Tag Archives: WV

Deer!

Family, Nature, WV, ,

On May 27, Emily and the kids witnessed a baby deer walk wobbly down into our yard.  The deer was all legs and was clearly very newly born.  The mother deer was nearby for awhile but we didn’t see where they went so assumed they left.  A little later, Abigail yelled, “I see a deer!”  I didn’t believe her at first but I followed her anyhow.  There, under a tree lay a baby deer all curled up.  The mother was no where to be found so we assumed she had abandoned her fawn.  We decided to wait it out a bit down on our patio.  Just a few minutes later, the fawn decided to come check us out.  It was so friendly that we couldn’t help but touch it.  I was concerned that we had ruined any chance of the mother accepting the baby again.  Still, we decided to wait it out, this time inside the house since the fawn curled up under our patio furniture.  Eventually (a long time later!), the mother came back through and picked up her fawn.  We hadn’t seen them in awhile but the other day, we saw them (or another family of deer?) in the yard.  This time, there were 2 fawns with the doe.  I was relieved to see that all was well!

The hard thing for me to believe is that there are so many deer in Charleston.  It was quite a thrill to see this all unfold.  We see deer several times a week eating apples at the neighbors’ apple trees or the new leaves on my raspberries.  I think we see more wild life here than we ever expected we would see in the city.  There are goods and bads about that but, I love that we get to see the deer so close!

New fawn

Isaac and the fawn

fawn knocking on the door

naptime for fawn

Fawns

Family of deer

Chanterelle mushrooms!

Canning, Garden, WV, ,

We decided to venture into the woods a little last night to hunt for some mushrooms.  There are tons of mushrooms growing on the leaf-bed in the forest we wisited.  Some I know are edible like the chanterelles we harvested.  There are some that I know are not safe to eat and there are a lot I don’t know about.  A friend is teaching me about mushrooms because I want to be an old mushroom eater!  I took a bunch more pictures when I went mushroom hunting with her on July 4th.  Anyhow, last night Isaac, Emily and I hiked only a short distance before Isaac found a patch of wild blueberries so he remained occupied with that.  After gathering mushrooms, we found a patch of blackberries so we picked a bunch of them and made 9 more half-pints of jam.  I am amazed, now that I am looking, how much food is growing around us here in the Charleston city-limits…I am also amazed at how poison ivy grows around here!

More blackberries

Canning, Garden, WV, ,

The blackberries are aplenty right now. We picked 2 1/2 qrts on Sunday, 4 qrts on Tuesday, and 4 more qrts tonight. The kids’ excitement has completely worn off by now though. Isaac brought a book while Abigail brought her positive outlook ;). My Dad (and sometimes I) used to pick blackberries along the logging roads near the house when I was younger. I am sure I always had a positive attitude. Anyhow, we have canned 27 half-pints of jam and 5 pints of syrup so far!  I think we will make a bunch more into syrup for pancakes since we probably have enough jam to last until next year. I see some blackberry homemade ice cream in our future too!  Speaking of that, Isaac and I discovered that a little jam (before pectin) tastes awesome on ice cream. I don’t care much for ice cream so I just get a little dab of ice cream and a heap of syrup. I don’t know what we are going to do if the picking continues to be as strong. I just can’t bear to see the food go to waste.  For the first time, we noticed how much poison ivy is in the berry patch.  I am not sure how we missed it before but we are hoping that we didn’t bring any of it home with us as well.

 

 

 

 

Rain!

Family, WV, ,

Isaac and Abigail’s aunt and uncle got them a rain guage for Christmas this year and they have been fascinated by it ever since.  Abigail in particular checks it for rainfall and then empties it everyday on our way to school.  Well, this has been an active year for her to say the least.  I looked at the NOAA site for information on how much rain we have gotten this year.  Charleston averages 44.05 inches of rain per year and July is typically the wettest month with an average of 4.86 inches.  From January 1 until June 30, we got 26.28 inches, above the average of 21.98 inches for the same period. Last year we only got 15.65 inches in the first half of the year.  July is looking like it will continue this year’s wet trend.  Our rain guage measured 1.7 inches from yesterday’s rainfall though the official measurement for the day was 1.16 (officially we got 1.54 the day before also).  Anyhow, it seems so strange to get so much rain since we have been pretty dry (it seems) the last bunch of years.  I prefer the green grass compared to the brown grass of last year but it is not welcome inside my house.  The basement has some wet spots.  Fortunately, it has floor drains too!

Another reason I love to live in Charleston, WV

Family, WV,

My brother-in-law and sister-in-law were out of town this weekend so we agreed to let their dog out during the day.  Of course, it rained off and on all weekend and we had to let the dog in and out according to the storm schedule.  The nice thing is, we live 1 minute from them. 

Last night we played cards with Emily’s mom and dad while the kids messed around and watched movies, etc.  A storm popped up so I ran over to put the dog back in.  The dog was 1 minute from Emily’s folks’ place too.  Things are just closer here.  We used to live near Nashville, TN and nothing was close…or even if it was close, there was too much traffic to “get there” in a reasonable amount of time.  We could see the grocery store from our first apartment in TN but it sometimes took us 1/2 hour to get there.  In Charleston, life is just easier.  We have most of the same things as any other city but it’s easier to “get there” from here.  But more importantly than being close to stuff, is being close to people…we’re closer to family and friends here.