Hay Bales

Every year the Killington area businesses try to outdo each other by creatively using hay bales...mostly the big round ones with some help from the older variety rectangular bales.

These were the first two I came across, and they were barely up the road from Rutland, which is 25 minutes from my house and where I do most of my shopping.

I continued driving along Route 4...heading east. It's all uphill from Rutland because Killington is known mostly for skiing. Not too many years ago the town changed its name to match the name of its ski area.

They were having a yard sale outside the store where this squirrel (or cat?) sat...that's why there's a rack of clothing in the picture.

Then came the monkey wearing skis...




It was a Saturday, September 1st, and after leading the Bone Builders class, I had met Mary in Rutland to go to the Farmers Market. This was just taking the long way home...

These cows were hanging out just across from the ski area access road. I took a detour to travel up that road.


The first thing I found was this cute dog house...


                  and then a brown bear.

Just then a gal came along with more plastic flowers...

Up to this point in my tour I'd only found animals I'd expect to see in Vermont. The giraffe was a little out of place...even though we are experiencing global warming...but he was cleverly done.




Yup, that's my red car in the background.

This moose was resting by a real estate office.


A red fox was further down the road...

And another bear...







Time to head back down the access road and on towards home...but then I had to stop for this fellow...

The Cottage Piano

My grandmother played the piano with gusto, but after all, she was definitely a force to be reckoned with. My sister plays politely. She has a much gentler personality. I, too, was given piano lessons, but after going through Book I for the second time, my teacher gave me up as hopeless! 

I don't know when this piano showed up at the cottage because my grandmother got it placed there long before I was even a possibility! She probably had it tuned on occasion, but after she passed away, I'm sure my mother didn't bother. Of Grandmother's 6 children, Mom was the only one who didn't play a musical instrument.

A couple of years ago my sister took pity on the cottage piano and called in a piano tuner. He recently returned...

This time when he looked inside, the piano hadn't been stuffed to overflowing by mice who thought it was a great hotel. After being rudely evacuated the last time, they hadn't returned...

I wondered why he was looping red felt ribbon in the wires and was told that that allowed him to tune one string at a time though there are 3 strings for each piano key.

Take the 3 strings on my dulcimer and multiply it how many times? It took him 2 hours to complete the tuning. I appreciate just how easy I have it...one, two, three, done. (My new dulcimer is being made...it'll have 4 strings.)  

I'd heard that he would play a tune when the tuning was complete, so I was determined to stick around.

I learned that his name was Bruce Arnold, that he was from Saranac Lake and he really digs 60s  and 79's music. He plays bass guitar for a local band.

Apparently, the first time he came it had been so many years since the piano had been tuned that he thought he'd only be able to tune it to itself, not to the real notes. Then he got a surprise. The piano was delighted to be tuned correctly! Bruce said it was because the piano sits in an unheated house. 

When the tuning was completed, he not only played...he sang as well!  And it wasn't just one song...it was 3:  "Just the Way You Are,"  "Lady Blue," and "Jazz Lullaby."

I thoroughly enjoyed the private concert.

Flowers for School

Years ago I decided to share the flowers from my yard with my fellow teachers. It was a way to bring my garden into school where I could enjoy it as well. Then it became a challenge to see how far into autumn I could continue to place a vase of flowers on each teacher's desk.

These are the fourth week's vases. The hydrangea blossoms came from my own bush, but the Queen Anne's Lace (carotte sauvage) and yellow Jerusalem artichoke were roadside picks.  

Last week the Black Eyed Susans came from my garden, but the Goldenrod was found by the side of a road and the flower clusters came from another garden in town.

I now have seeds for that flower and have sprinkled them on my tulip bed...they should come up after the tulips die down. Hopefully I will learn the name of those flowers before they pop up in the spring.

These were the vases for the second week...packed and ready to travel via my car. (More about my car in a minute.)

Here the Queen Anne's Lace is its normal white color. The ones I used for the fourth week I let stand over night in water with red food dye added.

It takes a couple of hours to create all 22 vases. I suppose I could do it faster, but why rush something I enjoy? 

There was enough phlox for the first set of vases, delivered on Monday, August 21st. Students weren't arriving until that Wednesday and I delivered these late in the afternoon so most of the teachers had gone home.

I took advantage of my replacement not being in the classroom and snapped a couple of photographs...

It has been 3 years since I've taught in this room and the burlap I left on the bulletin board hasn't been changed.

This was my "olive" tree. My niece, Carol Ann, painted it for me. By the time she got to the leaves it was late in the day so she cleverly cut a sponge into the shape of a leaf and then did a "dip into paint-press on the wall" routine to finish the job before heading back to college. That has to have been 20 years ago!

I used the tree every year as part of the scenery when we acted out Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.

Movable scenery, like the stone walls kids helped me create, have all vanished. My replacement doesn't do "acting," but no one has painted the walls and so the tree remains.

I still like to encourage reading...this is the back of my car. The small bumper sticker on the left says, "Going to war over religion is killing people to see who has the best imaginary friend." The small one on the upper right says, "Tea Party sounds so much nicer than 'Mob of racists and homophobes.'"

 And I certainly didn't want to waste the space on the car doors!

The other side of the car has "Love Your Mother" with a picture of the earth, "If the fetus you save is gay, will you still fight for its rights?" and "You can tell Monopoly is an old game because there is a luxury tax and rich people can go to jail."

 While I was teaching I decorated my desk. Those bumper stickers are still there....