Cure for Cabin Fever

It has been a busy month (when isn't it a busy month?!), but I'm taking a momentary break from the fray to share a few shots of the snow-covered terrain around the country house, an unexpected (but not surprising) visitor, and a bit of winter brilliance.

It's old, but, seemingly, ongoing news that the Northeast has been bombarded with heavy snows. There appears to be no let-up in sight either. (It is, obviously, midwinter.) We're pretty accustomed to heavy snows in these parts, but some years are far worse than others. (Last year was a snowfall cake-walk compared to this winter.) I've mentioned this before, but the good news is that we're well equipped to deal with it before it comes and throughout its duration - which is more than can be said for other parts of the mid-south and south, that are paralyzed by it, so things calm down as soon as the falling snow departs.

Here are a few shots of the most recent arrival, about a week or so ago:

An unexpected visitor strolled by with a friend the other day...it was bitterly cold, so I hope they were able to find some nourishment and protection in the woods next to the house...



Still, I'm not a fan of the white stuff. It's pretty when it first arrives at the start of the season (just before Christmas is nice), but, after about month, I've usually had enough. There's only so much shoveling and path-clearing I (and my muscles) can tolerate. I like my roads clear and dry, too, so, not being a "winter sports" enthusiast (I don't ski, snowboard, snowshoe and I haven't skated since childhood and don't care to go there again), I'm pretty much done with it at this point. After what, according to the weather experts, has been the eighth snowiest winter on record here in upstate New York (and still counting), I'm more than ready for Spring to come - much sooner than later, too, please!

A very dear friend recently made a holiday venture of potting up some flower bulbs - paperwhite narcissus and amaryllis - that she put in pretty containers and placed in a local consignment shop for sale. I gave her a number of extra white, hobnail glass planters that I had accumulated (since I've been clearing out the family home for the past month) along with some others of a suitable size and style that I picked up for her at my local Goodwill. It was, all told, a modestly successful initiative, but what my sweet friend didn't tell me was that she also intended to return one of my glass pots, containing a beautiful, big amaryllis bulb already started in potting soil, to me as a Christmas gift. It was a lovely gesture, and the nicest part was that the visual gratification would be delayed by a month, when the stalk and flowers gradually would emerge. Emerge they did and it has been a glorious sight watching the deep, coral-colored blooms slowly unfold and brighten some of these bleak snowy days of winter:

It's an affirmation that Spring is indeed coming...I know it is.

New Year, New Look

As the handful of you who are regulars here will note, in the interest of a new year and new beginnings, I've given the blog a major face-lift (blog-lift?). I loved the old design, its warm and toasty pumpkin plaid and turquoise, but with a new year comes a desire to clear the decks, clean the closets and get a jump-start on Spring cleaning.

As with a room in one's home, I wanted to shift away from things that are too fussy and pare down to a more simple, more sleek and - dare I say it? - a more elegant look and feeling. So, here, today, I give you the new and hopefully more contemporary version of Country Contemporary.

It's funny how styles, whether in fashion or interior design, are so cyclical, with things that were once new and trendy relegated to the back room and things that were, perhaps at another earlier time, so fashionable, have come to the forefront once again.

Now, as I prepare to leave, once and for all, my family's home of 50 years - a fine example of a mid-century modern ranch with international style references that was the cutting edge of contemporary style in 1958 - it has struck me as somewhat ironic that things with such classic, mid-century style and lines have returned to the forefront.

There always will be a strong affinity for the traditional home, but there is a place for "modern" in the mix. I'm not talking so much about the usual 1950s "kitschiness" as much as the low, sleek lines of a 1960s or 1970s contemporary sofa - simple, linear, and uncomplicated. I'm not a connoissoeur of such style as much as I merely am an observer of this style evolution, as one who lived through that earlier era that influenced much of my personal aesthetic when I set out on my own as a young adult.

As these trends change, so, too, does the world of Country Contemporary, the blog, evolve -- as well it should. I'll be tweaking a few more things on the blog as we go forward...eliminating some of the visual and audio clutter (I'll replace the buttons with links shortly, so you still can find some of the other blogs I admire and enjoy) and tightening up the graphics. (I've removed the music for the moment until I can find a way for it to be more seamless in presentation - it was seriously slowing down the upload at my end.)

As things progress here, I hope you'll continue to join me from time to time along this appealing, and hopefully interesting, new path.

For the (Winter) Birds...

Snow, snow, snow...the latest Nor'Easter to hit upstate New York left us with a fairly substantial calling card, but it didn't deter the birds who have made my bird feeder their daily source of food.  Good thing I filled it up before the last storm.

I heard on the news yesterday that it's only 65 (now 64) days until Spring (March 20).  That's encouraging - only two months to go - and the daylight is lasting just a bit longer than it did two months ago.  It's no longer dark as night at 5pm (always a tough transition for me to accommodate) and we've rounded the bend back toward warm sun, lush green trees and grass, and longer daylight days and evenings...aaahhhh!

I've put away most of the holiday decorations and have transitioned to just those generic "midwinter" items.  I like to keep the symbols of winter - natural pine cones and some evergreens - as my literal and figurative references and decorative gestures. 

The nice thing is that the brilliant ruby reds of the holidays make the transitional color thread right to Valentine's Day.  It's just the shot of color I need in the house to brighten these sometimes bleak, snow-covered winter days.  I've even pulled the Valentine's and Easter boxes out of storage as I plan the pieces what I want to bring out that will carry me visually and psychically through the winter and right up to the very edge of Spring.

   

Boxing Day Blizzard of 2010

It floated in innocently enough. A few flurries here and there, nothing terribly problematic. They faded. A few hours passed, and they began again...in earnest, and eventually with a vengeance. I had run my errands on Christmas Eve and had stocked up so I didn't need to make a run to the grocery store for milk. The kitties would be happy. I would have milk for my coffee. It could do whatever it wanted out there. And, not unexpectedly, it did.

By Sunday evening on this Boxing Day 2010 - a wonderful British holiday tradition you should check out if you don't know about it (and it has nothing whatsoever to do with pugilistics) - the winds were howling like I'd never seen or heard out here in the country. The neat thing was I could literally see the winds since they were whipping the snow into a complete frenzy right outside my windows! There were moments with the way the winds were sweeping through the trees, and all around the house, swirling the snow, that it literally was like I was watching white mini-tornadoes! Seriously...their velocity and twisting motion was staggering. I was glad I was able to watch it, as if it was some kind of weird, white, Weather Channel documentary, from the safety and warmth of the house. Phew!

By morning, the snows continued, but the bulk of the accumulation was already well on the ground and roads. Other parts of the Northeast well might have been more inundated than we, but for this upstate New York region, my county and my town got the brunt of the storm in these parts, according to the local television newscasts. Twenty inches, possibly more, 5-foot drifts. It was more than enough.

The view (above) out my front door yesterday morning, after the storm had passed and the sun emerged.

For all the years (half a century-plus) I've lived here (all of my life, actually), I've seen big snowstorms and blizzards. This was one of the big ones, for sure, but I'm not sure it was the biggest I've seen. It was big enough, though. Ususally our weather here in upstate New York follows the flow of the jet stream, blowing across the land from west to east, or from the chilly North of Canada. This blizzard, was, in fact, a true Nor'Easter - a storm, whether rain or snow, that moves north along the Atlantic coast, picking up moisture from the ocean as it spins counter-clockwise and dumps its rains or snows onto the land mass of the Northeast in its path. How quickly the front moves along, and eventually, off the coast determines how much rain or snow those of us in its path, even 100 miles inland, ultimately receive. A lot in the case of the Boxing Day Blizzard.

The good news is we knew it, or at least something, was coming at least two days in advance. Fortunately, I didn't have to go anywhere or do anything and could just wait and watch and let it play out. Unfortunately, others who were traveling for the holiday weekend didn't have that good fortune. Certainly, the havoc this blizzard wreaked on the transportation system in the Northeast was significant, and will take days to untangle, but, to be honest, with storms like this, it always is. What amazes (and amuses) me is that people are so upset by it - as if they are entitled to the utmost in travel convenience at all times. Hello, folks? It's winter. It's the Northeast. It snows here...a lot sometimes. Ding! Ding! This storm was forecast, so I don't get what part of winter weather and preparation for it they don't understand.

It takes time to clear the roads, although to the credit of the highway crews in my town, in my county and in my state, they were plowing before dawn on Monday morning. In the interest of full disclosure, I spent some time in my life - more than a decade, in fact - working for a highway authority - yes, that would be government - so I do know what goes on with these operations. I appreciate those guys (and some gals) who drive the plows and clear the roads more than I can say. We take completely for granted the safety and convenience they provide and, to be honest, while the taxes we pay here in New York are the highest in the country, it's times like this, when those folks do their jobs so efficiently and effectively, that it takes just a tiny little bit of the sting out of that financial burden. In my corner of the globe, they are worth every penny we pay for them.

If you find yourself traveling in a part of the country where even a dusting of snow or ice completely paralyzes all travel for days on end, you'll know what I mean and appreciate that while it can slow or even stop us cold briefly, things do get going as quickly as Mother Nature and the resources we allocate for plows and plow operators allow - and it's pretty darn fast, all things considered.

Dawn this morning, two days after the Boxing Day Blizzard of 2010.

It's no secret that winter weather can be very tough here in the snowbelt of the Northeastern US, but we do know how to cope with it and cope we do. I just wonder why those who are caught out by it don't get that program every time some overwhelming volume of snow seriously impedes the free flow of air, rail and highway travel. With patience, as soon as Mother Nature allows, we'll get her white mess out of the way. And we'll do a far better job of managing it faster here in the Northeast, and in New York, than many other parts of the country can. You can thank me and the rest of us in New York later for our tax dollars and highway tolls at work to make everyone's trip just a little safer and a little easier.

Merry Christmas!

At the risk of having this little corner of blogland become a place where I post only on holidays, I thought I'd better upload the early dawn photo I took this Christmas morning pronto!  I am here to assure you, my loyal followers (all 12 of you), that all is well in Country Contemporary-land...just the usual busy.  I also have been wrestling with technical computer challenges too boring to discuss, but suffice it to say there are not enough USB ports on my PC to make uploading my latest digital photos a speedy process. (What I'm really saying is I have to remember to upload photos before I connect to the internet because I don't have enough ports to do both simultaneously...and I keep forgetting to do that...sorry.  I'm hoping Santa might find a shiny new laptop leftover in his bag for me so I can escape these sad operational constraints...I'll inquire about that...maybe I'll get lucky.)

Today, however, I just did the deed, added a few more photos to the files so I could share them with you this morning.  The first is the aforementioned pre-dawn (or breaking dawn) photo of this very Christmas morn here in the country.  I could see it was evolving into a real beauty and deserved capturing for posterity.  (Apologies for the slight fuzziness...tough to get those long, dim exposures to be clear without a tripod to hold the camera rock-steady.)  The others, well, they're just for fun to mark the occasion.  My little Christmas gifts to you all...enjoy the day!

Here are a couple of errant tiny reindeer looking a bit puzzled as to how they ended up outside my home. I think they got away from that incessantly flying sleigh...

And, finally, a bright red cardinal on a painted wall pocket I found last year at Goodwill for a song (I use it for displaying seasonal greens outside the door).  I find it provides a cheerful crimson contrast to all this white stuff on the ground.  And speaking of birdies, I did, in fact, refill the actual feeder just outside my window to the brim with oiled black sunflower seeds and a pair of peanut suet cakes last night.  Now my lovely, fine-feathered cardinal (and chickadee and finch) friends will be pleased to find their favorite tasty Christmas meal awaiting them this morning.  It's the least I can do for them.

And, for those of you in need of a fine chuckle after these endless weeks of holiday shopping, food prep, and just general anticipatory anxiety, I direct your attention to the wonderful blog, The Blushing Hostess Entertains, for Catherine Coughlin's very amusing take on entertaining that transient Santa person...

Merry Christmas to all!  

Happy Thanksgiving...and THANK YOU!

Just a quick note to wish everyone who passes through here, whether just once or more frequently, a very happy Thanksgiving.  I'm so very thankful for my blessings and for the ability to share the things I love and care about here in blog-land. 

I wish for all of you a most happy holiday full of bountiful food and blessings to you and yours.  Thank you!

Betwixt, Between...and a New Tag Line

No sooner am I apologizing ad nauseam for not posting in recent weeks, and here I am with a second post in two days!  Never check a generous impulse, I've heard, so just go with it, gang.

One of the things I have been thinking about lately is the name of this blog.  I think Country Contemporary is still good to go here - I'm a contemporary person and I've been back living in the country, in a contemporary house, no less, for the better part of the year, so I think the title is a keeper.  The tag line - "Life and Style from the Urban Home from a Country Girl at Heart" isn't so accurate any longer, though.  I remain a country girl both at heart and, again now, in fact, but the urban home from which I originated the blog, and in which I actually "originated" in life from the age of about 4, is about to become someone else's urban home.  That meant the tag line needed, like some of the features of that wonderful midcentury urban home, to be updated to reflect the reality of these modern times.  So I changed it (the tag line, not the house, alas).

Here at Country Contemporary, the tag line is now "Life and Style from the Country Home of a Formerly Urban Girl."  It's still accurate, but more accurate and current now.  I've been back in the country since March and I was a bona fide urban girl, having been born and raised within city limits. 

In fact, I lived in the city until about age 36, when I bought my first country home.  I had been spending a lot of time in the country over the course of about eight preceding years.  I had renewed my childhood passion for horses and riding that was interrupted in my teens for all the usual reasons that derail horse crazy adolescent girls - school work, extra-curricular activities, boys, etc. - and because we lived in the city, the likelihood that we'd be keeping a horse in the backyard wasn't high.  I pleaded with my dad for that, but to no avail.

After an interruption of a few years, I resumed riding a bit during college, but, once again, the realities of life - working for a living and still residing in the city - interfered with the time I'd have to spend indulging in my long-held passion for equines or the ability to be near where horses needed to live. 

Fortunately, in my late 20s, a dear friend gave me a gift of riding lessons at a wonderful facility in the country near where I now sit typing this and, essentially, it changed my life.  More accurately, it returned me to my long-held passion and I took it from there.  After about two years, I purchased my first horse with an income tax refund I received one spring.  The rest, as they say, is history. 

Eventually, as my career progressed and my fortunes (read: bank account) grew, I made the executive decision to move closer to my passion and farther from the office after about six initial years of horse ownership.  I knew, after spending those intervening years learning the landscape and the culture of the community, that this was where I belonged....here in horse country.  But for a period of about five years that reluctantly but necessarily brought me back to the city more recently, I lived, happily, here in the country for 15 years.

All the while, I kept my post office box in the country.  I knew I didn't want to give it up even though I'd later moved to another country home several miles away.   I've had that box for more than 20 years now and I've used it continuously for business and for less important mailings, like magazines and such, that I didn't need to receive instantly.  I'd come out to the country - only about 30 miles from the urban home - periodically to retrieve the mail.  The box kept me connected to the community, to my great friends of many years who are my real support system, and, most of all, to the horses.  Now, since returning to live here earlier this year, I use that box as my primary address again.

By choice, after 25 years, I don't own horses any longer, but they remain central to my existence, to my sense of my identity and to my sense of calm and happiness.  I know that wherever I live, I must be in or near where they are so I can see them, watch them, pat them and just be around them, and so this formerly urban girl can always remain a country girl at heart...and in reality.