family. They have two cats now, Ginger and Joey, but no one can ever take the place of this big boy who was full to the brim with life and love and fun.
Getting over the loss of a pet is never easy, and is particularly hard for animal lovers like our family. I can’t imagine what it will be like to lose my cats when that time comes. Then again, maybe they will outlive me.
Have you lost a special dog, cat or other animal recently?
Please share in the comments below.
❤
Cold winter days are fast approaching, and for our feline friends and housemates Maisie and Viv, that means snowy paws and shorter trips outside.
Sometimes they cry to go out, but change their minds and make a quick backtrack when we open the door and the bitter wind hits their furry faces. Then they cry again as if we can magically change the weather for them!
“Cats seem to go on the principle that it never does any harm to ask for what you want.” – Joseph Wood Krutch, American writer, critic, and naturalist
These photos of root cellars are from one of my November posts five years ago. I’ve been thinking about them lately because in the speculative novel I’m writing, an abandoned root cellar figures largely in certain plot points of the story.
More than 130 root cellars have been documented in the Elliston area, dating back as far as 1839, and some are still used today to store homegrown vegetables.
According to Elliston folklore, the older folks told the children that babies came from root cellars. For more photos and info, click on the link below:
When I folded laundry from the dryer the other day, I put a throw cushion on top until I got around to bringing it upstairs.
I usually do that to prevent one of the cats from turning it into a bed. Well, Maisie couldn’t resist the warm nest and simply nudged the cushion aside.
“Voila! Thanks, Mom.”
I didn’t have the heart to drive her out of it. ❤️
“Like all pure creatures, cats are practical.”
~ William S. Burroughs
Jennifer's Journal 