The Morel of the Story

Morel, originally uploaded by pejnolan.

Last weekend was just beautiful!  One of those times when everything just ran smoothly for one whole day. Ahhh, that felt good.  Paul and I rode up to Door County to deliver a batch of prints to Chad Luberger at Plum Bottom Gallery.  Angela Lench was there, too. After business was out of the way, we all had a nice visit. Chad showed us how he is building a huge kiln without any mortar. It was amazing. Why didn't I take any photos?!? (palm to forehead, "stupid, stupid, stupid!:)

Angela showed me these beautiful gold wire crochet earrings with carnelian which is one of my favorite stones. Gosh I wish I could have purchased them! 

 As we went outside to leave, we were shown stone sculptures by a new artist at Plum Bottom. Faces were carved into the Door County stone - some white, others gray. At first I might have said they were whimsical, but then upon closer inspection they were anything but. There was an unsettling sternness in their features, so of course I loved them. They were also interesting because they looked the same as the other rocks in the garden, so much so that seeing the faces startled me a few times because I didn't expect them. 


Let me share with you a list of all the cool things I saw that day:

A rafter of 12 wild turkeys: They were so silly. We spotted them down a gravel road that was obviously not often traveled. It was like the turkey's didn't know what to do. They were running this way, then that, then into one another. Finally they decided to head towards the trees. It was hilarious!

Two sandhill cranes: One flew overhead as we were walking at Toft's Point. They have such a loud, croaking call. The second was foraging in a field right next to the road, oblivious to our presence as we drove past.

A muskrat: It was flattened like a pancake on the road in Manitowoc, but its fur was still beautiful - so it counts. No photo. You'll thank me!

Morels: We walked out into the woods looking hard for any sign of morels, and didn't spot any until several yards later.
Then we turned around and saw that we had almost stepped on many of them as we walked in. There were several dozen! My first official morel sighting "in the wild." I'd tell you where they were, but then I'd have to kill you.

A blanket of lichen: This was on one of the alternate paths at Toft's Point. It was a light, pale pastel green and looked so soft, I wanted to curl up and lay down on it. When I touched it though, it was rough and scratchy. I wondered how long it took for the lichen to grow so high. Lichen grow less than a mm/year and these were about 4" high!

A Canadian Goose nest on the rocks of the Bailey's Harbor Marina. The marina was going to be dredged in the next few weeks. I hope it doesn't make the parents leave their nest. It wasn't very well built. Maybe they were first time parents. There were feathers all around the eggs, but the eggs themselves were laying right on the stones. The eggs were much larger than I thought goose eggs would be!

Green: I saw on the shore of Lake Michigan at Toft's Point, the most vivid, incredible green as I looked into the water. The sun was shining on it in just the right way to make everything glow. Beautiful!

A few other things of note from the last few weeks:
• The wood ducks are back in the old tree down the street. It still cracks me up to see ducks in the trees.
• I saw the first worm of spring trying to cross the sidewalk after a cold rain. I picked it up and put it in the grass to help it along.
• The magnolias are in full bloom as well as the forsythia, daffodils, tulips, grape hyacinth and bleeding hearts. The color just makes my heart sing. I wish I could capture the colors in a bottle to release during the dark, cold winters. 
• I had my credit card number stolen. "Dear to-whom-ever-stole-my-card-number: You must be pretty bad off in order to steal from another person. I hope your life gets better and you get back on your feet."  


The moral of the story? After a marathon road trip to Door County, I feel more inspired and excited about creating. New ideas are swirling around in my head and that's a good thing.