An update....we are working every chance we get, weather permitting, to get the yard cleaned up. Nolon cuts out the firewood, and I drag the remaining limbs and twigs to one of the several piles around the perimeter of our yard. I keep discovering more breakage that we had missed before. It was a strange thing....many limbs split open, but did not break off. At the One Stop we talked to a couple that lives a few miles from us. He is the same age as I (She probably is too). They have lived here all their lives, but said they never saw anything like the breakage from that storm. They have a large farm, and are busy fixing fences that were downed by falled trees and limbs.(He is Nolon's barber.) I think part of the problem is that it had been unseasonably warm, and the sap was up. And talking about sap, the ends of the broken trunks on the river birch are 'bleeding' vigoriously, and have long icicles hanging down, on cold days. I way be weird, but I ate several of the sap icicles today. They have no didtinctive flavor. :-) I cleaned the debris from the base of the honey locust at the end of the house. The dafodils at it's base are getting ready to bloom! The Cornelian cherry is starting to bloom, too.

Finally back home after a temporary fix on my heater has it running again. Hope to get seeds out now to everyone promised. Sorry for the setback here. Got my seeds from Remy (Sample Seeds), of Salvia subrotunda, a red flowering subshrub Salvia, that is supposed to reseed here, Frank's Extra Large Dill, a dill that is supposed to be super tall, about 6-10', so wanted to try it. Dill doesn't generally like our hot summers, so usually wilts when it gets hot, so will let you know on this one, Salvia coccinea 'Lady in Red', Nicotiana sylvestris, Phlox paniculata New Hybrids, and Victorian Dwarf tomatoe. Will start seeds this week. On Austrian pines, I have two. One is about 20-25' tall, but very fat and squat, the other is about 12-15' tall. They have never lost any branches to ice or other elements so far. But they are so thick, the branches are so heavy and thick, and none of the lower branches have been removed either. I can't foresee them ever going down in a storm because of their sturdiness. Tiny Mama Wild Kitty came up for food yesterday finally. She is so precious. Very small, predominantly white with black spots. We hope to get her spayed this spring or summer (an effort of us neighbors) as she has become more used to contact with humans now and will come to us and let us pet her. Took a very long time. Wish someone would adopt her and Zena, the male Manx, who is very friendly and sweet. Kenna has been very sick with diarrhea, vomiting and chest congestion. I've never seen her down this long. She usually springs back after a couple of days, and it has been 4 or 5 now. The black birds discussed are probably Starlings. They love suet. I have had them on my suet feeder quite a lot, and of course, they tend to scare the other birds away. I have never seen the Cowbirds which don't come to my feeder or suet. They scrounge on the ground for food. especially food dropped by us humans. We had tons of them at Leadership Square when I worked there, because people would drop scraps of their lunch, etc. The grackles don't come to the feeders either. However, the Eurasian Collard Doves will come to scrounge on the ground for seeds or pieces of suet dropped by other birds. I wish I had my little white-breasted nuthatches back, but think all those sparrows scared them off, too. Have a nice day everyone! Susan

Thanks to each of you for all the kind responses and prayers. I managed to get some food delivered to my aunt today (Amazing what unlimited long distance and a credit card can do!). It wasn't a lot, and it wasn't fancy, but she has some healthy, nutritious, easy to heat (or not) meals and water now, probably enough for 10 days. That should hold her until she can get transport into town. Some of the phones are out again, and nephew, and one brother are still without power. Niece had power long enough to check her house (rented) and give the kids hot showers. She sounded "refreshed." She received a delayed Christmas $ gift from me, and immediately gave it to her parents (the fire victims.) She's my good girl. DB and SIL couldn't get the fire report until this afternoon, (volunteer fire departments and the members' phones were out again). The Red Cross provided his nebulizer and her blood pressure meds and gave them a small amount of emergency cash, for which they are very thankful. They left messages with the insurance company. Their home was a mobile home, but they were insured. I don't know yet if the contents were covered. I'll be posting on the "Emergency Preparedness" thread when I have more wits about me. Thanks again for all the kind posts, and please keep my family, and all the still-suffering storm victims, in your prayers.

That IS a cute chair, great score! Grandmotherly in a good way, if that makes any sense... that same feeling of enfolding cuddliness, I can almost smell the sugar cookies and Earl Grey tea. I actually like the matching pillow better, although it needs to be re-stuffed and really plumped up nice and fat - I think the chunky dark pillow breaks up that lovely feminine curve of the back, keeps the eye from moving smoothly over it. Wish the thrift stores around me had such goodies! Although if you don't mind my totally unsolicited random opinion which you are completely free to ignore or even tell me to shut my yap ;-) I wouldn't use a leather club chair for the other chair. I think with the partly-leather couch it could be a bit too heavy and make the yellow chair seem a little bit "all by its lonesome" as both the only all-fabric seating piece and the only pale-colored one (unless you did something like a buff-colored leather, which I just can't see working). I can imagine a small-scale wing chair - a low, almost squatty one to properly balance yellow chair, not a really vertical one (heck, if you lived closer I'd give you one we got as a handmedown that needs reupholstering. Comfy and sturdy and actually the fabric is brand new but but whoever picked that gaudy floral was stoned or something, and I do want a more vertical version) - in a lighter-colored, texturey, flecky fabric picking up colors from your tapestry couch fabric and a little of the red and yellow would be charming, IMO. Then pop a pillow on it that doesn't match anything at all, like an antique-type needlepoint one. If you were going to have two additional chairs besides this new-to-you one, I'd say go for it with one in leather and one in fabric. Oh, and I love the dog in the admiral's hat... is that a print? And if so, who is the artist? If you didn't mind I'd love to get one to go with my other "dogs in uniform" prints. :-)