New Housing Development

I have lived in the same house for over 20 years and the area across the street from the neighborhood has always been a agricultural field.

There were some changes over the years: the field was planted with soybeans or corn or wheat – we always tried to observe the sprouts growing into seedlings as we went by to discover which it would be. The margins changed when herbicides came into popular use. Crop stubble was left, and tillage was reduced over the years – never leaving the soil bare for long or at all. And now – the process to develop the land into a residential neighborhood has started.

The development is in the initial phase with civil engineers doing studies and developing a sketch plan. Last week there was a ‘pre-submission community meeting’ (part of the county’s Development Review Process) that was crowded…people standing all around the edges of the room because the seats were full. It was my first experience at this kind of meeting and I was glad I got there early enough to get a seat. There was a lot of tension in the room with a lot of questions about the impact on already clogged roads and overcrowded schools. I am on the mailing list to get the responses to the issues raised within the next 30 days. I’m also sign up to the community Facebook page so that I can learn from others in the community that know more about how to maneuver within the process to protect the interest of the already existing neighborhoods…if this new development proceeds.

One of the new things I learned in the meeting was that the traffic issues on the roads now are largely due to a development that did not complete as planned and provide an entrance/exit to a major through street; instead the development only uses the narrow 2 lane roads in place prior to the development which were not designed for the volume of traffic they now carry. No wonder the people that have been following the issues for years are openly distrustful of the process and the developers rather than starting out in ‘trust but verify’ mode.

It’s positive that there are so many people engaged at this point…that the big issues have been surfaced. This is becoming my close-to-home HoLLIE-like project!

Accumulating News Feeds

I use Feedly to collect all the RSS feeds I want to track all the time – looking at them via my web browser on my PC or the APP on my phone. It keeps my email from being overwhelmed all the time although there are some sites that only provide an email newsletter rather than an RSS feed. Most of the Gleanings I collect every week come from the news feeds. The HoLLIE course resulted in 3 additions to my list already:

• Climate.gov News & Features
• Maryland Environmental Health Network
• NASA Earth Observatory

There could be others as I hone my follow-up activities for the class.

I’m looking at my list of 48 sources in Feedly this morning and remembering how some of them got onto the list. Coursera courses prompted 13:

• Archaeological headlines – Archaeology Magazine
• Center for a Livable Future
• CleanTechnica
• Egypt at the Manchester Museum
• Europeana Blog
• Free Technology for Teachers
• In the Artifact Lab
• Meatless Monday
• Planetizen
• Smart News Smithsonian
• TED Blog
• The Dirt
• Yale E360

Others are part of my interest in online books:

• Botanicus.org
• Internet Archive Blogs
• New Online Books

10 more came from books/magazines I read in the past or organizations I was interested in following:

• AGU Blogosphere
• Cool Green Science
• Fitbit Blog
• National Parks Traveler
• ScienceDaily: Latest Science News
• Squarespace – The Blog
• The Scientist RSS – The Nutshell
• Vegetarian & Vegan Recipes: VegKitchen with Nava Atlas
• What’s Next: Top Trends
• Wildlife Promise

I periodically go back through the list to organize the categories I’ve created…delete feeds that are no longer of interest. As I wrote this I realized that there are some that I don’t know how they got on my list…but I’m interested in their content so they’ll stay in my Feedly list!

Ten Little Celebrations – March 2018

March 2018 had a lot to celebrate; some of the top ten were unexpected.

The Snow Day just last week was our first substantial snow of the winter. There had been so many forecasts that didn’t quite pan out that I didn’t bother to buy the makings for snow ice cream like I usually do. We celebrated with just the view and that we didn’t have to get out in the thick of the event.

Beavers at Mt. Pleasant

Two birds with fish at Conowingo. I celebrated that we saw both a bald eagle and a cormorant getting their fish within a relative short period of time after we got to Conowingo.

Another sign of spring – the first pre-K field trip of the season. I enjoy all of the volunteering I do but somehow the youngest children almost always are the highlight of the season.

The HoLLIE classes continued from February into March; each one was a finely-honed learning experience. I was overwhelmed with little celebrations so I picked a bird that I saw on one of the field trips that I had not seen before in our area – a hooded merganser pair.

The shell spiral in my front flowerbed was a visual celebration – somehow it made the day for me. I think earlier it had been covered with leaves but after the March winds, its whiteness made it stand out.

I also celebrated that we didn’t lose electrical power in the wind storm like a lot of other neighborhoods did. There was some siding damage and at least one tree down in our neighborhood….but nothing happened to our house.

The miniature iris at Brookside were something I did not expect; I didn’t remember them from previous years. Seeing them blooming among the other spring bulbs was a treat.

Yellow grass might not be something to celebrate in other seasons, but the bright color was like a beacon at the end of winter.

Finishing up our 2017 taxes was worth celebrating too. It’s something that happens every year and I’m glad my husband does more of the work…it’s celebration – and relief – when they are done.

First field trip of the season

The spring field trips have begun. I volunteered for the first pre-school field trip last week provided by Howard Country Conservancy at Belmont. It was the day everyone went back to school after our big snow and there still patches of snow on the ground. It was a sunny day but very chilly. The children arrive in cars with a parent (or two) rather than a bus. They were mostly 3 years old…a few had recently had a 4th birthday. They were bundled up enough that we walked around and looked at trees. The maple trees were blooming and had a branch that I could show them the flowers closeup. One little boy noticed that the color was redder in the sunlight but was almost black when the branch was in my shadow.  I learn something every time I do these field trips!

We talked about how seeds are planted – sprout – grow…Then started looked for tree seeds. They were thrilled to find sweet gum balls under one of the trees.

I also showed them a magnolia seed pod…also from under the tree.

We all pretended to be a tree seed growing in a forest – growing tall – and our branches moving in the breeze. Then we went inside and I shared a tiny tulip poplar tree (root and small shoot). The leaves had started unfurling because I’d had it inside for the past three weeks. The children warmed up while they learned about butterflies and the animals in the nature center. We learned a little about birds then trekked back outdoors to see and hear them. Unfortunately, it was a very quiet morning. We did see a hawk and the children remembered that they has seen geese on the pond earlier.

A good time was had by all!

Ten Little Celebrations – February 2018

February 2018 has been busier than usual for me than in previous years since ‘graduation’ from my career (that does sound better than ‘retirement’!). The activity that caused that was the day long HoLLIE (Howard County Legacy Leadership Institute for the Environment) classes once a week. I celebrated 1) after the first one – realizing what a rich learning experience the institute was going to be – and after 2) after the second week when we are at Goddard learning about how and what satellites help us understand the Earth…and having the serendipity add on to the class seeing the big rock with dinosaur and early mammal tracks. I could have counted all 4 days as ‘celebrations’ but decided to choose some other items to add variety to this post.

I celebrated seeing 3) 2 kinds of woodpeckers within about 10 minutes from my office window: pileated and downy and 4) the springtime tussling of male cardinals in the maple tree while the female looked on and stayed out of the way (a sign that winter in waning already).

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The old crock pot being replaced by 5) an Instant Pot was a little celebration (because of immediate success using it) and continuing.

Usually I don’t find anything to celebrate in the news…but the 6) successful launch of the Falcon Heavy was something to celebrate. It’s great that there is a heavy lift capability available - a capability we need to further our exploration of space.

Several things came together this month – focusing my attention on how much I’ve enjoyed being a 7) Maryland Master Naturalist…I celebrated the 4-year journey.

I vicariously shared some of my daughter’s experiences this month – 8) celebrating her post doc – teaching – and ‘what next’ search. It’s invigorating to understand how full her life is --- how much we still share so easily.

The weather after mid-month has turned very mild here in Maryland. Earlier I celebrated 9) enough snow to be pretty and that I had 10) no commitments and could stay home on the day it turned icy.

Spring Cleaning (in February)

During my winter lull in volunteer activity, I always try to do some major cleaning out of the house. It never works out to be as major as I want it to be, but I try again every year. I’ve already had a charity pick up one front porch full of ‘stuff’ late last year and now I’ve accumulated another pile that is big enough. It was a real mess at first because I didn’t have boxes to put things in….then I had a box of ‘stuff’ that ended up being trash and decided to donate some luggage/backpacks – hurray! Containers to hold giveaway stuff.

Two questions that I ask myself about each item that help me decide:

• Have I used it in the last year?
• Do I want to take it with me when I move from this house?

If the answer to both those questions in ‘no’ then the logic becomes:

• Does my husband agree (if it is an item that has anything at all to do with him)?
  • If so – Is it something that could be used by someone else?
    • If so – Do I know someone that I wants it?
      • If so – Deliver the items as soon as possible to that someone.
      • If not – Put it in the giveaway pile
  • If not – it goes in the trash or recycle for the week (or spread out over a few weeks if it is a lot of stuff or some items must be taken to the landfill directly in our area)

Of course – when we do eventually move from this house, there will be a lot of effort to clean out stuff to avoid moving ‘stuff’ that we don’t need (or want).

Becoming a Volunteer

It’s been 6 years since I retired and started volunteering more regularly. I got off to a slow start during the first year – taking 18 months to settle on what I wanted to do as a volunteer and the organization. Being outdoors in nature and working with a variety of age groups turned out to be ‘calling;’ it helped that the Howard Country Conservancy provided focused training to give me the know how to do it – first with elementary school field trips and then to preschool through high school. The interactions with hiking groups is something I don’t think I will ever want to give up!

Over the years, I’ve ramped up the amount of time volunteering and increased my knowledge over the last 4 years to be more effective as a volunteer by

• becoming a Maryland Master Naturalist,
• taking a 2-day course on benthic macroinvertebrates,
• attending an annual Maryland water monitoring conference, and
• (currently) enjoying HoLLIE (Howard County Legacy Leadership Institute for the Environment).

Last summer I added volunteering at Brookside Gardens (Wings of Fancy butterflies and model trains) in addition to the volunteering for Howard Country Conservancy programs. That filled in the volunteering lull in summer and December in prior years.

At this point, the only season of the year that I don’t have a lot of volunteer activity is the depths of winter! Right now – that seems like a good thing since the lull is allowing time to savor the HoLLIE days.

Instant Pot

I have finally replaced my 45-year-old Crock-Pot even though it still functions. It was a very popular wedding present in the early 1970s! Over the years, it’s gotten quite a lot of use, but I’ve always complained that it was hard to clean (it couldn’t be immersed in water since it was all one piece). It also had no way to seer or brown meat so I rarely did anything with hamburger meat in it. The knob cracked on the inside; my husband glued it back together and onto the metal stem. My daughter is checking with the grad students in her department to see if anyone wants it; otherwise, I’ll put it in the donate pile I’m accumulating.

I replaced the Crock-Pot with a 6-quart size Instant Pot – a lot more function

And a stainless-steel pot that comes out for cleaning…can even go into the dishwasher.

The first thing I tried was the Sauté function – making taco filling. It occurred to me that I might not ever use my electric skillet again. The down side is that the height of the Instant Pot makes it awkward to stir the contents of the pot for very long. I’ll probably still do most of my sauté (and stir fry) cooking on the stove top or move my cooking area to the kitchen table (lower than the cabinet) if I use the Instant Pot.

The next experiment used the Pressure Cook function using a spicy beans recipe in the booklet that came with the Instant Pot. I cooked presoaked pinto beans…set the Pressure Cook feature for 10 minutes. It takes longer to build up the pressure and let the pressure out than to cook! The beans were very soft and I added some cut up arugula to make a dip for corn chips….a very good winter lunch right out of the pot; my husband and I are enjoying the leftovers.

Overall – I have decided I like slow cooking rather then Pressure Cooking. I ordered a glass lid, so I can see what is cooking and reduce the bulk of the lid required for pressure cooking. Because it is so easy to clean, I am anticipating I will use the Instant Pot frequently and replace some of my oven and stovetop cooking in addition to the foods I traditionally made in my old Crock Pot. Maybe eventually, I’ll build up a repertoire of Pressure Cook meals too.

Gleanings of the Week Ending January 20, 2018

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.

Water-based, eco-friendly and energy-saving air-conditioner: All-weather friendly cooling technology works without mechanical compressors or chemical refrigerants, and generates drinking water -- ScienceDaily – This is one of those technologies I hear about…and hope it lives up to the potential talked about.

New Website Explores the Women in Architecture Your History Books Didn’t Teach You About | Smart News | Smithsonian – A little history.

The Ultimate Winter Wildlife Guide: Enjoy and Understand Creatures in the Cold – Cool Green Science and How Does Extreme Winter Weather Affect Wildlife? – Cool Green Science – It has been a cold January for us. The second article mentions that Carolina Wrens often don’t handle very cold temperatures; I did notice that I didn’t see or hear any on the extremely cold days and have only seen one since it has warmed up a little.

If Birds Left Tracks in the Sky, They’d Look Like This – Another instance where photography allows us to see our world in a way that we can’t do with our eyes.

Archaeologist debunking myth that most people died young prior to modern medicine - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) – Looking at teeth of 300 people buried in Anglo Saxon English cemeteries between 375 and 625 AD…and finding some that were older than 75! It is probably true that average life expectancy was short…but there were some that lived to reach old age.

Frozen Bubble Photos Capture the Amazing Beauty of Ice Crystals – I don’t think I am patient enough for this type of photography – but I can enjoy someone else’s work!

Revelations in the Way Poison Frogs Care for Their Young – National Geographic – There is a video of a parent frog getting tadpoles on its back…taking them to a new pool of water!

Face of Ancient South American Queen Reconstructed – Pictures and short video of the facial reconstruction from the woman’s skull. She was at least 60 years old when she died….and died some 1,200 years ago.

Bones of the victims at Roman Herculaneum - HeritageDaily - Heritage & Archaeology News – Skeletons were found in ‘boat houses’ where they were buried under thin mud….preserving the bones. There are enough of them to understand more about the population of the town…like the frequency of pleural inflammation causing rib lesions, skull depressions from excess irritation and scratching attributed to head lice and age demographics.

DNA confirms the Two Brothers’ relationship | Egypt at the Manchester Museum – I remember the Two Brothers from a course on Ancient Egypt and was interested in the DNA analysis that showed they were half-brothers (same mother, different fathers).

Prius Prime – Year 1

I’ve own my Prius Prime for a year as of today….and enjoyed the serenity of driving in EV mode for most of my errands. I took this picture just after I bought the 3rd tank of gas (it came with a full tank so it’s on is 4th tank at this point).

It has been an easy thing to transition from a gasoline powered car (my 10-year-old Acura TL) to a plug-in hybrid. I view it as a stepping stone toward and purely electric vehicle by the time I buy another new car…and maybe that will be self-driving as well. The plug-in hybrid has worked well for me since I do make road trips occasionally that would have taken more planning – changes to the way I travel – than I was ready to undertake. This car makes it easy since it just uses some gasoline when I am on the road for a longer time.

I like that the car charges overnight (I have it programed to start charging at 11:15 PM); I haven’t needed to upgrade the regular outlet in the garage since I don’t need faster charging. There have been a few times that I’ve come back from an errand knowing I had another later in the day that I’ve had it ‘charge now’ rather than waiting for the overnight….but it hasn’t been a frequent occurrence.

The only bad experience I had with the car was a tire blowing out (on my first road trip!) last summer. The passage of time has dimmed that trauma….and the car has been a wonderful drive for the rest of the time.

I’m still pleased with my decision from a year ago today!

Chocolate Covered Graham Crackers

When I spotted some chocolate covered graham crackers in the grocery store before Christmas – I quickly bought some….and then both two more bags in subsequent weeks. This is a food that reminds me of a person – a great grandmother. Every time we visited her, she had chocolate covered graham crackers to offer us as a ‘treat.’  I never ate them anywhere else so, in my mind, they were extra special.

These modern versions – more than 50 years after I ate chocolate covered graham crackers at my great-grandmother’s – are different. The chocolate coating is thicker, harder, and dark chocolate rather than milk chocolate. Those differences don’t matter. The ‘treat’ is wrapped in memory.

eBotanicalPrints

There is a new area of the website – a collection of links to and sample images from eBooks freely available online containing botanical prints; I’m calling it

eBotanicalPrints

It’s accessed from the site menu and currently includes 4 things: a general introduction, a botanical blog (where I’m showcasing sample images and providing more detail about my recent finds), and then links to the books themselves sorted by author and title.

The lists of links currently include the eBooks I found in 2017 but I have at least 10 years prior to that to wade through and add to the lists.

My intent is to use the botanical blog to showcase the collection. Some of the more general ‘how to’ posts will probably be collected into another item on the eBotanicalPrints pull down for References. Once the number of posts gets longer.

I’ve also added

Recent-Posts

To the site menu. That page will list the 10 most recent posts for the Blog and Botanical Blog.

Zentangle® – November 2017

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It was a challenge to pick 30 tiles from the 73 that I created in November. The first 13 I made while I was traveling in Texas for the first 2 weeks of the month. I used a clip board or the small box that I used to store pens, blank tiles, and stencils (from the Buntini boxes) as a support for the tiles. I made them in the airport, sitting in rocking chairs or on a bed, outdoors, early in the morning….wherever I was creating the Zentangle created a bubble of calm that made the stress of travel melt away.

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I also continued to use the lap table that my daughter used for art work when she was in elementary school. It has handy storage areas on each side to hold pens and blank tiles.

I keep the lap table down in the den and usually am listening to news while I create my tile; I need the Zentangle calm to not be overwhelmed by what I hear!

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10 tiles were created in my home office – the place I create the majority of my tiles most months…just not this November!

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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.

Birthday Cakes

My mother’s birthday was a few weeks ago and we celebrated over the course of a week while I visited in Carrollton. There were three cakes! I didn’t think to photograph the first one; it was purchased in a grocery store…a square carrot cake of about 3 servings with no icing on the sides. It was the old-fashioned kind of carrot cake with plenty of spices, raisins and pineapple (and carrots, of course). It was wonderful that the icing did not overwhelm the cake too.

The next cake was purchased by a granddaughter’s boyfriend from a specialty bakery – a Tres Leches cake decorated the glazed strawberries and Oreo cookies. Yummy! I just too the Lactaid…and enjoyed it tremendously.

A few days later, my sister bought Bundtinis – these are mini-Bundt cakes with a big swirl of icing on top. There were twelve each of red velvet, carrot, and cinnamon swirl. A good last hurrah for the birthday celebration.

All Day in a Symposium

Recently I spent a day at a symposium about the War of 1812. It was a learning experience for more than the topic!

I had not sat in an all-day meeting quite this dense with talks since I left my career about 5 years ago…and I was reminded how draining it can be. It is very difficult to be so sedentary for a day (and the chairs were more immediately uncomfortable).  Did I used to just accept this situation as ‘normal’?

I also have assumptions when it comes to food – that containers will be opened/unwrapped, that napkins will be available, that there are some ‘healthy’ choices. Those assumptions turned out to not be correct for the meeting and I realized that my history skews my views of how food is presented as well as the food itself. Maybe 20 years ago I would have accepted that there were no veggies offered…I am more particular now.

On the plus side – the talks were interesting and well presented. I lasted from 9-4 and then was too achy from the length of time in the unpadded chairs to stay for the last 2 hours. It was a day too long for me!

Zentangle® – October 2017

Zentangles at Staunton River were done on a clipboard – newly purchased, with a compartment that was more than sufficient to hold all the pens and blank tiles. The light outdoors and inside the tent was very bright (sunny days). The Zen of creating the tiles different-than-usual. I picked 10 tiles I made during the 4 days.

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I am still enjoying the tiles made from the Seltzer Water cardboard. The color and weight appeal to me. The paper cutter to process the boxes has a semi-permanent home on the island in my kitchen.

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Picking an old business card as a tile is my favorite for a ‘quick’ Zen fix. I am noticing that I am making a dent in the business cards left over from my career. It feels good to be pre-purposing them rather than simply dumping them in recycle.

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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.

Thrift Store Finds

I love the bargains I find at thrift stores. The thrift store jeans and other pants I bought when my daughter was a senior in high school (over 10 years ago) are wearing out…so it is time for some ‘new’ finds. On my first foray to the local thrift store, I found 3 pants; they cost a total of $16! I’ll clean out the old pants from my closet and put them in the giveaway pile although they are very worn and might only be good for rags at this point. The serendipity find of the day was a pair of winter boots that are warm and not too clunky. The soles don’t look worn at all and they are very comfortable. I always wonder at these ‘like new’ items; how did they come to be in the thrift store? I bought them for $9 and plan to enjoy them all winter.

Company Coming

The prospect of overnight visitors is always a good forcing function to get the house is better shape. I vacuum regularly but the parts of our house that we don’t use frequently (like the guest bedroom and bathroom) are not dusted and cleaned as often as the rest of the house.

And we tend to accumulate things on the surface areas in the kitchen – breakfast area – den. We have a lot more space than we need, and I’m always surprised at how long items remain in place once they are put down. So now I am feeling good about getting spaces cleared off and the house changed from summer to fall/winter. I brought in the glass birdbath bowl, cleaned it thoroughly, and filled it with the CSA bounty of winter squash – a great center piece for the kitchen island.

Squarespace 7 after a month

It’s been a little over a month since the transition of my blog from Squarespace 5 to Squarespace 7. I am still not totally comfortable with the new interface…but it’s getting better all the time. It seems like it was easier to become accustomed to Squarespace 5 but maybe that is just the memory being 5 years old! We always gloss over the hard parts after we figure out how to do something.

There are more options for formatting pictures in Squarespace 7…and it isn’t necessary to create a gallery every time I want to use a slide show in a blog post. The posts look better on the small screen of my smart phone than the old Squarespace 5 posts.

I’m still grumbling to myself sometimes…but I’ll get over it. It is just going to take longer than a month.

Five Years Post Career

It’s been a little over five years since my time shifted abruptly from being driven by paid career work to being driven by me alone. As I converted my 5 years of blog postings from Squarespace 5 to Squarespace 7, I thought about how things have changed for me over those years.

In the beginning, I felt very much like I did in my early 20s…that there were so many things I wanted to do and I just need to make some choices about what to do first. I was almost giddy with excitement but stressed by the newness of the choices I was making. The rhythm of writing the blog every day helped me overcome some of the discomfort of so many new things happening.

Coursera became available and I busied myself taking online courses. It was indulging the student in me that never grew up!

My husband and I did a little more travelling than before but that did not make as much impact on our lives as the aging of our family (hospitalizations, cross country moves, etc.). I was much more available to help as needed – and often that meant some traveling.

Volunteer work was always something I thought I would do but I did not anticipate 5 years ago that I would return so strongly to the focus of my (long ago) undergraduate degree: biology. Once I started being a volunteer naturalist for elementary school field trips with the Howard County Conservancy the ball just kept including more: Master Naturalist Training, Middle School BioBlitz, High School Stream and School Yard Assessments, pre-school nature programs, nature photography with summer campers and then, just this past summer, Brookside Gardens’ Wings of Fancy flight attendant. So far – once I’ve started doing something, I’ve kept doing it although I am probably close to capacity at this point. If I decide to start a new volunteer endeavor, I might have to stop something else.

I do more ‘art’ type activities that I did before – Zentangle and collecting of botanical/butterfly prints and photography. I still read quite a lot but I enjoy the pictorial books too. I spend more time with visual arts that I did earlier in my life.

Overall – I’ve noticed the change in myself…less feelings of stress…more joy. The pace of life has stabilized to be just right!