In the ongoing saga known as the winter of 2014. Now, we get ice.
It was close to half an inch on every surface around our house. Now, as I write this, the wind is howling. I hope not to hear the CRACK, THUD we heard all day today.
Only a fraction of the evergreen damage. Our property is surrounded by mature pines, spruce and fir trees. 20-30 year old trees. These by the driveway were many of the Christmas trees bought with the root ball and planted after the holidays by the original owners of this house.
The tops still looked fragile, and the warming temps made us feel a little better. We have cleaned up huge amounts of branches over the nine years we have been here. It was nine years ago today that we moved our first things here and spent our first night out here.
Back then, we learned about the wind across the fields. How it blasts through these wide open spaces. How it is colder here than in Columbia. Whenever I venture into town, the temps in my car will rise 3-4 degrees sometimes.
Thankfully, my favorite tree, the lace leaf Japanese maple, is doing OK. Just don’t go near it, or the branches will crack.
If it ever does stop raining, snowing, sleeting or freezing, we will have our hands full doing clean up.
Just another crazy winter week in the west parts of Howard County.
And, a lead in to reminding people to sign up for a very interesting program this Saturday night at the Howard County Conservancy. “Seeing Trees” — appropriate for what we are doing here. All of us “tree huggers”, and nature lovers.
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AnnieRie Unplugged 