A Little Bit of Nature to Start off the New Year

Happy 1st Saturday of the New Year!  It's a beautiful day here...breezy and sunny, with the hope of some rain tonight!! Keep Praying!  Speaking of rain and our "Still NO Waters Pond", this was the scene that greeted us early this morning:

It was quite unusual to see all these different species of water birds out on the dry pond together this morning! From left to right there were Canadian Geese, a Great White Egret, Sand Hill Crane, a Little Blue Heron that I almost didn't see because he's so small, another Canadian Goose  and a Great Blue Heron, and the other Sand Hill Crane! Normally they are rivals for any space on the pond, but today they are sharing what little bits of water rivulets they can find among the grasses and mud!

It really was quite a scene!!  We haven't seen any Canadian Geese all fall, which is unusual, but because the pond is so dry they haven't been landing here. So it was a surprise to see three of them out there today.  They didn't stay a long time, but it was a joy to see them at all!

You can see how pathetically dry the pond is.  It really is heart breaking.

But still they came and stayed a while and must've found something interesting out there to eat...and they weren't fighting over it either!

In this picture below, if you look way back in the back on that fallen tree, there are actually two of those pesky Muscovy Ducks sitting back there!  They didn't try to join the party of the other birds, however. Maybe they know they aren't welcome...

Hi Mr. Goose! I'm sorry there's no water for you to swim in right now.  

Still, I think these pictures are interesting as they foraged for whatever food they could find...

Looks like something must've gotten their attention! They are all facing the same way!

Except for Mr. Goose...something else has his attention:

I think these are his two lady friends...

Well, everyone is back to doing their own thing again...but wasn't it nice to see them all being cooperative with each other for a while? Gives us hope for our world in 2026...

Now, switching gears for a minute to a new location... Remember when I showed you these pictures HERE at the Kenwood Boat Ramp in October?

Well, we took a little ride down there this morning, and THIS is what it looks like now!

I don't think they need to worry about hitting any manatees in that water now...

However, don't be alarmed. This is NOT because of the drought!  This waterway is connected to a large dam and reservoir, and they do a "drawdown" of the water every few years to help restore the waters. Here is a link to more information: Rodman Reservoir Drawdown 2025

Even though we knew this was happening, it was still quite a shock to us to see it like this...

This is a close up of the area at the end of that canal above, which was a big lake before and a great place for fishing before the drawdown:

If you really want to know more about the controversy surrounding this place, here is an interesting article that gives you more information than you probably really want to know, but for some you may find it interesting: https://floridaphoenix.com/2025/12/11/rodman-drawdown-exposes-the-beauty-of-floridas-lost-springs/   That particular article doesn't paint our Governor in a very favorable light, and I must say on this subject I tend to agree with them, but in everything else he's been a remarkable Governor. Of course, I don't know all the ins and outs of this whole subject, but I would like to see the Ocklawaha River restored to its original beauty and place.  When man starts messing with nature, a lot of natural beauty is destroyed.  But that's all I will say on that subject. It will be interesting to see what develops on this subject in the future. 

I will close this post with this Psalm...I was going to just quote a few verses, but they are all so good I decided to include the whole thing. It just seems appropriate for all we are facing in this day and time.

Psalm 33

"1 Sing joyfully to the Lord, you righteous;

it is fitting for the upright to praise him.

2 Praise the Lord with the harp;

make music to him on the ten-stringed lyre.

3 Sing to him a new song;

play skillfully, and shout for joy.

4 For the word of the Lord is right and true;

he is faithful in all he does.

5 The Lord loves righteousness and justice;

the earth is full of his unfailing love.

6 By the word of the Lord the heavens were made,

their starry host by the breath of his mouth.

7 He gathers the waters of the sea into jars;

he puts the deep into storehouses.

8 Let all the earth fear the Lord;

let all the people of the world revere him.

9 For he spoke, and it came to be;

he commanded, and it stood firm.

10 The Lord foils the plans of the nations;

he thwarts the purposes of the peoples.

11 But the plans of the Lord stand firm forever,

the purposes of his heart through all generations.

12 Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord,

the people he chose for his inheritance.

13 From heaven the Lord looks down

and sees all mankind;

14 from his dwelling place he watches

all who live on earth—

15 he who forms the hearts of all,

who considers everything they do.

16 No king is saved by the size of his army;

no warrior escapes by his great strength.

17 A horse is a vain hope for deliverance;

despite all its great strength it cannot save.

18 But the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear him,

on those whose hope is in his unfailing love,

19 to deliver them from death

and keep them alive in famine.

20 We wait in hope for the Lord;

he is our help and our shield.

21 In him our hearts rejoice,

for we trust in his holy name.

22 May your unfailing love be with us, Lord,

even as we put our hope in you."

Amen!

Oh, one more thing...thank you to all who commented on my previous post HERE. Some wondered about the Black Eyed Peas that we ate, and I should've said that what I made was called "Hoppin' John", which is a recipe that adds a few things to the black eyed peas to make them more tasty.  Here is a recipe I found online that is pretty similar to how I made mine, except I cheated and used canned Blackeyed Peas, so I didn't have to soak them and cook them all day.  Other than that, I did add the onions, green peppers and celery and some smoked ham, plus some seasonings to give it a little more flavor. We don't eat a lot of hot spicy foods, so my seasonings were pretty mild (not cajun, like this recipe).  Just a little garlic and a slight bit of cayenne pepper along with salt and black pepper. Everyone's tastes are different, so some make like it with a bit more "heat" than we do.  And we served it over white rice, but any other rice is fine too. It was very good!

Hoppin' John Recipe for New Year's

Happy New Year's again dear friends!!  

Saturday Evening on Still Waters Pond

Good evening from Still Waters Pond.  It's been an active evening on the waterfront, following a light sprinkly shower this afternoon.  The pond is still rather shallow and is shrinking from lack of rain, even with the few thunderstorms we've had this week.  

But this evening we were visited by this Juvenile White Ibis. It appears he is walking on the water, but actually that's just how shallow it is there...

However, there is apparently something good to eat there among the lily pads and mucky puddles...

Actually there were two of these juvenile white ibis'.  

They were wading around with the three white egrets...

Can you find all three?  Kind of like "Where's Waldo?  Or, where's all three Waldos??"

Meanwhile, the Sand Hill Crane family came walking up from across the pond and waited at our back door for a hand full of bird seed...which the "Master of the House" enjoys throwing to them each evening (and morning too, if they show up).

Our resident "porch kitties", Blackie and Sunshine, had a front row seat to watch all the fun in the yard and on the pond.  They whisper back and forth to each other about how silly those Cranes look with their long skinny legs and extra long necks...but they have the  utmost respect for them and will not dare to go down off the porch near them while they are in the yard.  There seems to be an unwritten law that the Sand Hill Cranes are the rulers of Still Waters Pond and its surrounds...

And as soon as the cranes were finished with their evening treat, they took off across the pond and chased away the egrets, who flew to another corner of the pond,  and also the ibis, who flew into this tree on the other side of the pond.  If the egrets and ibis' tried to get back down and across the pond, the cranes would chase them away and let them know that this was their territory and they were not welcome there!

There is definitely a territorial pecking order on this pond!   That being said, now as the sun is going down all the birds seem to have retreated to their respective corners and everyone is settling down for the night.  All is calm and peaceful once again.

The End.

Well, that's the end of THAT story! LOL.  Let's see, what else has been happening in the past few days that I haven't already told you about? Let me think...

There are no pictures, but the kids came over last night for "pizza night". They brought our grandpuppies Sugar and Spice, and we all had a fun time together.   We put up the sheet outside on the porch to block the view of the porch kitties so the doggies wouldn't go crazy.  It worked pretty well, but there was one close call when Blackie found his way in behind the sheet and right up against the glass doors!  Thankfully I saw him before the pups did, and Benton actually distracted them and got the doggies into their harness/leashes and took them out the front door for a little walk. Then I went out on the back porch and encouraged Blackie to come out from behind the sheet with a treat. I repaired the opening where he found his way behind there, and all was well from then on. Whew! That was a close one! LOL.  

I actually had a doctor appointment this past week, a follow up to the lab work from the preceding week. Everything was fine except I was told that I am one point away from being pre-diabetic! That was a shock to me, as I rarely eat desserts/sweets anymore, I try to eat really healthy, I don't drink sweetened drinks and drink mostly water  except for one cup of hot tea in the morning and a glass of unsweet tea for lunch.  Of course the doctor reminded me about the breads, potatoes and all those "carbs" that I am most likely eating that do the damage even without eating a lot of surgary sweets.  So now I am looking at labels on everything I eat. I know some of you are on no-carb diets...I may have to start taking notes from you about what to eat and what not to eat.

The day after I got that news we went out to breakfast because hubby had to have some more lab work done.  We went to a place called "Colee's", which is in Palatka.  We've been there before and always enjoy their good breakfasts. 

I know they have some wonderful homemade breads and biscuits and even a huge cinnamon bun, but I refrained from ordering any of those tempting things...

And got a spinach and cheddar cheese omelette with a side order of bacon and some wheat toast, (which I barely ate).

Hubby hasn't been told that he can't eat carbs,  so he ordered the eggs, grits, biscuit, and sausage.

I'm sure we'd both be better off without all of those carbs, but someone other than me will have to tell him that. LOL.  Maybe that will come out as a result of all the lab work he has been having done. We shall see what develops.

I just realized that today is my Daddy's birthday. He would be 107 years old. My daddy was a wonderful, fun loving, and a good Chrstian father and family man.  This is one of my favorite pictures of my sister Doris on the left, Daddy in the middle, and me on the right. Someone snuck up behind us to take this picture while we were out for a walk, and you can see how we all reacted.  That should tell you something about our family...LOL.

I love this picture that resurfaced just a few years ago. This was on our farm in Pennsylvania. I've shared it here before so you probably have already seen it, but it's always worth repeating in my mind. This was our family around 1952.

Clifford, Russell, Laddie, Mama, Doris, Daddy and me.

And here we were in 2005, back row l to r: 

Russell, me, Clifford, Doris

Mama and Daddy on the front.

Mama died the following year (2006), and Daddy died in 2011. My brother Russell died in 2019.  So that leaves Clifford, Doris, and me.

I am extremely thankful for the family God gave me.  

Happy Heavenly Birthday, Daddy! Until we are all reunited in heaven someday.

Psalm 103:1-5

1"Bless the Lord, O my soul;

And all that is within me, bless His holy name!

2 Bless the Lord, O my soul,

And forget not all His benefits:

3 Who forgives all your iniquities,

Who heals all your diseases,

4 Who redeems your life from destruction,

Who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies,

5 Who satisfies your mouth with good things,

So that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s."

Thank You, Lord, for all of these blessings...Amen.

And good night to all...Have a wonderful SONday tomorrow!

Saturday Bits and Pieces

Here it is the first Saturday afternoon of May! The current temperature at 1:44 p.m. is 86 degrees F., and it is partly cloudy and breezy.  Still no rain, but I see there is a 65% chance of rain tomorrow! I hope they are right! Everything is getting much too dry, including Still Waters Pond. I will soon have to rename it "No Waters Pond" if we don't get some serious rain to refill it soon. But even though  it is getting dry and very shallow in most places, it doesn't seem to stop the activity on the pond...here's a few pictures from yesterday afternoon and today...

This is after we had a friend help us by mowing the area down along the shore of the pond. It's best to do that now while the pond has receded so much so we can help keep the weeds from growing up too tall right along the edge. Once the rains start back up we won't be able to clear that area again.

This isn't real clear because I zoomed way across the pond to see this Great White Egret. I didn't know until I looked at the photo on the computer that he had something in his mouth...

It kind of looks like a snake? If so, he is welcome to eat all the snakes he can find! LOL.

At about the same time, Mr. Great Blue Heron flew in and chased the egret away.  He is standing on the other side of the pond, where there appears to be a deeper little cove of water without lily pads.  I believe this is the area where water drains into the pond from the drainage pipes under the highway on the other side of the trees. That helps keep more water flowing into the pond...but again, only when it rains!

Where the Heron is standing normally is under water also.

Here's the Sand Hill Crane family coming up on our yard in the afternoon looking for a snack of bird seed or whatever they can find out there...I actually threw a few overripe blueberries out in the yard and they were enjoying that juicy little snack...  You can see how big "Trumpet" is getting next to his parents:

What a cute pose:

While I was outside taking these photos he was getting a little nervous and I could barely hear him making a kind of wheezy faint trumpet sound, probably asking his parents if it was okay for that big funny looking bird to be watching them from the porch...

They probably said, "it's okay as long as she keeps giving us these yummy snacks!".  

And yes...the Muscovy Duck keeps coming back to see if there's any cat food left for him.  I've been feeding the cats on the back porch again because it is much cooler there, but I'm trying to outsmart the duck and feed them at different times than what he is expecting.  He came early this morning and I hadn't fed them yet...

And you can see in these photos that Sunshine and Blackie were just totally ignoring him and giving him the cold shoulder:

You will also see that someone knocked over our birdbath during the night.  Apparently there was a thirsty raccoon out there trying to get water out of the birdbath...or maybe a cat or who knows what?  This has happened before, and usually when the pond is receding too much for the land animals to go get a drink.   Hubby suggested that we might want to put a little kiddy pool of water out there for the critters and turn the wildlife camera on it to see who is coming through at night. Might be a good idea...we'll think about that...

On other notes...let's see, this morning we took a ride up to see where Benton was selling his flower pots at a garden/farm market:

Here's something new that he made and Rose painted this past week to sell in time for the Memorial Day and July Fourth holidays coming up:

They are strictly for decoration and not really candles to be burned!

And he still has these cute different flower containers:

I really like this one!

One thing I have discovered since going to this market is this product:

It is a balm made of beef tallow and essential oils, etc., totally natural.  It is great for putting on cracked heels, calouses, abrasions, and itchy bumps or bites. Also good as a moisturizer on dry skin patches. I prefer the lavender scented one or the lavender + Frankincense combination, but today all she had was the big one with the Frankincense.  It is okay, and actually Rose is finding this is helpful on her psoriasis places to stop the itching, so I am going to share some of this bigger jar with her until we can get some more.  It is a wonderful home-made balm...but it is definitely not vegan, if someone is concerned about that.  The lady who makes this raises beef cattle (well, her husband and son do that), and she makes this from the beef tallow. She calls her business "Fat Mama's Tallow", but she is definitely not fat herself. LOL.  HERE is a link to more information about the benefits of using beef tallow on the skin.  One note, it is not recommended for oily skin, and you should test it on a small area first to be sure you don't have any kind of reaction to it. But I have found it to be very healing and soothing.

So that's my public service announcement for today.

Yesterday our church Women in Faith group sponsored our annual May Fellowship, where we invite ladies from all the other churches in our community to come and have lunch with us, along with a special program/speaker.  We were blessed to have over 60 ladies come from at least 5 different churches of all different denominations.  We do this every May, and the ladies all love being together as "sisters in Christ".  Here's a few pictures:

There was wonderful food...we keep it simple with delicious meat sandwiches on croissants and vegie, fruit platters from our Publix supermarket ("Where Shopping is a Pleasure"), 

And then our ladies bring desserts, which were all wonderful. I took a lemon/blueberry cake. It was good!

The theme was "Prayer Time in the Garden with God".

Oh, there's me!  I'm the official photographer for these events, so I had to ask someone else to take a picture of me. LOL.

These tables of so many lovely women represent women from not only our church, Interlachen (Global) Methodist Church, but other churches from around our community.  There were ladies from the Catholic church, The Baptist Church,  The Episcopal church, The Assembly of God, and a couple of other Global Methodist Churches from surrounding communities.

Theresa is our women's ministry president, in addition to many other jobs in the church. She's in charge of our kitchen and runs a tight ship! LOL.

Can you see our youngest member above?  She's a sweetheart.  I remember seeing her Mama here last May still awaiting this little one's arrival, who is her 4th little girl, by the way.  

Our guest speaker, the Director of a group called "Sisterhood of Servants", a ministry to young women and girls in the United States and Zambia, Africa.

This sweet friend just recently retired and this is her first time to attend a women's event at church since retirement! 

And this dear lady was our pianist until she had a stroke this past winter. She has been recovering ever since, and just finally was able to come back to church on Easter Sunday (and sang a beautiful solo!), and now is back singing in the choir, but she will not be able to play the piano anymore. She is a miracle of God's amazing grace and healing!

Our Church Secretary...without whom not much would get done for sure!

This dear lady has been battling cancer for a couple of years, but we believe she's finally on the "home stretch" to remission, by the grace of God.

Our sweet Pastor's Wife and worship/choir leader

Our "Blessed" friend Norma, who is also a nurse and takes care of so many!

Another retired nurse, who also helps with so many people, and recently herself had hip replacement surgery.

Another dear friend fellow choir member.

Can you feel the love?

There was definitely a lot of "love" going round, the Love of the Lord for one another...truly a "sisterhood of servants". 

Galatians 3:26-29 tell us this: 

"26 For you are all sons (and daughters!!) of God through faith in Christ Jesus. 27 For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise."

How many remember this old song by the Gaithers?   "The Family of God".  Sing along with us...

"You will notice we say brother

And sister 'round here

It′s because we're a family

And these folks are so near

When one has a heartache

We all share the tears

And rejoice in each victory

In this family so dear

I'm so glad I′m a part

Of the family of God

I′ve been washed in the fountain

Cleansed by His blood

Joint heirs with Jesus

As we travel this sod

For I'm part of the family

The family of God

From the door of an orphanage

To the house of the King

No longer an outcast

A new song I sing

From rags unto riches

From the weak to the strong

I′m not worthy to be here

But, praise God, I belong

Sing the song I'm so glad I′m a part

Of the family of God

I've been washed in the fountain

Cleansed by His blood

Joint heirs with Jesus

As we travel this sod

For I′m part of the family

The family of God

Yes I'm part of the family

The family of God"

Writer(s): Gloria Gaither, William J. Gaither

So these are my "bits and pieces" on this Saturday afternoon (now evening...I've had a few interruptions to feed the kitties on the front porch again because the duck kept coming back, and Sunshine is kind of stubborn and doesn't want to keep moving his dinner table back and forth, so I have to go through lots of antics to get him to follow me back around the house to the front porch from the back. It's quite comical to see)  and then I had to cook our own supper and wash the dishes. There's been other interruptions, but finally at 5:49 p.m. I am going to hit "publish" and call it done!!

I hope you've enjoyed coming along for the journey today. I feel like we are all sisters and family round here...Thank you for being here day after day.  You are a blessing to me!

Have a blessed Sunday tomorrow!

Sunshine and Blackie Sue say goodnight too!

Good Night!