Wolf Sanctuary of PA

Lately Facebook seems like it’s a place for people to disagree about everything from politics to the best apple pie recipe, but sometimes a gem sneaks into my feed.  Such was the case last week when Only in Your State made a post about the Wolf Sanctuary of PA.  As it turns out, this little gem is located within thirty miles of my home but until I saw it on Facebook, I had no idea it existed. Continue reading

Batter up!

I was in bed watching television late one evening when my then college-aged daughter came out of her bedroom and said, “Mom, look at Jo, she’s just running back and forth in the hallway.”

I looked towards the doorway of my room and saw Jo, our Cocker Spaniel, shuffle past my doorway, then shuffle past again, going in the other direction.

“I don’t know what she’s doing,” Kinsey said as Jo ran by again, her nose pointed up towards the ceiling.

“It looks like she’s watching something,” I said.

Kinsey looked up.  “Bat!” she yelled as she ran back into her room, “It’s a bat!” Continue reading

Bottle Trees

Several years ago I had the pleasure of visiting Kanapaha Botanical Gardens in Gainesville, Florida.  It’s a beautiful botanical garden with a mile and a half walk through various gorgeous exhibits, but the thing that caught my eye, the one thing I could not get out of my mind, was a bottle tree.  The bottle tree was made out of the large stump of a tree that had long ago died.  The bottles were mounted on pieces of rebar that had been placed into holes drilled into the old stump. Continue reading

Five Seconds

I took the long way home last night after work because the highway was at a standstill.   I actually prefer the long way because it’s a very scenic drive that winds along the Blue Mountain Range in Central Pennsylvania.  Because the road follows the mountains, there are many blind curves and hills so I try to be careful because you never know what may be just around the corner or over the next knob.

As I came around a corner last night, a fawn, still sporting its white spots, jumped out of the woods to run across the road.  I hit the brakes and slowed down, but the pickup truck, coming from the other direction, had no time to do so and hit the fawn head on.  The impact caused the fawn to fly through the air sideways before landing on the road and spinning in circles across the pavement, coming to a stop just in front of my Jeep.  As I swerved around its body, I saw two clumps of white fur floating down through the air towards the road.

Because of where I live I am used to seeing deer; they are everywhere and deer getting hit by vehicles is common.  I’ve been in a cars that have hit deer and I see dead deer along the roads daily.  But as I drove away from the dead fawn last night, I started to get tears in my eyes; the whole thing was so incredibly sad.  I couldn’t help but think of the fawn’s mother who probably witnessed the whole thing and my heart broke for her.  I’ve seen it many times, the doe crosses the road first; the fawn follows a short while later.  Had the mother waited a few more seconds to cross; or had the fawn gone a few seconds earlier or later, he would have made it.  Sometimes, five seconds can be the difference between life and death.

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via Daily Prompt: Witness

The Great Lamb Chase

At some point my husband Steve decided that having our two kids raise lambs would be a good idea.  He thought that it would be a good experience for the kids and that the lambs would help to keep the weeds down in the back yard.  And so the plan was hatched.  I wasn’t convinced that raising lambs for six months only to sell them at the livestock auction was that great of a plan to hatch but of course when Steve mentioned it to the kids, they were all in. Continue reading