WHEN YOU HEAR HOOF BEATS

Even though the sun seems to think it’s okay to sleep in and neglect its job of warming the morning air, I still get up early a few times a week and go for a walk.

 One morning last week I arrived at the river bridge when the sky was lighting up with a glorious sunrise.  I regretted the only camera I had with me was my cell phone. Although it did a pretty good job of capturing the moment.

On I tramped, following the river road with my mind wandering about when I heard a galloping sound.  Well, of course I thought it must be horses.

 It sorta looked like horses.  But I pulled out my cell phone and grabbed a fuzzy photo when I realized it was mooses not horses.

 Dang! If I’d had my Nikon I most likely would have a clear photo of this momma and her calf stopping to see what scared them out of the trees. 

They hurried off into the willows and disappeared down the river.  I walked on and didn’t see anything else remarkable.

SO…this morning when I decided to go along the same path, I grabbed my camera with the zoom lens so I would be ready when I heard hoof beats.

 The big Hunter’s Moon had spent the whole night lighting up the sky and was heading for bed.

By the time I arrived on the bridge, the sun was painting the sky with another brilliant sunrise.  This time I could capture the tip of the Grand Teton in Wyoming poking up just behind the Big Hole Mountains.

 I got a few more shots of the sunrise and, as the sky grew a little lighter, I carried my camera down the road where I’d seen the moose the week before.

 The pink sky reflected in the pond where a flock of Canada geese were taking a break on their trip south.

 More geese were already up and on their way.

Only gooses, no mooses, no hoof beats, not even any horses waited for me as I walked down the road.

 By the time I turned for home the moon was settling down and giving up the day to the sun.  Yeah, even though I didn’t get to shoot a moose or two, it had still been a good walk and a good start for the day.  

GIFTS FROM THE SEA

Just west of the city of Tillamook, Oregon I discovered a little town called Oceanside clinging to a cliff overlooking the Pacific.

 Down a flight of stairs was a wide, sandy shore.  There I went to do a little beach combing while I waited for the tide to go out.  A few other explorers and dog walkers were already there enjoying the quiet rush of waves.

 Some were launching kites in the ocean breeze.

I’d heard this was a place where agates could be found so as I walked, I kicked around through the seaweed deposited by the retreating waves just to see what would turn up.

The beach was long and I walked for quite a while finding little more than a few broken shells and some sand crabs.

I finally discovered a small agate among some gravel.

Then I found a broken compass, the kind that’s usually attached above the windshield inside a car or boat.  I rolled it around in my hand and dropped it in my jacket pocket.

A few minutes later I met a man walking and chatting with a boy who looked to be around six, judging by the gap in his grin next to a brand new grown-up tooth.  He carried a gallon-sized plastic bag almost filled with shells, crab legs, chunks of drift wood and pebbles.  The breeze ruffled his sandy hair as he looked up to see who I was.

I retrieved the broken compass and held it out.  “Look, I found Jack Sparrow’s compass.  See, it doesn’t point north.”  The dad grinned as the boy looked to him for assurance.  “Here, take it” I said.  “Maybe it will help you find what you want.”

The boy gazed at the gadget while his dad reminded him about Captain Jack and his pirates of the Caribbean.  I also showed them my agate, wished them a good day and went on down the beach.

I’d brought along my camera and took a few reference photos of the sea, the birds, and objects scattered about by the outgoing tide.

 I found a still life arranged by Nature on the sand and used reference photos to reproduce it in this watercolor when I returned home.

“And then, some morning in the second week, the mind wakes, comes to life again. Not in a city sense—no—but beach-wise. It begins to drift, to play, to turn over in gentle careless rolls like those lazy waves on the beach. One never knows what chance treasures these easy unconscious rollers may toss up, on the smooth white sand of the conscious mind; what perfectly rounded stone, what rare shell from the ocean floor.” --Anne Morrow Lindbergh--Gift from the Sea

AL ROKEER SAID HE LIKED IT

By some weird freak of nature I ended up with a couple of butternut squash plants in a part of my garden where nothing had been planted.  Winter squash needs a longer growing season than we have here on the east side of Idaho so I let it grow more as a ground cover.  Still, the unusually warm fall allowed my squash to mature.

 I really like baked butternut squash, but I was looking for another way to use my bounty of big orange vegetables so when I saw Matt Lauer and his guest stirring up the ingredients for Butternut Squash Soup, I decided to give it a try.

 The method of cutting the squash vertical before peeling was a good idea.  This squash hadn’t had time to form a really hard skin so the first step was easy.

 I liked the colors of all the vegetable ingredients and it was an interesting and fine idea to include chunks of a granny smith apple to add a bit of tartness.

 I put the apple, squash and other vegetables in my big, deep sauce pan, added the olive oil and sautéed them as instructed in the recipe I found on the today.com/food website.

 When the vegetables were caramelized and turning a golden color I added the chili powder.  I didn’t have any low sodium vegetable broth so I stirred up some onion soup mix, then sprinkled in the sage.

I brought the mixture to a boil and then simmered it until the squash was soft.

Since there was the option of having chunky soup or pureed, I saved some out and sent the rest through my blender.

 Before I served it, I stirred in the cream.  Then I tasted it.  

Well….it was better than the orange squash glop I hid in my milk carton at my grade school cafeteria, but it came pretty close to the canned baby food I poked down my kids when they were too little to know better.  Even when we added picante sauce to overcome some of the blandness, it wasn’t real appetizing.  I told DH he didn’t have to pretend to like it.  He declared, “Not my favorite,” and had another grilled cheese sandwich.  This may be one soup we will sacrifice to the sink gods.  Now that I think about it, Al Roker’s verdict was pretty noncommittal, “Perfect butternut soup weather.”

 http://www.today.com/food/dress-easy-butternut-squash-soup-crispy-sage-leaves-t50246