Minnesota – Valerie's Voice

Litter

The Faribault Flyers Bike and Ski Club picked up trash last week. The club adopted a portion of highway 60, out of Faribault. This means the club has committed to pick up litter along both sides of the highway section, at least twice a year.

Gary and I are members of this bike club and were available to help. It was a windy day, and that was challenging…keeping the plastic garbage bag from blowing away, or its twisting and dumping all the contents out. But, the sun was out and it was a mild temperature.

We were all given fluorescent vests to wear. The traffic on this particular highway is heavy, and a little dauting at first, being so close to the road with the cars whizzing by. We were given garbage bags to fill, then instructed to leave them on the side of the road to be picked up.

We divided into four groups of four or five.

We were told mark with a bag… and do not touch… drug paraphernalia or firearms, if we came upon any. I found what looked like a small firearm. I did pick it up because I was fairly certain it was too small to be real. It ended up being a large cigarette lighter in the shape of a gun. Sigh.

This small, heavy, metal gun that was a lighter.

It felt good to be outdoors on this spring day, while picking up the discarded pop and beer cans, liquor bottles, miscellaneous paper, fast food bags and cups and utensils, cigarette lighters and cigarette butts (the worse). I think there is a mentality that cigarette butts are not litter, so smokers just throw them out the window. There are a lot of them!

Full trash bags set along side the road for pick-up. We filled 35-40 bags, in two hours.

It felt good to participate in this community service. There were several of us from the bike club that showed up to help. Many hands make light work, although it was still hard work. We had a handy, dandy picker-upper which worked well. It reduced the amount of bending over a little bit, during our two-hour shift.

Six months from now, the club will set apart another afternoon to collect trash from the same section of the highway. It’s one of those jobs that is never ending, but I think we make a difference.

Square Dancers

My childhood friend, Diane, called me a couple weeks ago, to wish me a happy birthday. We have exchanged the same birthday card since 1979. It has become a treasure. Diane called to say I would be getting the birthday card late this year, because she was “snow birding” in Florida and forgot to bring the card along to send to me from there.

It was fun to chat with her awhile, and catch up on our kids. She told me this story.

In 1953, my father built this house that I grew up in.

When Diane’s mother passed away, several years after her father died, Diane’s son bought his grandparent’s house. So, he now lives in the house where Diane grew up, and across the street from the house where I grew up, in Northeast Minneapolis. It’s wonderful to know the house is still in her family. Her parents built their house in the early 1950’s, as did mine.

A special wall painting discovered under the paneling.

Diane told me her son has done a lot of updating and remodeling of the McKinley Street house, and currently he’s working in the basement. He began tearing the old paneling off the walls. Underneath he found the typical cement blocks, but also a surprise.

Taking care to preserve this special painting.

Back in the late 50’s, Diane’s father painted two life-size square dancers on the cement block wall. I had forgotten about them, but remembered them as soon as Diane mentioned it. A few years later, when her dad finished off their basement, he covered up the square dancers with paneling. Diane recalls that when her dad covered up the painting with paneling…he said, “it will be interesting for someone to discover these dancers someday.”

A moisture control was brushed over the wall painting, to help persevere the painting.

As Diane’s son was tearing down the paneling, lo and behold, he exposed the painting of the square dancers.

Little did Diane’s father know at the time, it would be his own grandson who would discover his special treasure on the wall, under the paneling!

Into The Deep

The Galleria’s spring flower show, Into The Deep, opened last week.

An annual flower exhibition is created every spring by Bachman’s, and it’s a delight to walk around indoors, and see all the beautiful and colorful representations of the theme, made with flowers.

This year’s theme, Into The Deep, included a great variety of sea floor images…

It’s easy to use your imagination while viewing these wonderful, artistic displays.

Hidden in the flowers are terrariums with tiny “mermaid gardens” inside a clear, acrylic globe. I liked this idea.

The challenge is to find all eight of them among the different scenes. I think mermaids are becoming as popular as fairies.

There were also sea creatures: jelly fish, a school of yellow fish, lobster claws, sea horses, octopus limbs, o my…

On a weekday morning, we arrived about 10 am and it was comfortable viewing the displays. An hour later the crowds had begun to grow (no pun intended-ha!).

Then, it was fun to people watch, and see so many enjoying this amazing exposition. But, we could only image it would get busier and busier as the day went on. We left to make room for others.

For me, the flower show builds excitement as I anticipate seeing spring flowers out-of-doors soon.

The show goes through April 7.

An Alien Has Landed

In addition to cleaning up my flower gardens in the fall, I also clean up my fairy garden. I remove the fairies and paraphernalia, wash them up, then store everything away until spring.

Then I place a winter scene in the garden, with a single component; a fairy sitting next to a snowy tree. Even though, in “normal” winters, snow covers it up for most of the season, it’s fun to place this ornament outside to have a winter fairy scene too.

Of course, this non-snowy winter the garden has not been covered in snow, and you can see the fairy and tree easily.

However, it has been invaded by an alien.

The other day as I was walking by, I noticed a small figure next to some glass mushrooms I forgot to put away last fall. When I picked it up, it looked like an alien. I trust it’s a friendly one.

I will add him to my ever-changing and expanding fairy garden this spring.

It’s fun to know others notice this whimsical little world, tucked away under a rose bush in my back yard.

On a walk recently, I noticed these yellow crocuses already popping out of the ground these early days of March (3/7/24).

Home Again

We have arrived safely home from our 4,690 miles road trip, through eleven states in southeastern US. We saw a lot of beauty in nature, and beauty in the many friends and family we were able to visit. We are grateful all went well, and we had a great time!

There have been unusual weather patterns all across the country. It was warm here in Minnesota during February, with little snow fall. And it was cooler than normal in the southeast, where we were.

In Iowa Monday night, February 26, it was 72* and we ate dinner outside on a restaurant patio.

But our welcome home present was a cold snap. As we drove closer to Northfield the next day, the temperature kept dropping. When we arrived home we unloaded our car in 25* temperatures. It also started snowing. Sigh. We woke up to 5*!

It is predicted to remain cold for one day and then the temperatures will start climbing back up again. What a roller coaster. I wonder what kind of weather March will bring?

A Library and Cat Yoga

My friend and I spent a day in Cannon Falls, a small-town east of Northfield with about 4,400 people. The town has a trailhead for the Cannon Valley Bike Trail so we are very familiar with the town. We have been there often. After bike rides, one tends to look around the surrounding towns, and occasionally go out to eat, or out for ice cream!

On this winter day we were just exploring the town itself. There were two shops in particular we wanted to check out, but they happened to be closed on Monday and Tuesday. However, we found two other fun stores we had not been to, and there are two great antique shops to browse around in.

A pretty wreath hanging on the door to the library, to invite you in.

While walking up and down main street I mentioned to my friend that the library was really nice. I had been in it a few times. (I like libraries and tend to check them out.) It’s a wonderful library for a small town. This library is unique in that it has a fireplace which makes a cozy place to sit and read a book, or just sit a spell. We decided to go in and take a look.

The lovely sitting area by the fireplace in the Cannon Falls Library.

After enjoying the fire, we looked around. There is creative children’s area, and every time I’ve been in, there is a simple kid’s craft, in a baggie, to take home.

In the community room I noticed a guy rearranging chairs. On the big screen a gal sat poised on a chair with the title Chair Yoga. So I asked about it and he told me chair yoga was a weekly occurrence, about 30 minutes in length, and it was about to start. I looked at my friend and we smiled and nodded in agreement that we’d join in on this chair yoga session.

With the two of us, we made a group of six. We practiced with some friendly women. They explained the not-so-good quality video was taken of the regular instructor who was out on medical leave, so they just taped her leading the practice. You really couldn’t hear her, but we could follow along by watching her.

I didn’t get a photo from the video of the cat, but I dug up this one of our playful, family pet kitty from years ago.

And it was comical. The instructor’s cat was very much a part of the scene. He was very active and fun to watch. He’d jump up on her, crawl over her shoulder and down her leg, jump back down, pounce around the room, and jump back up on her, and then back down to the floor, batting his paws at her feet. This went on the entire time, and she continued to do yoga. It added a special, humorous dimension to this chair yoga practice.

Thirty minutes later we said good-bye to our new friends, who gather at the library three times a week for some form of exercise…a great idea for a library we thought.

We headed off to lunch, smiling all the way…what a serendipitous moment at the Cannon Falls Library…we’re so glad we went with “the flow.”

Urness Recital Hall

Urness Recital Hall on the St. Olaf College campus is a wonderful venue all year long, but it is especially cozy this time of year with its intimate setting and attractive lighting.

The light shining through the windows of Urness Hall, lighting up a dark space.

We bundled up and went out into the cold night for a 7:00 performance at Urness Hall, knowing it didn’t take long to get to campus, it would be easy to park, it would be a free concert with a reasonable time commitment, and we’d hear some exceptional music.

Along one wall in Urness Hall is floor to ceiling windows. Sound boards help create fine acoustics.

The venue was maybe half full with students and community members. We sat on an aisle, behind a St. Olaf conductor of a different ensemble, who was in the audience. I’m sure she couldn’t help herself…she was covertly conducting the performance from her seat. She was fun to watch.

There were three musical scores on the program. The first two were composed by Johann Sebastian Bach 1685-1750, a German composer, and they both included the harpsichord. The third piece was composed by Pyotr Lylich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893), a Russian composer.

Apparently during the 16th-18^th centuries, the harpsichord became an important European instrument, which may be why Bach’s compositions included the harpsichord.

The harpsichord and music score, on stage, ready to be played.

I don’t know the history of St. Olaf’s harpsichord, but I overheard this was the first time it was played in Urness Recital Hall. James E. Bobb, the conductor of a choral ensemble at St. Olaf, and an organ/harpsichord professor, played the harpsichord during the performance.

St. Olaf’s harpsichord, moved to the side after the first two pieces were finished (the top was removed before I was able to take a picture.)

The third piece by Tchaikosky was performed by 21 students from the St. Olaf orchestra. They were student-lead by the first chair violin (or viola), and included four string instruments: violin, viola, cello and bass cello. It was a lively, spirited performance. The students really do put a lot into their playing. Not only is it wonderful to hear them play, it’s fun to watch them play.

The 21 orchestra members playing beautiful music.

And so, an hour and 15 minutes later, we were putting our jackets back on and heading home, glad that we took the time to venture out for some high-quality music, being uplifted on this dark, cold January evening.

Farm Animals

I never have given much thought to farm animals before I started feeding the amazing creatures at the farm where I help out about once a month. Often when I help out at this local farm, I tag along with their primary caretaker so I can keep current on the method to remember which animal gets what, and how much. Then, when the caretaker wants time away, I am solely responsible to feed the animals and get it right.

Farm quilt from the National Quilt Museum. January 2022

I agreed to help out this week long before I knew it would be so cold outside. I started worrying about how the animals survive during these days of frigid, subzero temperatures. I didn’t realize how much I have let these animals into my heart and care a lot about their welfare.

My favorites…the two horses, in May 2023. I didn’t take any photos of the animals on the frigid day in January.

I looked up how horses survive and I learned that horses grow a “new, longer hair coat. These winter hairs stand up, trapping tiny air pockets between them. The effect is like that of a thick, down-filled comforter with tremendous insulating quality.”*

Then I looked up how donkeys survive in the cold temps and it said donkeys should have a suitable shelter, a structure of at least three sides, and it should be free from draughts, and be waterproof.*

One of the two goats. I have a hard time telling them apart.
Photo from March 2022.

Finally, I looked up goats. For goats, they need a winter shelter that is dry and waterproof and out of the wind. Inside this shelter, the goats will stay warm even during the coldest weather.*

And that is how it played out the day I went to feed the animals on my own. The temperature managed to crawl to one degree above zero, but the windchill was 19 degrees below zero. Gary drove me out to the farm and provided a warming station (the truck) for me to tuck into between chores.

When we arrived I got out of our truck and was greeted by the farm dog, a cute little guy. He ran up to welcome me, and I gave him lots of pats and rubs, and he in turn gave me lots of excited tail wags.

Then I looked in on the cats and they were safely tucked inside an out building…I added food to their bowls and checked their water. I made sure the cat door was locked for the night.

Best buddies, and brothers. Photo taken July 2023.

When I arrived at the horse and donkey pens, sure enough, the horses were standing outside waiting for their dinner, and “the boys” (two donkeys who are brothers) were staying warm in their three-sided shelter. I petted them all, talked to them while parceling out their hay, and checked to make sure their water hadn’t frozen over.

At the goat pen, the two goats were also waiting for me in their shelter. I filled their food dishes and quickly placed them apart from each other before getting in the middle of the two hungry goats.

Last, but not least, the chickens were in the chicken coop, waiting for supper.

I really enjoy this little gig…I have always loved animals, but never had the chance to be around many farm animals. I’m grateful for this opportunity to care for them and to get to know them by name, and even talk with them!

*source of info: Wikipedia

P.S. I understand that this is fun for me because I do it occasionally. I pray for the caretaker who feeds and cares for the animals morning and evening, day in and day out, and on hot, sunny days and gray, subzero days!

Below Zero Temperatures

Not only are the outside temperatures below freezing, but they are below zero degrees Fahrenheit…with wind chills about -27 degrees, according to Alexa.

Looking out on our back yard from our living room window.

So what does one do in these subzero temperatures?

It would be a great time to go through the closets, or files, or piles of paper on desks…or to clean out the kitchen cupboards, or do some deep cleaning in the basement…

Did I do any of those?

Nope…

On this gray, cloudy, bitterly cold day we stayed inside. I turned on the oven and made some peanut butter cookies (using my mom’s recipe),

It’s been a long time since I made peanut butter cookies.

then curled up by the fireplace and read all afternoon.

And it was good.

Now, what will the coming week bring…it is supposed to be below zero all week…

FiftyNorth

We took a CPR class this week. It was offered at the senior center in Northfield. Although I hope to never have to use what we learned, it’s good to be refreshed on what to do, just in case. Our instructor was engaging and knowledgeable and the three hours went by quickly. We were able to practice on a mannequin to get the feel of just how much pressure you need to use when applying compressions. Little green lights lit up when you were doing it right. These features were not in place years ago…many years ago…when I last took a CPR class.

The electronic sign off the street, near Jefferson Avenue.

The senior center in Northfield, called FiftyNorth, is a vibrant one. There are numerous activities and classes to choose from, and many members.

The smell of coffee brewing and popcorn popping in the lobby is alluring. A jig saw puzzle on the table by the window was inviting, people were chatting in the lobby while sitting on comfortable sofas and chairs, a receptionist was there ready to greet you and answer questions. There are rotating art exhibits by local artists on the walls. I’m glad to be a member of this senior center, although I could make much more use of the facilities – I was more active prior to Covid.

The parking lot is usually full at this busy senior center.

After our CPR class, as we were walking out, we noticed Little Frida Café & Taco Shop, a small café in the dining room of FiftyNorth. It has limited hours – only open for breakfast and lunch, on weekdays, serving authentic Mexican fare. I had always wanted to try it, so we took this opportunity to order the lunch special. It was tasty! And so reasonable. Another hidden gem in Northfield.

The sign near the entrance of FiftyNorth.

I did have to get used the senior center’s name change to FiftyNorth a couple years ago, but now I like it and think it’s catchy, and a good fit.