May 23, 2020

Venturing Out and Weekly Gleanings

May 23, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

A Zentangle Prompt

Inspiration for a pattern can come from our environment. Sometimes creating a pattern is relatively straightforward. The prompt for today is to create your own pattern based on the picture of tiles to the right. Hint: start with a grid of squares. Use your pattern in a tile. Other patterns in the tile are tangler’s choice (i.e. whatever you want).

Here are some tiles I made based on yesterdays prompt: Make a tile using the gingo pattern.

It is one of my favorite patterns for mono-tangle tiles.

Venturing away from Home

I went to Howard Country Conservancy’s Mt Pleasant to record a Facebook Live Zentangle session. It was the first time I had driven my car in May! It was also my first volunteer gig since early March – and a good experience – but I realized how out of practice I have become with getting out and about. There was a ‘newness’ to my car even though I’ve had it for a few years. Mt Pleasant is a place I know very well but hadn’t been there since January; it felt unfamiliar.

I was glad the flip chart pad and gallery board were wrapped in plastic trash bags because it was raining heavily when I got there. It took two trips to get into the building and I was glad I had worn a windbreaker and waterproof boots.

The mask that I wore during set up did not stay in place as well as I wanted. I need more experience with securing it and being certain that I can breathe well enough through the layers of fabric. It’s a good ‘lesson learned’ before I venture out to try doing my own grocery shopping in June.

The materials I had prepared ahead of time worked well…minimizing the amount I had to create while I was talking.

The Facebook Live session lasted about 20 minutes and made a three-part tile using TIPPLE, CRESCENT MOON, and either MEER or POKEROOT. I missed not being able to create a mosaic of the student tiles at the end. Here are tiles I made with the patterns after the session.

I’m not sure how any of my volunteer gigs will be possible anytime soon but I’ll probably do some hiking at Mt. Pleasant…on a sunny day…another small ‘venturing away from home.’

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

Gleanings of the Week

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Soak in the Details of the Moon with this High-Definition Photo – A backyard astrophotographer with a lot patience.

Record conservation study of Tutankhamun's tomb solves mystery and raises new questions – Teasing out more history from a much-studied place.

Top 25 birds of the week: Bright Colours - Wild Bird Revolution – It’s a gray rainy day as I write this….I am appreciating the colors!

New Thoughts on Turkey’s Oldest Temple Complex - Archaeology Magazine – Gobekli Tepe…built by hunter gatherers over 11,000 years ago….requiring hundreds of people to construct. I first learned about it in a Coursera course a few years ago.

NASA's ICESat-2 measures Arctic Ocean's sea ice thickness, snow cover -- ScienceDaily – ICESAT-2 was launched in September 2018; I learned about it during visits to NASA Goddard during my HoLLIE class in spring 2018. It’s good to get an update on it now.

The ingredients for a longer life - BBC Future – Study of populations where many live to 100…focusing on eating habits, social connection, a few cups of tea or coffee, sweet potato and bittersweet melons, landscape…and moderation.

Saving energy and lives: How a solar chimney can boost fire safety -- ScienceDaily – If a building has a solar chimney, it will suck smoke out of a building during a fire…giving people more time to escape!

Risks of Clutter, Tips for Decluttering Your Home | Berkeley Wellness – I had intended to spend some of the ‘stay at home as much as possible’ time de-cluttering. But I moved on to other projects. Now I am returning to the idea just as I am beginning to tentatively venture out. The clutter in my house is not enough to make it unsafe…but I do have a lot of stuff that I no longer need.

Tracing the human genetic history: Every tooth tells a different story – Another data point for forensics when DNA is not available. Teeth often survive for longer than other parts of the body.

New evidence of watery plumes on Jupiter’s moon Europa - GeoSpace - AGU Blogosphere – I’m missing Charles Cockell’s Life in the Universe Pandemic Series. This article is about new analysis of data collected by the Galileo mission flyby of Europa in 2000. The ESA Juice mission, which is scheduled to launch in 2022, will study the potential habitability and underground oceans of three of Jupiter’s moons: Ganymede, Calisto, and Europa.

The Zentangle® Method is an easy-to-learn, relaxing, and fun way to create beautiful images by drawing structured patterns. It was created by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas. "Zentangle" is a registered trademark of Zentangle, Inc. Learn more at zentangle.com.

May 22, 2020

Fledglings and Zentangle Prompt

May 22, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

A Zentangle Prompt

Make a mono-tangle tile using the gingo pattern.

Here are 2 tiles I made yesterday with the prompt: Make a tile using these three patterns: WAVLIN, CURLY-Q, and DL Sunray.

Fledglings!

Our bird feeder was suddenly busy after 2 windy days when the birds tended to stay in the trees. And we had some special visitors. Two birds that are just learning their way around the feeder. The first was a downy woodpecker. The adult male came first and

Then a bumbling juvenile. It was noisy from the deck railing at first the tried the feeder but not where it was able to get any seed. The male came back to show it the technique again but the young one had already flown off to the sycamore and then back to the maple.

2020 05 IMG_9777 (7).jpg — An adult white-breasted nuthatch came to the feeder and then flew below to get seed from the deck floor. It was followed by a scruffy looking bird with less distinct markings…a little clumsy getting around too. A fledgling nuthatch?

The other bird that came to the feeder that I hadn’t seen in a few days was a red-bellied woodpecker. Last summer we had at least one red-bellied woodpecker (in July) but this must have been mom getting a snack rather than training a fledgling.

I am pleased that I haven’t seen a fledgling cowbird coming to the feeder with a weary adult bird from another species.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

May 21, 2020

Iris, Forest Path, Too Quiet

May 21, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

A Zentangle Prompt

Make a tile using these three patterns: WAVLIN, CURLY-Q, and DL Sunray.

2020 05 img803.jpg — Here is a tile I made yesterday based on the prompt: *Use the* *POKEROOT* *pattern to make the frame. Aura the POKEROOT berries like* *CRESCENT MOON*.

Unique activities for yesterday:

Very Quiet Morning. Normally when I first wake up just after 5:30 AM, there is a lot of birdsong and I listen to it for a few minutes in bed – appreciating the sounds and trying to identify the birds singing. This morning it was eerily quiet. What was going on? My guess was a hawk (or other predator) in the area.

Four iris buds have opened on the stalks in my office. Bringing a little outdoor beauty indoors.

The path into the forest. The deer path into the forest doesn’t seem as obvious today. The plants are growing faster than the deer come through to keep it open. I’ve decided to enter at a more formal path next time we hike since I’m sure the prickly vines that are part of the forest undergrowth are growing rapidly too….not pleasant to hike through even in heavy jeans.

2020 05 IMG_9762 (2).jpg — If I look in the other direction from my office window – I notice that our neighbor’s dogwood is still blooming. The little bit of pink seems to develop as the flowers get older. It was a very windy day for photography…but the little bit of blur appealed to me.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

May 20, 2020

30 Years Ago, Tea, and Pokeroot Zentangle

May 20, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

A Zentangle Prompt

Use the POKEROOT pattern to make the boarder around the frame. Aura the POKEROOT berries like CRESCENT MOON.

Here are some tiles I made yesterday based on the prompt: Make a scribbled string with your pen that results in small spaces (no need to do a border first). Fill (with same color as the string or a different color) spaces that touch at points. Optional: experiment with this pattern using multiple colors.

This is my go-to tangle for when I want to just fill in spaces…play with color. Every string is different. Sometimes I make a very dense string and then combine some spaces as I fill in. Sometimes I fill some spaces and make a simple shape (like a spiral) in others.

Unique activities for yesterday:

Enjoying teas I got for Mother’s Day. My daughter got me 3 kinds of teas from Elijah’s Raw Herb Supply. The company participates in the Farmers Market in Springfield where she discovered them but she’s been ordering their teas via their online shop during the pandemic. I have now made a pot of each and I like all three of them…but do have an order of preference: mint-chocolate chip, yerba mate chai, and immuni-tea. All three have stevia leaf so are a little sweet – pleasant, not overwhelming, no aftertaste. I make a pot at a time with a teaspoon of the loose tea in the carafe of my coffee maker (that only is used for making tea). They are all good hot or cold. It will take me a bit to use up these teas but I already have identified another one I want to try: Organic Lemonaid – herbal.

Hearing a phoebe several times…but not seeing bird. Frustrated…

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

30 year ago – May 1990

30 years ago this month, I started back to work after taking 6 months off with my baby. It was a big change for the whole family. I was getting up at 5:30 AM and leaving the house by 6:45. My daughter was getting up at 6:30 – hungry – getting a bottle to enjoy until her Dad came to get her ready to go off to day care. I picked her up by about 4 in the afternoon. It was only 3 days a week to begin with but with the plan that I would go back to full-time in September.

My part-time work was different from the technical work I had done before…a rotation into the marketing side of the business. We did some proactive changes for the household like putting up baby gates and arranging for a cleaning crew. Little did I know that the cleaning crew would be the same for many years…until I retired more than 20 years later. The same family day care lasted until my daughter started Montessori school. The choices in May 1990 were good ones.

The baby took the changes in stride…enjoying the novelty of spending time with other children and new/different toys. She was beginning to vocalize. Cheerios were her favorite finger food.

There was still time for family outings: picking strawberries and walking around the Brighton Dam Azalea Garden (with the baby asleep in the backpack toward the end).

My mother sent me a poem from a 1958 Good Housekeeping magazine that she had clipped just before I had started off to kindergarten – “For a child leaving” by Marjorie Lederer Lee for my first Mother’s Day and as my daughter went off to day care. I couldn’t find a version of the poem online, but it was in a book published in 1973 (What have you done all day? By Marjorie Lee)… so still under copyright.

May 19, 2020

Zentangle, Yard Work, and Peppermint Custard

May 19, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

A Zentangle® Prompt

Make a scribbled string with your pen that results in small spaces (no need to do a border first). Fill (with same color as the string or a differnt color) spaces that touch at points. Optional: experiment with this pattern using multiple colors. I’ll share my creation based on this prompt in tomorrow’s post.

Here is a tile I made yesterday based on the prompt: *Make a string that divides the tile into 3 areas. Fill the middle area with the* *TIPPLE. Fill the other two areas with* *MEER*.

Unique activities for yesterday:

Planting some seeds in the front flowerbed. I prepped a small section of the front flowerbed last month with cardboard and a layer of compost…but then decided it was too cold to plant seeds. Now – I think the frosty days are over, so I worked in some potting soil around the mint that was encroaching into the compost and planted some seeds I had collected over the past year from various places (mostly from my volunteer gigs). The forecast is for rain later this week… and warmer temperatures. Hopefully, the seeds will sprout and do well in this location. I had quite seeds left which I sprinkled into my chaos garden and some less dense areas of the rest of the front flower beds. Right now, things are crowded with day lily leaves which – surprisingly – the deer are not bothering.

Blooming Nine Bark Bush. The bush is blooming and otherwise growing vigorously. I noticed the blooms and the variation the color of the new leaves.

A Weed. There is a small flower growing among the day lilies – a weed. It had a tiny insect in one of the flowers. I opted to the leave the plant.

**Making Peppermint custard.** I bought hard peppermint candy chips last winter with the plan to flavor snow ice cream with them…but we didn’t get any snow! So – I decided to make a custard with them: 5 eggs, heaping ½ cup of peppermint candy chips, 2 heaping tablespoons of beet root (for color…flavor overwhelmed by the peppermint), 1/2 cup almond milk and chopped pecans on top. (Cooked at 425 degrees for 15 minutes then at 350 degrees until the custard was fully set…toothpick came out clean…about 25 minutes). Yummy…not overly sweet.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

May 18, 2020

Zentangle Prompt, Goldfinch drama, and Thalidomide History

May 18, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

(I am starting a new section today….a Zentangle prompt. I make at least one Zentangle tile per day and will post what I did with the prompt on the following day. This is my small attempt to make some aspect of my post ‘actionable’ --- enjoy!)

A Zentangle Prompt

Make a string that divides the tile into 3 areas. Fill the middle area with TIPPLE. Fill the other two areas with MEER.

I’ll share my creation based on this prompt in tomorrow’s post.

Unique activities for yesterday:

Drama at the bird feeder. Sometimes I notice a relationship between bird species at the feeder. Around 7 AM, a goldfinch was on the gutter of our deck then flew down toward the feeder and there was at tussle with another bird. It only took seconds, but the net was the chipping sparrow contented itself with whatever seed was on the deck under the feeder while the goldfinch enjoyed breakfast.

Ordering a wedding present. There is a family bridal shower and wedding this summer in Texas. I am coming to terms with the idea that I won’t be able to attend unless the pandemic situation changes very dramatically. So – I ordered gifts for the couple today and they’ll be delivered within a week. At least that aspect can continue in a near-normal way.

67 20 05 (6).jpg — **The Thalidomide Generation – Life Magazine from July 1968**. (Available from Internet Archive here.) Some history with relevance today: new drugs can have positive results…. followed by devastating side effects.

More puzzles. I ordered 7 more puzzles for my parents today – which brings the total to 11. We’ll learn from this experience…how fast they come, the quality of the puzzles, how fast they are completed…before ordering more.

Tulip poplar full of blooms. The tulip poplars in the forest behind our house are full of flowers that contrast more with the leaves than when they first started blooming Soon the petals will fly away and the seed pods will continue maturing…with seeds to shed next winter and spring.

_Sarah 2020 05 a.jpg — **New cat in the family.** My daughter in Missouri is enjoying an addition to her household – a cat that seems happy to have found a new home!

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

May 17, 2020

Zentangle Gallery Board, Friendly Downy Woodpecker, Abu Simbel, Iris, and Puzzles

May 17, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Visit from a Downy Woodpecker. Just before 8 AM I was sitting beside the window in my office and suddenly a downy woodpecker flew to the screen and made noises like it was trying to tell me something. It flew back to the maple. About an hour later it happened again! This is a bird that comes frequently to our feeder. I’m wondering if she is a little frazzled with nestlings right now.

**Making a Zentangle gallery board.** I’m prepping for a program I will be delivering soon…wanted something that I could easily use to show many tiles and patterns quickly. The session is short, so I need to make every minute count!

Pictures of when Abu Simbel was moved - Life Magazine December 1966. I remember being fascinated with Ancient Egyptian history beginning in 1965…so I imagine I was interested in this article from 1966 although I don’t remember it. The pictures are dramatic even by today’s standards.

Replenishing the puzzle supply for my parents. My almost-90 year old parents are about to run out of puzzles. They enjoyed them pre-pandemic but have gone through their supply faster for the past couple of months and can’t get out to shop for puzzles right now. Most of the puzzles they had were 2nd (or 3rd or…) hand so I got a little sticker shock looking at new ones and then discovered that lots of people are buying more puzzles than usual. I ordered 4 from Walmart am at looking at more now (trying to figure out an effective way of finding out which ones they’ve already done). In January I had planned to travel a week of every month to be with my parents, but the pandemic put a stop to that after one trip…so I’m ordering puzzles to fill parts of their days.

**More iris stalks in my office.** I am composting the old iris stalks in the garden and cut two more to bring indoors. There is still one left outside. These two stalks seem to have larger flowers. They were growing in a different location and may be happier there than in the front flower bed irises. I have discovered that I enjoy having flowers from my flower beds/garden in my office.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

May 16, 2020

Weekly Gleanings, Racoon Visits and Rearranging Office

May 16, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

(I’m still social distancing/staying at home as much as possible….but am changing the title of the blog posts to reflect the accumulation of topics in the posts. I’m tired of only the date changing in the title since March 15th, 2020)

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Racoon in early morning of 5/12…and then on 5/15! I was downloading the birdfeeder cam videos and noticed right away that there was an odd one just before 2 AM on 5/12….it was a racoon! It was a female probably hungry because she has babies still in the den – too young to eat on their own. It didn’t appear that she got anything from our feeder.

We had another racoon visit on the 15th just after 2 AM. I couldn’t tell if it was a female or not. It could have been another racoon or the same one giving it another try. The animal used a different strategy to get the seed coming at the feeder from above rather than below….but the strategy didn’t work. It looks longingly at the feeder from the bench on the deck before it leaves.

Rearranging my office. It’s a work in progress. The room has been my office since we moved into the house in November 1994 – and it’s the best room in the house for an office because it looks out to trees. I bought the three-piece computer office tables from IKEA as we moved in and had them connected in an L until about 9 years ago when I wanted better access to the windows. I detached the longer table from the corner piece at that point. Then I detached the shorter table about a year ago so I could use the whole surface area of the corner piece…and now I’ve moved the small table by the window but pulled out a bit. When I am sitting at the small table, I have a clear view of the bird feeder. We’ll see how it works. I might not like it in the afternoon when the sun shines in and I need to close the curtains to keep the room from heating up.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now for the gleanings from my news feeds during this past week….

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Check Out the Beautiful Flowers in Bloom at the Keukenhof – I missed going to Brookside Gardens this spring. I’m glad there are beautiful photographs like these and that we have the forest behind our house.

Researchers Reexamine Ritual Sacrifices in Ancient Mesoamerica - Archaeology Magazine – Evidently there is skeletal evidence that there were 3 distinct methods used for heart extractions.

Researchers Uncover New Evidence That Warrior Women Inspired Legend of Mulan | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – Not specifically Mulan but there is physical evidence that female warriors road across the steppes of what is now Mongolia around the 4th or 5th century AD which is about the time the first historical mention of Mulan appears.

Dolphins, Surfers and Waves Sparkle in Bright Blue Bioluminescent Glow Off California Coast | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – Dinoflagellates. Watch the two videos.

Top 25 birds of the week: Birds of Prey - Wild Bird Revolution – This group includes a Snail Kite – which we saw in Florida a little over a year ago. (I posted about it too!)

Nearly half of US breathing unhealthy air; record-breaking air pollution in nine cities -- ScienceDaily – I was surprised at some of the cities listed on the top 10 most polluted cities (short term particle pollution)…and the comparison of that list with the year-round list was interesting.

Cool Facts About Common Backyard Wildlife – The list includes racoons. Evidently racoons are usually very clever about accessing urban/suburban food sources. So far – the design of our bird feeder is working…frustrating the racoon.

Infographic: Building Bacteria to Fight Cancer | The Scientist Magazine® - Work being done in mice at this point…goal is to target tumors specifically and minimize side effects of treatment.

Paleontologists reveal 'the most dangerous place in the history of planet Earth' -- ScienceDaily – 100 million years ago the Sahara had flying reptiles and crocodile-like hunters!

Great Lakes Without Winter Ice – A picture taken from the International Space Station in February.

May 15, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/14/2020

May 15, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Birds nesting in our neighbor’s eaves. A pair of European Starlings found a way under the eaves of our neighbor’s house and they have nestlings. One came out this morning and looked more like a juvenile Brown-headed Cowbird than a juvenile starling. The cowbirds have been around a lot this spring. Now I don’t seem around the feeder as much so maybe they are moving to new territory.

Grocery delivery. First thing in the morning I made the final tweaks to the list. Is it feeling ‘normal’ to have my groceries delivered? No - I don’t think it ever will. I like to do my own shopping and will get back to it as soon as I can. It took the shopper an hour to find 18 items. It was stressful to stay glued to my phone for that length of time to respond to substitutions; the web page stopped working for a short period of time too. This was the 7th delivery so if it were going to achieve the comfort of ‘new normal’ I think it would have already. It’s been a new shopper every time and maybe that makes it continuously ‘new’ each week.

Mowing the grass. It had been dry for a few days and the temperature was in the 60s…a good day to mow the yard. The south side that had been too wet the last time we mowed so the grass there was getting high. I decided to experiment with making a short video during the first part of the mowing. I used an old larger name tag holder from a conference that was big enough to hold my phone then taped it to myself rather than letting it swing from the lanyard. I started the video, put it in the holder and started mowing. I had put the tape too low on the name tag and the weight of the phone caused it to tilt down a little. The two pictures below are clipped from the video…a part where I was mowing the tallest grass and the lawn mower stalled…I turned off the video. I’ll be refining my technique…but it was a fun experiment.

Two beauties at the bird feeder. As I was starting my day, the bird feeder was active with the woodpeckers and two early birds that seem to be around more often right now: Indigo Bunting and American Goldfinch – both males. Until this spring, seeing an Indigo Buntings were a rare treat but they seem to be enjoying our birdfeeder and we see the males more than the females.

Several years ago, I saw one feeding in the meadow at Howard County Conservancy with a flock of gold finches while I was hiking with a 2nd grade school group in the fall. We all stood and watched the birds until they moved too far away. One little girl commented – “I thought they were butterflies…but they’re birds!” It was a magical moment in nature for me … and the group of children (and chaperone) I had with me.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

May 13, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/12/2020

May 13, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Morning light. When I first walked into my office shortly after 6, I stood at the window and noticed the light in the treetops – a part of the view I don’t see from my computer table. Through the veil of the sycamore that is just beginning to leaf out, the trees on the horizon are a wall of green most of the time but the morning light made them look very yellow, highlighting the layers of the forest

Indigo buntings. Just before 10 AM, I looked down from my office window and saw a downy woodpecker on the feeder. I stood up to take a picture of it and noticed a male indigo bunting on the railing! It jumped down to the floor of the deck and I quickly went downstairs to get a better angle to photograph the bird. And then there were two of them (both males). They seemed to be enjoying the seed on the deck but didn’t go up to the feeder. It’s a first time for us seeing this bird in our backyard.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now for the early morning birds of May 7th…

I downloaded the videos from our bird feeder cam for last week and discovered that there was quite a sequence last Thursday morning.

At 6:02 there were 2 male rose-breasted grosbeaks at the feeder.

At 6:21 there was a female downy woodpecker. A few minutes later at 6:22 the woodpecker was still there, and a fox ran through the yard below.

At 6:24 a male red-winged blackbird was singing from the deck railing.

A female red-bellied woodpecker showed up at 6:47.

At 6:52 there were three birds: a male house finch, a male cardinal, and a female cardinal.

At 7:14 a Carolina wren was on the feeder and a squirrel was on the railing.

A male red-bellied woodpecker got a peanut at 7:21.

The birds were fabulous, but the big surprise was the fox. We’d seen a post on our neighborhood Facebook page of a fox with young about a block away in our neighborhood…but this was the first fox I’d seen in our backyard this year.

May 12, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/11/2020

May 12, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Sending in my absentee ballot for the Maryland primary. The primary was moved to June 2nd and is being done by mail for most voters.

Life Magazine in 1962. My youngest sister was born in 1962. Internet Archive has one issue for that year. It had ads for Carnation Instant Milk, Pepsi, Chef Boy-ar-dee, and Kodak film. There was a story about Paris fashion that was not as interesting as I thought it might be. The article with the most pages and caught my interest was called Sights that Never Lose Their Magic and included pictures of Paris, London, Venice, Hong Kong/Avila, Gizeh, Istanbul, Fuji, Angkor, and Taj Mahal. The last one is probably my favorite – moonlit instead of blazing sun. (click on an image to see a larger version).

**Taking out kitchen scraps to the compost pile**. I’d been collecting the snippets in the kitchen and took it out to the compost pile since the container was full – after adding a spent iris flower this morning. I should take it out more frequently since there was mold growing in the bottom. I took some pictures of tiny flowers growing in our yard and some shade loving plants under our deck on the walk back to the front of the house.

Checking the iris stalks that weathered the 2 nights of cold temperatures. They survived. Their location is somewhat protected, and the buds seem to be maturing normally.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now for some goldfinch observations….

2020 05 IMG_9442 (4).jpg — House finches are frequent visitors to our feeder…goldfinches not as often. But they have been showing up a little more frequently and the house finches seem to accept them as non-competitors at the feeder.

The males have their summer plumage at this point, so they are easy to spot.

May 11, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/10/2020

May 11, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Nice surprise first thing in the morning: 4 irises. When I went to bed the night before, there was one open iris and another that was just beginning to unfurl. I expected there would be two irises open the next morning.

But there were two more than I expected! What a great start to Mother’s Day!

Photographing a spent iris flower. The first iris bloom (that had broken off the stem and was in a small glass of water) wilted and I decided to take it apart to learn more about iris flowers. I quickly discovered that they are three types of petals…and 3 of each kind. Going from the outside inward: falls with beards and stamens attached, standards, and style arms. The falls are the largest and the style arms are the smallest.

20200509_164317 falls with beards and sepals.jpg

I took some macros shots of various parts of the petals. They were thinning and watery…had started to degrade with age.

The last picture is of the cut stem. (Reference)

Seeing two Scarlet Tanagers in the red maple. We are seeing birds we haven’t seen before in the forest behind our house…because we are looking more frequently. Scarlet tanagers are insect eaters, so they don’t come to the feeder. We didn’t notice any females, but they are harder to spot. I wonder if there is a nest in the maple. (The picture looks ‘painterly’ because it is near then limit of the zoom on my camera).

Opening a new supply of bird seed. We used up all our bird seed we’d purchased from the local bird club. The new supply I ordered from Amazon came a few days ago. There was only a small amount of seed left in the feeder, so I emptied it for the doves to enjoy and opened the new bag to fill the feeder with fresh seed.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

May 10, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/9/2020 – eBotanical Prints

May 10, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

2020 05 IMG_9511 (4).jpg — **The first hour of the day.** Somehow there was a lot to observe when I first went into my office yesterday. There was ice in the birdbath. It is cantilevered off our deck railing about 1 story off the ground and tends to freeze before things at ground level. The ‘freeze watch’ forecast had been right.

2020 05 IMG_9511 (2).jpg — Then I noticed that one of the buds on the iris stalks I brought in yesterday was open. I have a very flowery office at this point.

2020 05 IMG_9511 (3).jpg — I was cleaning my glasses when a bird flew to the roof of the covered deck and dropped something blue that rolled down into the gutter. I put my glasses on and could see that the bird was a robin before it flew away. Then I used the zoom on the camera to see what was in the gutter: a partial robin eggshell! The bird was doing some nest maintenance. I hope the baby bird was kept warm by the other parent.

2020 05 IMG_9511 (9).jpg — A few minutes later, there were two birds fluttering around in the air a little way from the bird feeder. I got up and took pictures of them after they flew to the sycamore. One flew off to the forest and shortly after a male Rose-breasted Grosbeak arrived at the feeder and the remaining bird flew off to the forest with the male. I think the two birds in the sycamore were female Rose-breasted Grosbeaks! I am glad we have the birds coming to our feeder occasionally this year. Maybe they did in previous years too…I just didn’t see them.

The flowers of the tulip poplar look unharmed by the cold weather.

Browsing Life Magazine from 1958. Internet archive only has 2 issues from 1958 (March and December) – the year another of my sisters was born. There were a lot of articles on the entertainment industry. I collected some of the ads (click on the image to see a larger version). Some of the brands are still around: Disney, Campbells, Coke, Pepsi, General Electric, American Airlines, Northern, Jell-O. There were also a lot of ads for cigarettes and various kinds of alcohol.

**Tangle background for the poppy.** I used light colors to fill in the blank areas of the tiles around the poppy image that I had ‘colored’ the day before.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now for the monthly post about the digital botanical print books I browsed through in April 2020….

There are 15 new books this month. The first 3 are by Anna Atkins and are cyanotype photographs (process invented by Sir John Herschel) of algae/seaweed. Then there were 11 volumes of Flora fluminensis – Brazilian plants publish in the 1820a. The last book is much more recent (2006) and about Hollies; the illustrations are photographs in this one.

The volumes are all freely available on the Internet by clicking on the hyperlinked title. The whole list of 1,879 books can be accessed here. Sample images and links for the 16 new ones are provided below. (click on the sample image to see a larger view). Enjoy!

Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions V1 * Atkins, Anna * sample image * 1853

Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions V2 * Atkins, Anna * sample image * 1853

Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions V3 * Atkins, Anna * sample image * 1853

Flora fluminensis - V 1 * Velloso, Jose Mariano da Conceicao * sample image * 1827

Flora fluminensis - V 2 * Velloso, Jose Mariano da Conceicao * sample image * 1827

Flora fluminensis - V 3 * Velloso, Jose Mariano da Conceicao * sample image * 1827

Flora fluminensis - V 4 * Velloso, Jose Mariano da Conceicao * sample image * 1827

Flora fluminensis - V 5 * Velloso, Jose Mariano da Conceicao * sample image * 1827

Flora fluminensis - V 6 * Velloso, Jose Mariano da Conceicao * sample image * 1827

Flora fluminensis - V 7 * Velloso, Jose Mariano da Conceicao * sample image * 1827

Flora fluminensis - V 8 * Velloso, Jose Mariano da Conceicao * sample image * 1827

Flora fluminensis - V 9 * Velloso, Jose Mariano da Conceicao * sample image * 1827

Flora fluminensis - V 10 * Velloso, Jose Mariano da Conceicao * sample image * 1827

Flora fluminensis - V 11 * Velloso, Jose Mariano da Conceicao * sample image * 1827

Hollies foor Gardeners * Bailles, Christopher; Andrews, Susyn * sample image * 2006

May 09, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/8/2020 - Gleanings

May 09, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Coloring a flower picture. I found a wonderful book on Internet Archive – Flower Designs by Marcia Bradford. It is printed one flower per page with light lines. They were originally intended for watercolors. I selected the one that looks like a California Poppy first (saving the morning glory for another day); there are 18 flower pages to pick from!

I saved the page from the book as a jpeg then printed it on manila cardstock. I used a paper cutter to make ‘tiles’ (so that it would be a mosaic rather than one 8.5x11 inch page). I like the colored result. Tomorrow I’ll fill in some of the blank area with ‘tangles’!

Bringing in more iris stems. We had a freeze watch for overnight, so I cut two more iris stems yesterday. The others are not far enough along to bloom, so I left them outside and hoped they would survive the frost. I took the vase outside so that I could put the new stems into water right away with the stem I’d cut previously.

Unfortunately, I bumped the flower on the way back into the house so now the flower is in its own small water glass.

While I was out, I also cut more mint to use in my smoothie with the chocolate protein powder. It tasted so good last time that I’ve added the combination to my smoothie rotation. Hopefully, the temperature will not get down low enough overnight to kill the mint.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now – the Gleanings for this week

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

One little Chipmunk on a Mission! – Pic for Today – Chipmunks are such fun to watch. We have had then periodically around our house but not all the time. They seem to like our front flower beds and porch when they are around. Squirrels are the constant in our neighborhood.

New PMEL Science at Work Video: How tiny particles affect air quality and climate | NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory (PMEL) – The video as just under 4 minutes…. explaining how we learn about aerosol particles (important because the particles can impact health).

Image of the Day: Ancient Dental Enamel | The Scientist Magazine® - Quite a lot can be derived from protein sequence analysis these days.

Top 25 birds of the week: Endemic Birds - Wild Bird Revolution – Some birds native only to a certain place.

City of Houston Surprises: 100% Renewable Electricity — $65 Million in Savings in 7 Years | CleanTechnica – The city is planning to power all municipal operations with renewable energy! Also included in the program – the provider will help city employees purchase discounted renewable energy.

Organic food growers see surge in demand during pandemic - UPI.com – Glad the organic farmers are thriving. So far- I’ve been able to get organic produce in my grocery deliveries. My local Community Supported Agriculture farm will begin in June.

Understanding deer damage is crucial when planting new forests -- ScienceDaily – UK research on an issue we deal with in the US too.

Frozen, fresh or canned food: What’s more nutritious? - BBC Future – A little update. The article confirmed what I already knew…it’s good to know I don’t need to reset my thinking.

Analysis of Pompeii's Garbage Suggests the Ancient Romans Recycled, too | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – Evidently garbage was piled at city walls and sorted for reuse. They lived much closer to their garbage.

Wildflower Watching as a Source of Solace and Diversion – This is the time of year to find wildflowers. I am always surprised at how amazing even the tiny ones look when I can get close enough to photograph them.

May 08, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/7/2020

May 08, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Grocery delivery. We have settled into a weekly rhythm for the grocery delivery but it’s still true that each one is a little different and a learning experience. This week the part of the app that allows approval of substitutions didn’t work so I had to do approvals via texts. The shopper started a little earlier than I expected but I noticed right away. Only one item was out of stock although there were substitutions for some things. I was surprised that all the meat items on the list were available because of the stories about potential meat shortages. The whole process including delivery took about an hour (an indicator that the shopper was experienced).

**Iris in a vase.** I noticed when I was distributing the groceries from the front porch (non-perishables to the trunk of my car for a few days and the refrigerator items into the house) that an iris was blooming. I brought it inside and put it in a vase. It was very wet from the rain during the night, so I left it on the kitchen island for a few hours. Now it is upstairs in my office.

Browsing Life Magazines from 1956 – the year one of my sisters was born. There were picture stories about Grace Kelly, the convention/election for Eisenhower’s second term, Princess Margaret visiting Africa, and the University of Mexico. The ads were interesting too – electric skillets, Carnation evaporated milk and Lady Borden ice cream!

Finishing Charles Cockell’s Life in the Universe Pandemic Series:

2020 05 IMG_9404 (4).jpg — **Appreciating the wall of green.** The trees have filled out in our forest and the view from my office window is achieving the look of summer….filled with the gently moving wall of green leaves. My office is 2 stories from ground level, so see the middle of the trees over the roof of our covered deck. The red maple is in the foreground with very tall tulip poplars behind.

Photographing the nictitating membrane of a male red-bellied woodpecker. The bird was enjoying breakfast at our feeder and one of my pictures happened to catch the blink!

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now - a Nuthatch Pause….

Last week a white-breasted nuthatch sat on the railing of our deck…very still. Its eyes were alert and it sometimes moved its head slightly. Usually the nuthatches come to the feeder and quickly get their seed and fly off. They seem hyper. This bird was just opposite. Then it suddenly turned its body by 90 degrees…and went back to normal behavior with quick, purposeful movements…flying off to the woods.

I remembered that I’d seen a downy woodpecker in the almost the same location a few days before and wondered if there is something different about the scene from between those two knots in the wood that causes birds to be wary/stay still.

May 07, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/6/2020 - Routine

May 07, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Photographing an iris bud. I decided to do some macro photography of the iris bud that had dried up before it put it in the compost. The materials for the project: clip-on macro lens, jeweler’s loupe, a sharp knife and cutting board, and then the iPad to use as a light table. The sections were cut as thinly as possible (not microtome thin, unfortunately).

The loupe provides 22x magnification, so I started with that. These are cross sections of the desiccated bud.

The cross section of the stem was not desiccated, but obviously not functioning well enough to get water up to the bud.

The sleeve around the bud was almost completely dry although there was still a little reddish color that I photographed a few days ago.

I took one picture with the clip-on lens to show the whole bud cross section in one frame.

Making biscuits. Sometimes I get hungry for breads…but not enough to buy a loaf. Making biscuits from scratch fills the craving. This batch was made with a little more milk and spread into a shallow pan to bake. The sheet was about 1/2 inch, so it was somewhat like bread. I slathered a rectangle with peanut butter in the first round…then had ginger preserves for the second serving (yesterday). I still have enough for at least one more serving!

Browsing McCall’s Magazines from the 1920s. Internet Archive has several McCall’s Magazines from the 1920s available. I’ve been browsing through them the past few days …. realizing that one of my grandmothers would have been 20 in 1927…wondering if she saw these magazines. All of them have a segment about clothes …. with patterns available. It was a time of drop waists (or no waist) … shorter hemlines … shoes that were color matched to dresses for formal occasions.

Watching the compiled hatching moments from Cornell Lab of Ornithology. A 3 minutes video of birds emerging from their eggs: Barred Owl, Osprey, Red-tailed Hawk.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now about the beauty for routine….

I’ve been emphasizing some of the things that are different about each day…things that keep the days at home from settling into a sameness. But the routine is important too.

I get up about the same time every day…go to sleep about the same time every day too. My internal clock is quite strong. These days the birds are already beginning to make their morning song when I am waking up. I enjoy listening to them for a few minutes before I get up.
Breakfast is almost always a smoothie…enough that I consider it the routine. But the ingredients of the smoothie change from day to day…and some days I decide to something completely different. I had left over biscuits and ginger preserves yesterday because my husband was snoozing when I wanted to have breakfast (and I didn’t want to make noise with the Ninja to make the smoothie).
Creating at least one Zentangle tile is something that I do sometime during the day. Sometimes I do more than one but not in one sitting.
One way or another, I get 12,000 steps (counted by my Fitbit) during the day. I try to spread the activity out during the day and get at least 30 minutes of ‘active minutes’ as calculated by the Fitbit.
I browse (occasionally read) 4 eBooks a day. Sometimes I count magazines as books if they are lengthy…or I group several of them together to count as a book. For example, 4-6 of the Life magazines are counted as a book.
The blog post is also part of my routine…it was before the pandemic and has continued to be part of my daily rhythm.
And then there are the notes I keep for myself on whatever I am doing. I find that a learn better when I take notes while I listen…when I read…even just after I talk to people.
Noting at least 4 specific things I am thankful for and ways that I was kind to others and to myself at the end of the day.
20-30 minutes of yoga and Breathing app round out the daily routine.

Now that I am looking at my list, I am realizing that it hasn’t changed very much from what it was before the pandemic. Maybe I am doing a bit more reading and might not be as rushed to complete the whole routine every day.

May 06, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/5/2020 – Dead Pine

May 06, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Sending off a check to a relative graduating from high school. Some events continue to happen no matter what. The details of how they are celebrated might change. This one was far enough away a card/check was what I would have done even without the pandemic.

23 20 05 (3).jpg — **Seeing an ad for GE’s Wonder Kitchen in** **the June 1955 issue of Life Magazine** – A 9.5 foot combo: washer/dryer, sink, dishwasher, stove with a stainless steel counter. Add a refrigerator and have a complete kitchen! It was a product for the new suburbs. Note that the developer Bill Levitt was reviewing the product…known as the father of modern American suburbia – also for his refusal to allow racial minorities to buy houses in his development (see Wikipedia article here). So – this one page reminds us of the relationship of two big themes of the 1950s.

Watching the Juilliard Students grid music video (Ravel’s Bolero). It’s 9.5 minutes of music and performances…students and faculty and alum…from wherever they are ‘at home.’

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now about the cutting down of a dead pine tree….

One of our neighbors had a pine tree that died over the course of last summer and fall. They got a crew out to cut it down a little over a week ago. I watched the action from my office window…through the branches of the sycamore. It was the big excitement of the day. The process involved cutting off the lower branches as far up as the ladder reached, one of the crew climbing up the trunk using the stubs of branches for footholds and cutting off branches as he worked upward then cutting off the top, taking a break (maybe to get a bigger chain saw), and then cutting the tree close to the ground.

I took pictures of the stump a few days later. It’s always sad when a tree is cut down….even when its already dead. In the forest dead snags are great habitat for woodpeckers! But this tree had high potential of causing damage to a house if it fell on its own. It was a good idea to get it taken down in a controlled way.

May 05, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/4/2020 – Red-Winged Blackbirds

May 05, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

**Walkabout worms.** We had thunderstorms overnight and there must have been enough rain for long enough for the earthworms to move about on the surface in the night. I found two dried out specimens in our foyer. They must have crawled up the step to our porch…across the concrete porch…up another step…maneuvered under the front door (which seems to be well sealed)…and then into the foyer which is not earthworm friendly. It’s happened before when we have rain that continues for hours.

Gathering mint from the front flower beds for my morning smoothie. Along with the mint the smoothie had almond milk, chocolate protein power, kale, and a banana. Yummy!

Follow up on the iris buds on the stalk that broke. I put the broken stalk in water back on April 30th when I discovered it broken in the flower bed. I took pictures of it for 4 mornings after that and finally gave up on it yesterday. There was a beauty about it even as it deteriorated. The irises are purplish when they bloom so I was surprised at the pink tinge on the bud.

Mowing the grass. I did the whole yard except for the low place that was still too wet from the recent rains. I haven’t mastered the art of starting the mower (my husband did that part for me at the beginning). The weather was near perfect for the task: temperature in the 60s, a breeze, and sunny. We are talking about getting an electric mower…no more combustion engine fumes which are not healthy to breathe.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now for the drama at our neighborhood storm water retention pond….

I heard the red-winged blackbirds before I got to the pond as I walked in our neighborhood last week. A male was announcing his territory on the stubble of cattails from last summer

There was another male nearby – silent – in the grass.

On the other side of the pond there was what I thought was another male flopping around at the muddy edge of the pond. Then I realized that it was two birds!

After a bit more fighting…they separated and moved in opposite directions through the vegetation. They both were bedraggled looking…staggering a bit. I think the one in the pictures below might have been the winner since the red on his wings is still displayed.

The other one looked worse and appear to be covering the red patch on his wing.

A female red-winged blackbird observed the ruckus from a short distance away.

May 04, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/3/2020 - Dogwoods

May 04, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Browsing Life magazine (on Internet Archive) from around the time I was born (mid-1950s). There were articles about Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation and exploration of the artic. I was surprised at the number of ads for cigarettes and alcohol. The two images I picked to show as samples were both ads: IBM Electric Typewriters (not yet the Selectric models that had the golf ball-like type element which the company made up until shortly after I joined the company in the 1980s) and a passenger train through the Southwest.

Photographing tiny leaves on our red oak with the digiscope (smartphone attached to spotting scope). The branches of the tree are too high to get close enough to do macro photography (I’m not confident enough to use a ladder that high). We put the spotting scope on the front porch, and it was able to focus on the top branches of the tree. We waited until the sun was in the west to provide good light on the leaves…make it possible to ‘freeze’ the motion caused by the breeze.

**A picture of a cat visitor in Missouri**. There is a cat that comes to visit at my daughter’s house periodically (started about the same time the pandemic did). It meows loudly at the door to be let in, visits, then goes home. I was talking to her when it appeared on Saturday evening about dusk. She sent us a picture of the cat that appears to be very much ‘at home’ in their house. It probably belongs to a neighbor although she isn’t sure which one.

Experimenting with Procreate App features. When I make Zentangle tiles on the iPad with the Apple Pencil, I use the Procreate App in its simplest form…changing colors occasionally or changing the intensity of the lines. I experimented with the ‘liquify’ feature on some old tiles. The original is on the left and the right is the one I augmented with a few swipes.

And then I did another with a partial ‘recolor’…quite a change from the original! It was fun to experiment although I think I enjoy the creation of Zentangle tiles in digital form that relies on my own drawing rather that the razzle-dazzle features.

2020 05 IMG_9435.jpg — **Receiving a new computer for my husband.** Fed Ex delivered it on a Sunday! We were not expecting it until Monday and my husband was still doing backups of his old machine when it arrived.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

And now for the neighborhood dogwoods…

I photographed white and pink dogwoods in our neighborhood during last week’s walk. They were all in front yards and I was able to photograph them standing in the street. The white ones seemed to be a little bruised…might have been out longer than the pink ones. But both were still beautiful. I like the dogwood flowers because they are a springtime feature of our area, the way the trees move in the breeze with their delicate leafy branches in the summer and then the red of the leaves/seed clusters in the fall. I probably like the white ones that are native to North America the best.

May 03, 2020

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/2/2020 – 60 years ago

May 03, 2020/ Gwen Morrison

Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Catching up on a Charles Cockell’s Life in the Universe Pandemic Series:

Making Zentangle tiles while listening to astrobiology videos. I made tiles that start with curvy strings that create spaces to fill with color…the coloring using the ‘pattern’ of connecting spaces via corners. I made two tiles while I listened to the 6 videos.

**Celebrating a new low weight for the year with dark chocolate.** Being at a new low weight for the year is s great metric to start the day. I enjoyed the dark chocolate right away - for ‘breakfast.’

Beginning of sycamore seed balls. The light was good in the afternoon to observe the newly forming sycamore balls through the skylight in the master bathroom. I turned the screen on my camera so that I could point the camera straight up and brought in a chair to sit on (help me hold the camera steady). I was surprised at how red the tiny balls looked.

A wary downy. I was looking through pictures I had taken recently and found some of a downy woodpecker on our deck railing. It sat there relatively still for longer than I expected. As I reviewed the pictures, I realized that maybe it was being still to escape a predator from above.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts here.

Thinking about 60 years ago this spring…..

I was in kindergarten…walking home with a bean seedling I’d sprouted in a paper cup. It was a warmish spring day in Texas, and I was excited to show the small plant to my mother. She met me when I was about halfway home but didn’t seem interested in my plant which surprised me. She told me that my grandfather had been hurt and was in the hospital.

Those moments became my most vivid memory of my kindergarten year. The details around the moments are missing. Did I usually walk home by myself? Where were my little sisters when my mother came to walk with me? Had the accident just happened, and she was still assimilating the news herself? What happened to the bean plant?

I was at the age where memories start to become more plentiful. By the time my grandfather came home of the hospital – a leg amputated and much thinner - I remember the first time we saw him at his home (my sisters and I were not allowed at the hospital) and thinking how different he looked. He lived another 16 years – helping me and my sisters all along the way…showing us life well lived. Today I am feeling how fortunate we were that he survived 1960.