my favorite mornings of all

Monday morning is my favourite morning of the week. today the frost and the sun greeted me as i went outside. impromptu little boy visited, we knitted, he is seven and he knits well( i do not knit well) and we baked banana coconut bread. we spotted a blue herring on the barn gathered our coats and hats and followed it through the golden wheat stocks, fallen leaves and through the trees.

K celebrated his birthday yesterday, he is humble and allowed us to continue to build our chicken coop, can i just say how much i like the new coop made of barn wood, old windows. k and i could easily live in it and there is something rewarding to know we could build  us a home if we wanted too. I love this man very much and as he turns a year older i can not help but think how lucky i am to know him, love him and be his wife.

a quiet morning after

yesterday k and i spent the day at the farm and mostly indoors after chores and the occasional hay feeding. we cleaned the house and re-arranged furniture before cooking thanksgiving dinner. we watched movies, glimpsed at dog shows, knitted and exchanged thanksgiving wishes via email to friends. we sat by candlelight and ate our meal( we got full too fast). then out we went under the dark sky and fed and tucked away the animals. came in made an apple crisp and watched another movie, then probably my favourite part of the day we lay quietly, with lights off on the couch.

this morning  i was supposed to go to a tea house with people i hardly know, but the warm air, soft rain and clean air made me want to stay home and sip tea while knitting some more. I am thinking about how to decorate, where to place our christmas tree and how to wrap presents this year, do i do it like the year before last or last year , nope something completely new  think.

grateful for the view

when you live on a farm in the country side there is something you do often, something i do daily and that is look out the window. at first you simply see the light, dark or blue skies, the grey clouds or the bright sun, the fog or the wind,  then you look at the trees and notice the last few leaves that remain, then your eyes begin to focus on the animals and birds that are flying by, soon you realize you are looking through it all now. you start to see your passed, how it has brought you here, you start to hear little titbits of conversations, laughter and tears, you start to feel warmth and sadness for those who are no longer here, then you begin to focus on who is and how grateful you are for  being able to love the ones you do.

i am grateful for seeing through the trees, home.

stella & bullet

a few weeks ago my husband and i headed out on a beautiful sunday afternoon, we were going to an art showing. on our way there my husband said" we are just looking and that our budget would not allow for us to bring anything home at the time" somehow we came home with a young cat named stella. both  k and i were confused at how we ended up taking a cat home from the exeter animal shelter that had a booth at the show. I had seen stella when she was just born at the shelter on the days i volunteer, yes she was born in a cage and six month later she was still there. i had thought about getting bullet a friend but hesitated every time i visited the rescue( so many cats heart breaking really) after all aren't we dog people we would say to each other. 

the house for the first few days was crazy, bullet who was the reason behind bringing Stella home in  the first place hated us, he refused to eat, would stare her down as she walked passed him, i soon recognized this to be love and they have beenthat way ever since. she is sweet and so different than him, she loves basking in the sun in the laundry room, although i do think it has to do with being in a cage for so long that she seems to like small spaces. in the evening when the dogs are upstairs in bed she comes out and bullet spends the evening talking to her i mean he really does not stop, he calls out to her when he can't see her, she hides behind corners and leaps to him. they play from room to room knocking down vases as they meet in mid air and then finally when they can no longer put off sleep they cozy up to each other on the ottoman.

what i look like these days in things & what i have seen

my mum gifted me this gorgeous bag for my birthday, i bought these clogs to lift my spirits with a gift certificate recieved by a dear friend and now i am 5'10" tall! I have been knitting it is calming, i made my first fingerless mittens and now i am starting something new. I am again in love with wool and alpaca socks( just think until last year i had never wore socks in the winter time or ever. Of course my mocha in hans, a pearl ring k. gave me a few years back, a ring my mum gave me on our autumn getaway and a necklace that deb from bon bon  surprised me with on the day i finally got to meet her. Oh and the silhouette that a very talented artist at the broolyn flea made for me.

movies i have seen in the last month or so

I am love( too early to talk about it, need to process but the use of music(instruments) to set the mood was incredible)

Jude( one of the most heart wrenching seens ever  seen is in this film- love the greys)

sweet land ( love the scenery, the relationship and she was endearing)

ondine( i used to think i would be a wife to fisherman, love the greys and life by the sea)

the city of your final destination( i loved it, loved the role of arden( my make believe baby name for sure) her sweetness and her clothing, the property is a dream)

morning glory( we went to see it in a packed movie theatre, laughed a lot. McAdams looked fantastic it was good. i found myself weeping in the car way home for how driven i used to be)

when autumn delivers

the weather has been lovely. strolling through the pasture in the fall and finding flowers that have gone to seed is one my favorite things to observe. just like i enjoy discovering at the end of winter days as it slowly introduces us to spring the first peeks of green that make there way up pass the fallen leaves and wet grass . I think i love the browns, beiges and creams, the dark greys of this season the best, all these colors remind me of andrew wyeth and his paintings of  the in between seasons. sometimes when driving through vermont or maine i can sware i am in one of his paintings. although the photographs i have posted here are nothing like his paintings, i do hope to take some as i have done in the past of what he might have been looking at.

in the photograph of the chicken on the wicker chair with pillow that is Autumn she is named for her beautiful coloring and her quiet nature just like the season. Autumn like's to lay her eggs right by my front door on teh chair and tuck them under the pillow, lets just say she home delivers! Then there is Caramel who is on the post, we believed he was a female and quickly started to wake up to his four am calls,  caramel also named for his colouring is still confused at what gender he is, for he is in love with Liev are only other rooster( just so you know Liev himself is confused so i think the match is perfect.) and then there is this chicken with it's beautiful greens, blacks and golds he is yet to be named for he is not mine but seems to have decided he wants to be.

displaying

i decided to take a few things out the boxes that were tucked away. i took a branch and draped some of my pieces then hung it from my ceiling temporally.  I repurposed my pin cushion and tray and placed some of my rings where thimbles should be. I also took a silver bangle and hung earrings from it. I must confess i hardly wear any of it on the farm but i do look at them as pieces of art.

I apologize for therandom posting as of late, will  hopefully have something special for you soon.

looking at the sky through the trees

it is a mild autumn day and all signs that snow had fallen has gone away. most of the trees are bare except for the beautiful large oak trees on the farm. the birds are out eating the berries that are no longer hidden by foliage, cardinals, blue jays, robins and a bird who's name is unknown to me is singing, perhaps calling for the one it wants to love. as i was hanging my laundry to dry the big oak leaves swayed in the wind and i could not help but stare up at the sky through the trees, is this what  birds feel like, oh to be a bird.

this might come out as cold

i hope not because to me it was the best monday morning present (i do feel like it selfishly for me). it is amazing how snow outside can transform your home indoors, the light changes in every room and as i walk around it is as if the walls wrap me like a warm cozy blanket. there is no secret how much i love winter and the unexpected snow that comes in the fall. I feel so awake this morning, instantly renewed,  I am happy.

I put on a wool hat, mittens and my camera and went to do chores and snap a few in between
ps. i do have a few more to share...

the opened door

it has been raining here for two days now, it is not a complaint since the rain is much needed here at the farm. my mind has not stopped thinking, under a night time sky i pace with thoughts. things happening so fast yet i am reacting to them as if they are not happening at all. they are good changes so please do not worry, i just have to ask why suddenly i am okay with it. a grown up voice in my head says "be wise and know that it might still come with heartache" i know this is all vague to you dear readers it can be nothing else at this time, all i can say is, it is odd to me that one can keep a door closed so tight and one day sunddenly with no explanation to oneself  you walk to that door and open it.

dear readers i love  having you here, do you know how much your presence makes my day richer.

* i think the rain might be stopping since at this very moment a symphony of birds are outside my window!

visual comfort

tomorrow will be big, huge step, a fork in the road honestly tomorrow might just change the direction of my life.

* the top photo of the chandelier in my home, was the very first photo i put on la porte rouge.

our journey

i married k. thirteen years ago today and i would do it again,

 i would do it again my love