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Bletia purpurea | Fakahatchee Strand Preserve State Park
Digging through my Florida photos from last March still. This post had been sitting in my drafts folder for months and months. I was able to steal a few moments while Forest was sleeping to process the photos and get this up to share. This lovely little orchid was very accessible and growing by the side of the road. Sometimes you don’t have to dig too far in Fakahatchee Strand to come up with something so lovely.
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Loving Lately
+Patrice and Justin are hiking the Te Araroa trail in New Zealand…follow them! +You Know You’re A Hiker When… +The Girl Who Goes Alone +What Going For A Personal Record Can Teach You +Raw Chocolate Pie +Panic At The Drive-Thru—I had a similar experience in the Chick-Fil-A drive thru a few weeks ago. My word of advice, don’t take a sleeping baby thru a drive thru at lunch time where you’ll be jammed in by other cars. Just don’t. +I painted a single leaf +Cow Buck +Food For the PCT +Northeastern Sierra – Finding Fall +Fun, Fearless, Female, and … Feckless?: Cosmopolitan.com and #Casey Nocket +The Serial Podcast…excellent podcast brought…
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The Garden’s Last Hurrah
The overgrown and weedy section near the bees. When I stole 10 minutes the other day to wander around the yard I also tinkered in the garden for a few minutes. My time spent enjoying the garden is practically non-existent now that the weather has turned cooler, the daylight is short, and I have returned to work. Weekends are spent trying to catch up on chores in the house and keeping the baby fed, changed, and happy. Gardening? What is that? Despite being a little sad that winter is coming, I’m glad at the same time—I can just abandon the garden and not worry about it until spring. I can’t…
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The Bees | Silent Sunday
(Ok, almost silent…the cooler weather has allowed me to get closer to the hive these days without risking getting stung, which in turn means more bee photos!)
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Before It’s Over…
I spend most of my commute to and from work oogling at the colors on the trees. There are a couple of sassafrass trees near the office that are a glorious apple red tempting me to soak in them, if one could soak in trees. Peak fall color is here now and quickly passing. I don’t get to wander around my yard much these days but I stole 10 minutes the other day and wandered around to see what I was missing. With what seems to be an early freeze this year (first one last night—but not a killing freeze at least) winter may be rolling in sooner than I…
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Adventures with Fungus | Forest Friday
Just a new weekly meme. Something for me to share a Forest photo and to write a little something here.
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Returning to Fitness
Getting back into shape postpartum has been eye opening. The last time I did any hard workouts was last December before I knew I was pregnant. Since all the months prior hadn’t resulted in a positive pregnancy test I had decided to bust my butt and start working out hardcore with some YouTube videos to try to lose about 10 lbs. I was feeling it, doing good and enjoying it. And then I got pregnant. Out went the hard workouts and in came the walking and general hiking. I missed rollerblading and even the 1-2 mile jogs I would take. I didn’t lift weights much and after a certain point…
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First of November at Kleb Woods | Nature In The City
I’ve written about Kleb Woods twice before but last weekend was the first time Forest had been there. We didn’t have a ton of time to do a longer hike and I wanted to stay relatively near the house so we chose this small park to do a little outside rambling. This time we explored the north section of the park, taking the stroller and a sleeping Forest along. I spotted a Passiflora incarnata fairly quickly but found no fruit or flowers. The downside to this park is that it is overrun with yaupon holly, Ilex vomitoria. Ideally they would burn this park on occassion but I think they come…
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W.G. Jones State Forest | Nature In The City
Last weekend we took Forest out for his first ‘hike—he strolled, we hiked—at our local state forest, WG Jones State Forest. Chris and I have been there a few times and thought it would be a great outing for us to stretch our legs and to get away from the house for awhile. The forest is split in two by a road, FM 1488, with the larger tract being on the south side of the road. This tract also has the most trails. We set off from the western most parking area on 1488 and Forest managed to stay asleep during his transfer from truck to stroller. I had debated…
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Backyard Leopard Frog
About a week ago I was coming in from hanging up diapers and noticed a leopard frog on our back porch. It hung around for a few days and let me get a photo of it before finally disappearing into the garden. We have a healthy frog population around our house but this was the first time I had noticed a leopard frog. Southern Leopard Frog information from TPWD