March 1, 2014 A beautiful morning!

It is a beautiful morning out there.  The sky is clear and the sun is shining.  The horizon had just enough cloud to pick up all the pinks and rose colors with a bit of mauve thrown in this morning.  I was wishing I was on the shore for that sunrise.  However, I now need snowshoes too....to head out there in the mornings.  Toby is having a hard time navigating all that snow even there.  The last three days I have been on different stretches of shore....yesterday being by Kadunce, and fell thru the already deep snow thru the ice layer.....and think....what the heck!  There shouldn't be holes there.  The ice has gone out on Lake Superior with all this wind.  In a few places, like near Kadunce, there are some big piles of aquamarine colored ice piled up that looks lovely.  However, yesterday it was snowing pretty hard at the time and I left the camera in the truck and just took Toby on his little adventure for the day.  I have never had to wear snowshoes to walk on the ice on the shore before.  I can still amble along....deep or not, but it is that falling thru the holes you can't see which is perturbing.  I  shouldn't get too comfortable just because I am wearing snowshoes either.  They could go thru a hole too.  Oh, I should mention it is -25 below 0 again this morning.  At least the wind wasn't blowing.
As much as I like to hit the shore early when there is color, there is so much snow.....I just plain feel guilty when I jump in the truck and make my deer friends wait for their breakfast.  Days are getting longer and they are arriving earlier all the time.  Then, they lay down under the spruces and wait for me to get up and out there.  Most certainly, their food in the woods is way past buried.  If they get off their deer trails, they are also  buried....if they are a fawn.  The adults still manage to keep more than their neck and head above the snow.

Here is another from this morning.  Both of these two photos are taken just a couple of feet from the house.  There are deer laying all over near the house resting after their breakfast.  The angles are a bit difficult since I took them from inside the house, so as to not disturb them.  In the top one, I was also dodging deck railings.  They are laying down by the water hole too. 
I was talking to my neighbor when I stopped to get eggs a couple days ago.  He had the same thing happen as I did.  He was coming home, there was a deer on the road....it jumped the bank to go almost out of sight in the snow.  I don't think the deer could possibly have a worse winter than they are having.  If the snow ever crusts at this depth, it is going to be just ugly.
Speaking of deer having a tough time.....I think plenty of residents of the people kind aren't having it too nice either.  We are having the coldest winter in 139 years.  The cold just hangs on and hangs on.  We have never used this much propane before.  EVER!  If you don't use propane to heat your house, heat your water, cook with, whatever.....consider yourself fortunate.  The price had climbed to over $5 a gallon.  People will be having to decide whether to have warmth or to eat pretty quick.  I really get perturbed at the powers that be when they gouge people like that on necessities.  They can always manage to have an excuse to raise the price of something sky high....and then some.....when people really need it. 
Funny, all this talk about needing to be independent of foreign oil and such in this country.......
Now, we have the bakken oil fields so close to us.  Doesn't seem to be helping the cost of our fuel much does it.  Always an excuse.  Sell it to the highest bidder and ship it out of the country.......  Bah humbug!  Big money talks, as usual.  They don't give a crap about the little people in this country that do the work and make everything work.  Don't even get me started.......
Anyway, it's peaceful in the yard and it's a lovely day.....even if it is cold!