January 2019 – Owlnature

The national birdwatch 2019 in Finland (& pics today)

On Saturday, yesterday, I took part in the national birdwatch again, the national birdwatch 2019, Pihabongaus 2019, organized by BirdLife Suomi here in Finland. It was my fourth time now and I was standing and walking in our garden again. As usual, I had a good time and I was freezing at the end of the event even though I had warm clothes on. 🙂 But it was only -9 degrees Celsius, they said that it felt like -14 degrees, during my birdwatch hour.

So, I saw… a lot of snow and it was snowing a bit, too. Well, as always, I heard many little birds singing, singing in the trees, but I didn’t see that many birds. I recognized the voices of great tits and blue tits and crows. And I saw a magpie, a great spotted woodpecker, a few great tits and I heard and saw a flock of tree sparrows as well. The great spotted woodpecker was pecking at a pine tree and it was nice to watch it with binoculars. One great tit came to perform a solo in front of me, that was funny.

So that was what happened. 🙂

And just a few pictures that I took in our garden today:

We have around 30 centimetres of snow here where I’m living. I suspect that we have more than 30 centimetres… It’s been snowing like every day now – sometimes more, sometimes just a little bit. And they say that it will still be snowing.

The sky is blue!

…and at night the snow is still blue, too. 😉 This was bad after 1.30 am today.

Leena

Some more outdoor hobbies

The first picture I took on Sunday:

Archery! Getting to know archery, learning archery, actually shooting an arrow from a bow… I’ve wanted to do this for many years, we both have, my boyfriend and I, but we started this only just before Christmas. It looks easy, but when I had the bow in my hands for the first time, I didn’t know, I didn’t understand, which way to hold it… That was funny.

Now we just shoot arrows in our garden, without a target stand, but we’re thinking of building a target stand to my boyfriend’s field for example. We have a lot to learn, but it’s so nice to learn and to finally do something that one has been admiring for a long time. Yay! 🙂

We had the super blood wolf moon – superverisusikuu in Finnish, early in the morning on Monday, yesterday. I set my alarm clock for 6.25. When I woke up first I looked out of the window with my still sleepy eyes and saw a shiny edge of the moon and thought to myself “good, not cloudy…”, then I went outside and my eyes were still a bit blurry, but I could see that the moon was already turning red. I looked through binoculars and suddenly my eyes were wide open: “this is really happening!” – No clouds this time. I even had time to make coffee and then enjoy my coffee watching the total lunar eclipse. My coffee was hot, but I was freezing a bit at the end of the event, because it was around -20 degrees Celsius.

Morning coffee today…

It was cold last night, well under -20 degrees Celsius. Now, in the afternoon, it’s -10 degrees Celsius and it’s snowing.

Leena

And then there was more…

…snow. It has been snowing again. Right now we have 25 centimetres of snow on the ground here where I’m living.

First pictures that I took yesterday.

It snowed quite a lot in the evening on Wednesday and at night between Wednesday and yesterday. And then the sun was shining yesterday, before it started snowing a bit again.

Do not leave even footprints…? 🙂

Step into… This is the time for cross-country skiing!

Coffee yesterday, and the book is a fairy tale about Lapland, Sampo Lappalainen by Zachris Topelius (1818-1898). Topelius wrote the fairy tale in 1860. The drawings in this book, from the year 1983, are by Hannu Lukkarinen.

And pictures that I took today:

Just morning coffee…

It’s been snowing today as well. And they say that this wintry weather will continue now – snow, cold weather, sunshine, snowing…

And the sun’s been shining, too, today… And after that it already snowed a bit again…

I started to clear snow from our terrace yesterday and continued today…

Leena

Strange how familiar – more about January

It was sunny and it was windy on Friday, and a lot of snow fell from the wintry trees that we had… We had some sunshine yesterday, too, but today, now it’s already snowing a bit, and they say that it will continue to snow. – Now that is what I really like! Right now, because it’s January! 🙂

Late in the afternoon on Friday.

The next four pictures I took already on Saturday a week ago:

Never before have we seen so many deer tracks in our yard. – We have seen deer tracks often in our garden this winter. The animals are night-time wanderers, but we saw a ‘herd’ of three deer once, early in the morning, and a couple of deer in the daytime.

On Saturday a week ago there were many deer tracks in our yard, first I thought there had been two deer, but then I kept finding new tracks, and it looked like there had been at least three deer. Well, that was our strawberry patch in the pic above – that was the first time that deer had actually been doing something in our garden – digging and eating and it looked like one had been lying down there. Deer oh deer…

Some prints and tracks that I found:

deer hoof print, cat paw print in snow — A **deer hoof print** and a **cat paw print**.

A deer hoof print and a cat paw print side by side. – A nice coincidence. 🙂 Deer hoof prints that we see here are usually quite small…

…but then I found these tracks – the hoof prints looked a lot bigger… “What was that? – The devil has been in our backyard?”, I thought to myself. ;D

Now pictures that I took yesterday:

Amaryllis. Always majestic… And the scent is lovely and delicate!

My amaryllis had three flowers in the first stem, this is now the second stem, and it has four flowers, the flower in the picture is the first one that’s fully opened. Just marvellous.

Now just one pic of our new house plant, staghorn fern or elkhorn fern. Hopefully it won’t dry out… An interesting plant!

I went for a walk barefoot from the sauna again on Friday night, twice. I had only a towel around me and the snow and the chilly wind felt very nice. Comfortable enough – meaning one can do it without hesitation…

Our cats’ mother, the mother cat, came to live with us – that’s something new and nice as well. We travelled to Central Finland to get her on Monday this week. We had seen the mother cat only once before, very briefly, almost four and a half years ago and we didn’t remember how she actually looked like, so that was an interesting surprise for us, too, when we saw her on Monday. 🙂

Leena

Wintry pictures

It has been snowing quite a lot again. We have now 18 centimetres of snow on the ground here where I’m living. Snowy, soft…

First pictures that I took in our yard yesterday.

Norway maple.

The cherry tree. Hopefully it survives the winter. Our first cherry tree did not survive last winter, it was its first winter… but the tree was different and it was in a different place in our garden…

Snowy garden…

Backyard trees.

Winter… like in Moominvalley. 😉

Silent, magical…

Backyard pine trees.

We took a walk by the lake Pyhäjärvi near our home yesterday, just before it was getting dark. – The pine tree trunks didn’t have snow on them there in the woods, but they looked wintry, too – they were like light purple. That looked nice. 🙂

At the end of a cape, which is also a ridge, about half a mile long amidst the lake ( – oh dear, I don’t know how to explain this any better than this in English… 🙂 )

And today, in our garden again…

dwarf spruce, January — Dwarf spruce, blue winter lights.

Leena

Snowy

It snowed quite a lot in the evening on Tuesday and at night between Tuesday and yesterday. And it was very windy. The storm had been even record-breaking for a while at the sea. It was windy yesterday, too, but the sun was shining. Well, about the snow… must always say this, but this is quite a lot snow for us here in southern Finland – in eastern Finland and northern Finland, for example, they always have a lot more, that’s only natural. 🙂

The first pictures I took in the morning yesterday:

My dwarf spruce. Hopefully it survives the winter…

Hmm… Our car.

The wind made it look a bit different…

…but beautiful.

By the lake Pyhäjärvi near our home at noon yesterday. There was a chilly wind…

And in our garden in the afternoon.

And today:

composter, temperature — Year-round composter

It’s warm inside the composter in our garden.

It’s -11 degrees Celsius outside now at around 11.30 am. But they say that it “feels like -16 degrees Celsius”. Yes, it does feel a bit like that, but it’s not windy anymore and the sun is shining.

Leena

The next chapter

It’s… next year! Hmm… 🙂

First four pictures that I took in our yard yesterday, on New Year’s Eve:

A deer it was… I noticed these two days ago, and took this pic yesterday, before it started snowing in the evening.

One of yesterday’s many lights… It was snowing and it was windy. But very nice.

A candlelit sauna and from the sauna outside to walk barefoot in snow on the terrace and in the middle of the yard. And then back to sauna, and then do it again. I love how it feels! 🙂

So I watched one more Christmas film; The Polar Express (2004). I’ve tried to watch it, on two occasions, before – some years ago for the first time and again – was it at Christmas a year ago – I can’t remember anymore, but I fell asleep, on both occasions, already in the beginning of the film. – I was interested, but I was also very tired, obviously… So now I was determined to watch the film. And what a nice adventure it was! – And I’ve been just sleeping through it before… ;D

Another film I’ve watched after Christmas is Bird Box (2018 Netflix).

And two pictures that I took today, on New Year’s Day:

Amaryllis. I bought it yesterday, at half price at a local grocery store. I have to find a place for it in our living room, this is not the place, just taking a… hasty picture of two things that’s been happening. – I was watching the New Year’s Concert of The Vienna Philharmonic. I love watching it every year.

It’s been sleeting and water’s been dripping again today, but they say that it will be colder in the evening again and that it will snow. And they say that then it will be cold and sunny. Hmm…

On the broken couch… Happy New Year!

Leena