Monthly Archives: May 2025

Bovine Chic

Ally Bean at THE SPECTACLED BEAN writes an entertaining blog featuring miscellaneous topics, thought-provoking questions, and links to a variety of quizzes. One of her posts included a link to a quiz to determine your home decorating aesthetic. (I was going to link directly to the post, but I couldn’t find it. Sorry, Ally!) To no great surprise, the quiz determined that my aesthetic is Farmhouse Chic.

The rustic nature of The Cabin is one of the reasons I fell in love with it. Our first viewing of this house is my only experience of love at first sight. (Okay, maybe that’s not true. Any random kitten provokes a similar feeling.) Not long ago, I realized that I may be leaning a little heavily on the “farm” portion of Farmhouse Chic. I told Kenn, “I may owe you an apology. I seem to have decorated the whole house with cows.” (Hobby Lobby feeds into my bovine obsession.)

My love of cows traces back to my childhood. I grew up living next door to my maternal grandparents. My grandmother was a bit of a hobby farmer and always had a few cows. Growing up around cows is how I learned that the saying “Curiosity killed the cat” should actually be ” Curiosity killed the cow.” Cows are nothing if not nosy. Stand in the middle of a field of cows and it won’t be long until you’re surrounded by cows checking to see what you’re doing.

Now for a peek at my “bovine chic.”

Our dining room wall.
A close-up of the wreath on the dining room wall.
This one hangs outside the kitchen door. I almost forgot about it.
Shower curtain in the guest bathroom.
Artwork in the guest bathroom. I added goats!
In the master bedroom.

What’s your decorating style?

Stormy Weather

I love the Progressive Insurance commercials about turning into your parents. I absolutely LOL’ed when they released the weather commercial; it perfectly describes both Kenn and our oldest son. Every morning, Kenn gives me a weather report including the high temperature expected and any chance of rain. Yesterday’s weather report was basically, “Things have changed. The rain now isn’t expected in this area until around 5pm. Radar shows a big blob of rain over Birmingham, AL.” With that, we went about our morning.

It was a muggy day, so we elected to sit inside at church. Inside was a good call; when the service ended, it was obvious that a pretty good rain shower had moved through and it was still sprinkling. Kenn and I said our goodbyes and headed home. (He volunteers with the parking team, so we usually drive separately.) As I drove, the rain picked up enough that the intermittent wiper setting wasn’t enough and I switched to the lower “continuous” setting. Then, about halfway home the rain changed from a steady, semi-hard rain to what my youngest would call a “wrath of God” rainstorm.

Y’all it was horrible. I switched the wipers to the fastest setting, turned on the defroster just in case, and turned on the hazard lights. Fortunately, there wasn’t a lot of traffic on the two-lane road I was on. It was one of those storms where it would probably have been best best to pull over, but doing so was impossible. That stretch of road has no shoulder to speak of; pulling over would mean going down an embankment and into a field. There’s also a section of road work where a traffic circle is being installed. So, I hugged the center line and kept my eye on the white line at the outside of the lane. However, even with the wipers at the highest setting, I could only get a glimpse of the white line every few seconds. The rain was blowing across the road in sheets – which occasionally included small limbs. Since there are a lot of pecan trees in the area, I prayed that, in addition to staying on the road, no limbs would come in through the window. I have never been so glad to get home. I made a dash inside, then stood at the window watching for Kenn. He and I take different routes home from church so I had no idea what he might have encountered. He did arrive home safely. It turned out that his route had several trees and limbs blocking the road.

I have to say that yesterday’s storm is in the Top Three worst storms I’ve ever driven in. One of the other worst storms was also in the local area. I had headed out to pick up my oldest grandson for a visit when a horrible rain storm moved in – equally as bad as yesterday’s storm with hail thrown in for good measure. I did find a place to turn around so I could head back home, but that time, I actually wasn’t on the road and didn’t realize it until a sign suddenly appeared ahead of me. I veered to miss the sign and wound up in a field. Fortunately, I was driving the Tundra and I managed to get out of the field, back on the road, and crawl home. The other Top Three storm occurred in Fort Smith, Arkansas when I was driving to Estes Park, Colorado. There I was, on the interstate in an unfamiliar town, and I couldn’t see a bloody thing. As soon as the rain let up and I could find somewhere to pull over, I did so and just sat in the car and shook for a few minutes.

Image from depositphotos.com

Fortunately, Daisy waited until yesterday evening to act up. Kenn and I met friends for dinner and on the way home, Daisy lost her mind. She started beeping and displaying error messages. “Eyesight disabled.” “RAB disabled.” “Check engine.” Simultaneously, the engine lost power and began running erratically; we managed to pull into a parking lot and began doing research. I thought I was going to have to call our friends and ask them to circle back and take one of us home to get the truck. We were able to eventually get the engine running smoothly enough to be able to make it home. Once at home, we disconnected the battery for about fifteen minutes and removed and replaced the gas cap making sure that it was sealed correctly. One or the other of those things fixed the problem. I’m convinced that some sensor got wet and temporarily malfunctioned. As of today, Daisy is still running fine. I’m just so, so thankful that whatever happened didn’t happen during my drive home earlier in the day.

Now that I have the song stuck in my head, I’ll leave you with a link to Lena Horne’s version of Stormy Weather.

This is for the birds

It has been a busy spring! We’ve seen more nesting birds than we usually do. One of the things I love about The Cabin is that we have bluebirds here. Bluebirds like open spaces, and this is the first home we’ve had with enough space to attract them. We’ve got several bluebird houses and a pair selected a different house to nest in. We got to listen to the babies when they hatched and see mom and dad flying in and out as they cared for them. We even got a few glimpses at the babies before they flew away.

Peeking at the world.

I’ve always liked wrens; their little flipped up tails give them a sassy vibe, and I’m all about sassy. This year, wrens have built a nest in the rafters of our carport. While we haven’t located the nest, the top of a nearby fence post has become a favorite place for mom and dad to perch. I’m thoroughly enjoying the impromptu serenades throughout the day.

Watching the world go by.
Singing.

Some birds of unknown species build a nest on one of our downspouts every year. Kenn says they’re barn swallows, but I disagree. Barn swallows don’t build typical nests and this nest is nothing if not typical. Whatever type they are, I’m not sure if they’ve ever successfully raised babies. It’s quite possible that they have; they location of the nest makes it difficult to see so we don’t see the parents flying in and out like we might if it were in a different location.

We’ve also seen brown thrashers hanging around the shrubs near the deck so I suspect there is another nest we haven’t seen. I’m going to be replacing most of our birdhouses over the next few months with varieties that are a little easier to clean out. Hopefully, we be able to see even more families next year!

Several years ago, Kenn surprised me with the gift of having the yard at our previous house certified as a wildlife habitat by the National Wildlife Federation. He had to jump through several hoops including providing a diagram of our yard including the plants, food, and water sources available for wildlife. I proudly displayed the certification sign in our yard. All of this years bird watching reminded me that I need to get our current yard certified. After all, we have four acres of land, with somewhere between two to three of those acres being wooded. So, I went online and found out that the process has gotten a lot easier; I just answered a few questions, paid my fee, and boom! Done. Now, I just have to wait for my new sign to come in.

Are you a bird watcher?