Green shoots are peeking up all over outside, daffodils and crocuses mostly, because clearly the single degree weather will not return now that it is in the fifties.

This is not to say that everything was dead in the first place. My herb garden has decided that winter is a wuss, so why bother giving in? The sage is still going strong (I actually popped outside on one of the single degree days to grab a few sage leaves for the soup) and the oregano has been quietly seizing the opportunity to take over all the undefended real estate. At some point it’s going to run into the creeping thyme and there will be war.

The photo does not do it justice, but to be fair, I was trying to wrangle my camera and a stack of half a dozen books at the same time. The library had a preview of an upcoming quilt exhibit and when I saw this hanging on the wall I had to take a picture.

I prefer to think happy thoughts. In this case, of an orchid flowering. Because it’s wrong that we’re cheerful that the temperature is going up to merely freezing.

Turns out those photographers who took photos of frozen bubbles have more practice (time? resistance to cold?) than I do. It’s actually quite hard to get your bubbles to land in one piece. But when they don’t, they don’t pop- they end up looking like bits of very thin plastic wrap. It’s very bizarre. I want to try it again with more layers so my legs don’t decide that it’s time to go inside and sit by the heater thankyouverymuch.

And for anyone who thought the title of this post was a Hobbit reference, at some point I will get around to posting a rant about a certain Kiwi director’s horrible fanfaction. But not right now, because I am making soup and it is nearly done.

Alas, poor Frosty, we scarcely knew him…

Yesterday evening, it was below freezing. Not long after midnight, it was in the fifties. (Fahrenheit.) This morning when I got up (which I should mention was at 7:30, not noon) it was 57. This was bad for snowmen.  Small snowmen, such as preschool kids might make on their own, didn’t survive. Slightly larger specimens now look like this. I can’t decide if it’s modern art or ancient ruins, but it definitely no longer looks like a snowman.

Belated, because I didn’t remember until right before I turned in for the night… the tree is down now, I had great fun chucking it out the window. (It’s a tradition. It’s also easier than me wrestling a tree as big as I am through the house to the door when there’s a window right there.)