Guess what?? It's WINTER.

I put up "guess what" photos on my Flickr from time to time--it's become a game with us!  So far no one has actually nailed this one, though they're very, very close.

I've mentioned the problem with the insulation falling off under the floor of the shed...that means there's 3/4" of plywood between my feet and the North Pole!

So what IS this?

It's the paint water in my little enameled tin pot; I left it on the floor overnight.  We keep the heat in the shed at about 48 degrees when we're not there, but it can't overcome that icy floor!

I'm thawing my paintwater in front of the little heater!  Since we have to carry water over from the house, I'm sparing with it.  It'll work just fine once it melts...

And happily, I've since discovered that if I leave the little pot on the wool RUG instead of the floor, it doesn't freeze.  Nether does Pepi's water.  We WILL solve this before next winter!!!

Video setup

 

So far, this is the best setup for shooting how-to videos I've come up with at the shed (or anyplace else!)  Two lamps, one of them with both incandescent and fluorescent, one shop light, and the little lamp pointed at a sheet  of styrofoam for bounced, indirect light.  It's STILL darker than I'd like, but so far so good.

My ancient tripod helps, but of course getting it located so the camera is sort of over my shoulder so it can catch my hands drawing or whatever is a tad awkward.  Better than the desktop tripod I WAS using, of course!

So far the FlipVideo works best.  As you can see, space is tight--big shock in a 10 x 10 space full of other stuff, eh??

 

And this morning's lovely cold post-blizzard sunrise...we were out there shortly after that, drinking coffee and working!  Yes, the floor is still cold.  Oh well.  By NEXT winter, we'll have that solved, one way or another!

WINTER!

It's been cold, snowy, and icy for days now, but J. makes sure I can get to the shed.  This morning, since they're calling for Snowmageddon and ice, he's gone out with the Ice Melt!

He's been joining me more often since we got a comfortable chair for him, too, and it's lovely! 

I've been working on a series of new mini-classes out there, and it's the perfect place for it.  Not so many distractions, no Internet, no Facebook, no Flickr, no email (though J. did bring the netbook out to work on taxes one day, and said he got the 'net on it, SSHHHHhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!  I'm pretending I did NOT hear that!)

I've got a pretty good setup for shooting mini-videos for the classes, but the photo I shot of it didn't work--will try again!

Nature continues to amuse and amaze me, there...who knew how much I was missing, in the house! 

I never realized till now that gray squirrels are such gourmands!  They only eat the germ and discard the rest of the kernel like picky kids at the dinner table.  No worries, though, the blue jays, raccoons, and fox squirrels don't mind cleaning up their plates!  I keep an assortment of magnifying devices at the shed to help me see these details better.

All in all, I've been working hard and playing hard, and it's great!

Where we are on Earth

No wonder we get so much wildlife at the shed...and just to the south of this a couple of blocks is a large wooded city park with a river and walking trail.  It's right on the very edge of town, which is why I bought this place 30 years ago.  It's STILL on the edge of town, how cool is that?  It would be hard to build on that steep wooded hill!

Looking at our place on earth...

...no wonder we see all manner of birds (including wild turkeys), the occasional fox, opossums, raccoons, and more, along with deer only a couple of blocks away...

Mapquest is SO handy...I knew the shed backed up to a finger of woods that proceeded up the hill and trailed on behind the houses on the little state highway.  Seeing it from the air REALLY makes me realize how much woods touches our place...