“The day after” (Thanksgiving)

“The day after.” (Thanksgiving)

Rain in our forecast all day long. It is lovely as it falls on the roof, especially on our back sunporch. The leaves we blew into tall piles on Wednesday have already started to “settle.” I am amazed how little wind there is here in North Carolina. In Oklahoma, all these leaves would’ve probably already blown away. Here, they patiently wait for us to bag them up and send them to the dump.

Our dogs love to look out the front storm door, and into the backyard through the sunporch glass. The continual activity of our neighborhood squirrels make the world outside our house seem like an amazing zoo of interesting activity.

We continue to recover from the trauma of our cross-country move last summer. I am thankful to be still, to not have anywhere to go today.(Except the gym with our USAFA-application motivated daughter!)

I am thankful to have a warm cup of coffee in my hand, a sleeping bag for my blanket, and my amazing life partner at my side. And two loving golden retrievers who lie, occasionally, at my feet.

Thanksgiving 2022 in North Carolina.

Rachel Reports from the Volcano House

Today in my STEM class I showed an amazing video of eruptions from the Kilauea Volcano in Hawaii. This was one of our “curiosity links” for this week. In one class, student questions about how lava cools led me to discuss “lava tubes” and show this photo of a lava tube which I took in 2009 when our family visited the big island.

I ended up also finding this short video of Rachel, at age five, reporting from the Volcano House. Oh how this makes me want to go back to Hawaii with our family!

Planting Pumpkin Seeds

Today we worked in our flower and vegetable beds in our front and backyard. Among other things, we planted some pumpkin seeds. We’re not sure if we’ll get any pumpkins (or cantaloupes, or ears of corn) but we’re going to give it a shot! Later this month we’re going to plant some tomatoes too. Here are a few photos from today’s inaugural planting, along with a short video narrated by Rachel. I’m thinking these photos will make a great narrated slideshow if we keep taking pictures as the plants grow in upcoming weeks.

We Planted 4 - 6 Seeds in Each Hole

These are seeds for "Big Max" Pumpkins

Putting seeds in the hole

Pumpkin Seeds in the Hole

Covering up the hole with dirt