High Button Shoe
April
..un-huh. I do know it isn't April 1. I was waiting for ranting raven to come up on April 1 and it didn't get released until about 9PM, and yesterday the day just got away from me....as it often does. Todays plans were changed also by 9:30AM. I was going to have my snow tires taken off this morning and 3 tractor tires fixed. However, before I could get out of the house, the heavy rain changed to heavy snow. Our bare ground is now covered in snow. I am listening as I work on new products and old orders to an oldies radio station from Cadillac (10 miles north of us) that is predicting the scattered rain 'showers', temps in the mid 60's, high winds. Do these guys ever look out the window? I can't even see the woods beyond the hay fields it is snowing so hard. In fact, I can barely see the hayfield! So needless to say, I think I will keep the snow tires on a few more days. Snow in April is Michigan is not an uncommon weather pattern. Before this day, however, I did believe spring had gotten here. My lilac bushes were budded out, the tulips were several inches out of the earth, and the daffodils have blooms. The many wild birds here on the farm were busy gathering dried grasses for nests, and the resident wild turkey 'herd' have strutted around in the yard and the fields around the buildings, with the old tom, while putting up with the younger jakes certainly makes his dominant status known. These birds are truly magnificent in their range of colors to their feathers when the sun strikes them. Their antics never fail to make me smile. Last Thursday Ronnie summoned me to the back yard to hear the long awaited chorus of the swamp frogs croaking loudly to herald in spring. I LOVE the spring and early sound of frogs. And those of you who have read letters from me for any length of time know I LOVE swamps. Always cautious for snakes, which I do not have a love of...I still frequent swamps often, as you find the best stuff in swamps. The pussy willows are just starting to come out, so I will have to dig out my swamp boots, try to remember which cutting tools of Ron's I am supposed to use for this purpose( sometimes I get the wrong clippers....don't do that!) and get me some pussy willows. Ron's old farmers tales for my frogs, is that they have to freeze in three times before spring is officially here. I suspect today would account for one time. While I often don't pay too much attention to him, he is most accurate in his farm & land knowledge, and I get the inevitable smile and smiling eyes when he tells me "didn't I tell you that?"One of the projects of yesterday was to change the many clocks we have. I love day light savings time to get the additional light in the evenings. But I am running on low gear today. Perhaps because the house is dark, and I miss that hour of sleep I lost. Old bodies don't adjust as well as they used to. Yard work has reminded me once again of the too many bags of chocolate I have managed to munch thru in the winter months, so that is sworn off again. The seed catalogs have been coming in droves for more than a month now. Having finally convinced the resident garden/farmer NOT to plant a garden that could easily feed the entire county a few years back, I am now more content to buy fresh produce from the local farm market and let THEM contend with the invading garden varmits, lack of rain, too much rain, cold temperatures, beating down sun, and the WORST thing....tomato worms. euuuwwww! And the second worse thing, my aching back to weed it. After last year, and planting sunflowers, sweet annie and pumpkins in my flower/herb garden and all the work it took to make it how I always visualized I wanted it to look, it did. And I loved it. This year I am adding gourds to the garden again. Why, you might ask, would I do that? Ron contemplated vocally the same question! And just to torment myself further, I have been gathering century old bricks from a discard pile at the Gundrum Mercantile Building and plan to make myself a 'walk' thru the garden. Ronnie laid out the design on the yard with a few bricks to show me what I should do. That is probably a better plan, than my plan, which wasn't a plan at all. My 'plan' involved just digging enough dirt out to put the brick in so it was level with the ground and making a path to where I wanted it to go. Sounded simple enough to me. The problem with his design plan for me, is that I can follow that design for a few feet and then it turns into something else. That's like my plans for doing some intricate embroidery stitching like I have on several of the old wool quilts I own. Always impressed with this delicate work of probably a century ago, my work like it, takes on a mind of its own and after about 8-10 inches, it no longer resembles what I started out with. But as my garden is wild and unstructured, I guess it matters not if the brick path follows suit. I will only have the original designer frowning on me. But I rarely pay attention to that!A week ago, our Sunday was changed with a phone call from our niece, wanting us to join them for lunch at a local eatery. Pam and Terry bought an 1880's Mercantile in the small town south of here. It has been vacant as a business for many decades, altho the previous owner had used it for years as a storage facility, and it was badly neglected. Ronnie is doing the restoration of this stately old building for a future business adventure for them. Terry is never without his camera and is very professional in his photographs. I, on the other hand, muster through, spitting and sputtering when something I thought was great turns out to be less, if, indeed, it turns out at all. I had been taking some photographs myself in this long forgotten old building interior, with the natural props of old building treasures. ( I consider them treasures, others might consider them junk! No matter.) And trying to get the lighting right, as the upstairs is a giant cavern of a room, complete with the old floors, walls, ceilings, bare light bulbs hanging from the ceilings, and the magnificent 4 over 4 panes of wavy original glass windows that go almost from floor to ceiling. So there I was, my imagination going wild with possibilities, and I apparently infected Terry with my enthusiasm, or perhaps he just plain took pity on me and my obvious inadequate talents. Three hours later and a disk with over 400 photographs on it, we just stood back and smiled. I spent HOURS going thru the disk he made for me, and Wednesday went to town to have the photographs turned into future cards for me. I am SO very impressed with these cards! We will be making another session with other props to take more photos. His more expensive camera has prompted me to think of buying a better camera. However, as I watch him do all sorts of things with that camera that I would never be able to comprehend, even with chocolate, a pot of coffee, and a very clear mind day... I guess I will be content to have him photograph. Especially when I remember that I can't get my one camera to show any pictures on the media chip at the moment. What's with that? I intend to take it into Radio Shack where a very nice about 50 looking guy with a long grey ponytail, took pity on me last time I had a problem and even WITHOUT A MANUAL, just clicked a few times and voila, problem fixed. I tell you, looking pathetic works every time.So that brings me to what we have on ranting raven this time. http://www.rantingraven.com/Exhibit95.php the cards! Please look. We will be adding several new cards often. They will be up on the website under the header Gundrum Building Collections.If you want something different from the cards available out there, these are it!Oh, before I forget, I need to tell you..I must be having some problem with my computer and getting messages or sending messages. A couple weeks ago, BrunieMae (www.saltboxfarm.com) told me she had emailed 3-4 times that week and I had not responded. I never got the emails. And they didn't come back to her as undeliverable, so she assumed I got them. Then this week, a new friend told me she had gotten the same email from me 3 times and she had already responded to it. Forgetful, I may be, but I usually DO know if I have mailed something...so anther problem! Another lady from CA wondered a week later, if I hadn't gotten the order she emailed me. Which I had not. SO.....if you get more than one email of the same email, let me know. If I don't respond to you, in like 3 days of when you mail me something and are requesting or ordering something, let me know. Beulah and RhettaMae often have mail to me come back to them as undeliverable when they use the byers@highbuttonshoe.net address but don't have a problem when they use the byers@net-port.com address. So..if you are experiencing that... try the net port address. good grief! Miss Elspeth (www.pineberrylane.com) is having the same not knowing if it got there problem too.I will be sending you another email in about a week with our news! I know, you will be slumped over the computer in constant anticipation. However, it will be worth your weakened condition..promise!Thanks for asking to be a part of the farm.in fond regard, Miss ClotildaeBay user ID comptonhouse