Wolf Moon

Tonight is the "Wolf Moon," the first full moon of the year, and it also happens to be the biggest in a year, since the moon is closest to us on its orbit. We're lucky enough tonight to have a clear, though cold, sky and we sat on the back porch tonight, finishing our wine with all the lights off and a cozy fire burning in the stove, while the moon rose through the sycamore and pine trees straight east of us over our little woods.

What a sight, as it moved slowly from branch to branch, now in clear sight, now appearing to be pinched in a giant's fingers as it moved through the pine branches. Sometimes a cloud covered it for a while, only to move on to show us where it was now. It looked mysterious, spooky, friendly and flirty in turns.We took a few pictures, and I'll post two of them here, of the moon rising through the trees. Mostly dark, but so pretty. I'll also post one I found on the internet, and didn't take myself. Isn't it pretty? Someone has a much better camera than I do.It's been a beautiful clear sunny day today, about 13 degrees, and we have about 2" of clean snow covering everything. It's so cold that the sun made the whole front yard look like diamonds. What a gorgeous day. I did venture out for a short time to feed the hungry birds, and walked back to see the deer tracks in the woods. I saw a lot of tracks where they were just strolling around, and many tracks around the feed corn we put out, but they're not bedding down in our woods in this cold weather, but staying in the more dense woods to the east of us, where the cold winds are more blocked. Lots of rabbit tracks though.

We've been watching the temperatures in the new greenhouse, hoping for warmth enough to plant spring garden seedlings in there, but the neighbor's tall pines shade it too much to really warm up. It is keeping in the 30's or higher, even on these really cold days, and warmed up to the high 30's today. As the sun rises in the sky, we'll get more warmth in there, and garden seedlings will be a possiblility. I think in a few days, we'll start some lettuces and radishes in there. Those are pretty cold tolerant, so should do well.

In the meantime, we'll enjoy the beauty that surrounds us and stay close to that warm wood stove.