Shindig 2013 Raffle

We went to last night's Shindig on the Green in downtown Asheville, the first of the season.  The weather couldn't have been more perfect to sit outside and listen to the usual lineup of local musicians, watch the cloggers perform, dance the "sit down square dance" and chat with a few people we know.

But the photos are of the fund-raiser raffle items.  First up is the quilt Alice, Ann and I made. We came up with what we thought would be a good name, given the quilt's purpose: Square Dance.

Sorry about the blurry photo - light conditions were pretty low by the time they got the raffle items on stage.

This next photo is for my friend Earl, who lives all the way off in Arizona. He has a quilt he commissioned me to make so he doesn't need that.  He was interested in the other raffle item, a Martin Guitar.

The guitar is being demonstrated by Grammy-award winner Bryan Sutton, who grew up in this area but has moved on to work in Nashville.  It's a sweet sounding guitar!

Here are the ticket stubs for Earl's investment in chances to win, $2.00 each, 3 for $5.00

 

The man who sold me the tickets felt sorry for me* having to fill out so many entries and did several of them for me.  

*Or maybe he just wanted to get me out of the way so he could sell more tickets faster. They were selling - but the other people only bought one.

Hike to Rattlesnake Lodge

One of the reasons to retire to such a beautiful spot as this is to take advantage of the mountain scenery and great outdoors, which we don't do often enough. But this morning, we decided to hike to the Rattlesnake Lodge which Norris had only done on rescue missions for the fire department in the last couple of years (probably why he hadn't thought to do it for fun?)

Most of the hike is in the trees, but every now and then, there is a vista.

That one shows clouds in a distant valley - we had no clouds in our valley.

This next photo is of the only spot where you walk among such large boulders.

In this next photo, Norris is standing in front of the Ambler family swimming pool. You can see some of the concrete wall in back of him. 

And here, he's gone just a few steps to the left. No one has swum in the pool for a long time.  The lodge was sold in 1920 and burned in 1926.  There are good sized trees growing in it today.

And just before turning around, Norris took a photo of Cheryl standing in front of what was the spring house. The area of the spring was lined with rock and water still flows in.

It's only a 1.4 mile hike from the parking area, and most of it is pretty level. Still, it's a much more interesting and strenuous walk than the five laps we took yesterday around Lake Louise in Weaverville.

Jack in the Pulpit

Yesterday, Norris went on a fire fighting mission. While there, one of the other RCFD members commented on the Jack-in-the-Pulpit he saw at the home, saying they are native but not all that common. At the mention, Cheryl remembered seeing one earlier in the day in our yard. If you click for the closer view, you can see "Jack" inside the pulpit in this photo.

 Not too certain about the lighting, we took another shot from above - in this one you can see what looks like the three leaves of a smaller Jack-in-the-Pulpit just below the leaves of the plant we pictured above.

 

These are located just on the edge of the wildflower meadow, more or less hidden behind the shrubs planted last fall along the curved stairway.

Photos on a rainy day

Foxes have been the talk of the neighborhood lately, and though we've seen them on the main road, they haven't been hanging around our place.

On the other hand, for a few minutes, we got to watch this young fellow, here just beyond the Flame Azalea off the back porch corner we pictured recently.  We think it was probably a male since it was not accompanied by any cubs, but it must be a young one since it was not a large bear.  Young males stay with their mothers until they are 2 yrs old, so he might have been one that was recently kicked out by his mother to make room for new cubs.

The photo was taken through the screen, so it's not all that clear, but we thought it worth cropping to the face with those ears trained in the direction of the photographer.

Bear was discouraged by Human, and headed back in the direction from which Bear came, turning multiple times as he tried to judge the threat.

 He reappeared further away but mostly kept to the undergrowth. Clicking on any of these photos will give you a closer view.  You can see our garden-shovel-scarecrow in the foreground of this next one -- Bear is a good distance away. Our Thoughtful Spot is just to the right out of the view of the camera at about the same distance as Bear is here.

Bear kept descending, and we kept watching, but we assume he crossed the road and headed to the little creek.