a new use for a spatula

Our end-of-March timeshare on Hilton Head is a two story townhouse....three bedrooms so it's great when the kids come to visit.

The only problem is that it has open stairs. Very attractive to a one year old and a challenge to keep him from climbing at every opportunity. Maybe next year I should bring a baby gate?

So either his Mama or Daddy or Grandma would supervise the climb.




So much fun to peek through the railing...




And fun to reach out and wave...




But then Grandma got the bright idea that she could just guard the stairs by sitting on them! Worked well for Baby Luc to say I was "stuck" and couldn't move but Big Brother Tai (aka Tai the Science Guy) needed to solve my predicament.

Solution: Use a kitchen spatula (great idea, Mom!)

Of course it worked. Such ingenuity has to be rewarded!

where does this come from???

At least once a week, the ocean produces this foamy, bubbly tide.

Is it pollution dumped from passing ships?

Is it from detergents?

Or is it, as my Honey says, the weekend bathwater from Europe.....

my walking buddy

I love my early morning walks. There is minimal bike traffic on the paths, it's peaceful and quiet...everything I need to get my day off to a good start.

And if I get lonely, there is always my walking buddy...........and this is about as close as I dare get to him!

on the beach......

We have only two more weeks left here before we return to the land of ice and snow so we're taking advantage of every moment we can to walk among the live oaks, the spring blossoms and, of course, on the beach. This was early evening, just before the sun set.



Looking northeast, you can see our l o n g shadows cast on the sand. I love looking at the vanishing point where land meets the sea.



Looking into the sunset you can see the many footprints echoing the activity of the day.



Looks like it was a very busy day...all soon to be washed clean by the high tide.

My BFF comes through......

A little while ago I posted about a large plant growing here on Hilton Head Island that I could not identify. I really liked the blossoms or berries or whatever it was that it produced. No one else knew what it was either...



Until my BFF JJ came to visit...she knew right away. There had been one growing in her parent's yard when she was just a little toddler in So Cal. She says it's a Japanese Aralia.

When I walked past it the other day, the berries had turned a dark purple.



But when I Googled Japanese Aralia, I discovered that I had missed the aralia's blooming season, which is in the Fall.



One more island mystery solved............thanks, JJ.

The birds...they know better

Every morning here on "the island" I wait for the sun to start it's journey and then I go for an hour long walk. This is one of my favorite parts of my walk, the perfect stillness of the lagoon reflecting the path ahead of me.

My January walks began around 7:20 AM but as the sun began to rise earlier, I was beginning my walks around 6:20 AM. I love the peace and quiet and the freshness of the world at that hour. I would be sitting at my computer and when the birds began to sing I knew it was time to get moving.

Then along came Daylight Saving Time. What a whiplash that turned out to be. Back to the dark ages.

But birds don't do Daylight Saving Time...they appear to have stayed on Standard Time. They're merrily singing away IN THE DARK each morning, apparently oblivious to the fact that the sun is not yet up.

Which just goes to show you that we should just leave some things well enough alone.

The signs now make sense....

We've been spending our winters (or some part of them) in South Carolina for the past eleven years. These signs are all over the place but rarely do you ever see an alligator close enough that you would even consider feeding one. They're often on the golf courses or sun bathing on the banks of large lagoons. Where this sign is posted, we have NEVER seen an alligator.

But never say "never."

Last Monday this little guy appeared on the banks of our lagoon. He was just outside the swimming pool fence...I didn't crop the photo...I think that's actually the fence. Note the sign.....just so people wouldn't get confused about which swimming hole was intended for humans.

Spring is teasing us

Can you see it??

The early signs of spring??

There, in the center....those sweet pink blossoms.

Spring is coming to our winter island in South Carolina. Temperatures next week will range from 56 to 77 degrees. Heaven.

Back home on our other island in the Niagara River, there are no blossoms. Just snow. Temperatures between 24 and 46 degrees.

I think we'll stay right here for a while longer.

Wordless Wednesday

You can't make me smile, Grandma :(

The Birds

Do any of you remember the Alfred Hitchcock movie The Birds?

My father worked at the studio where the movie was filmed and brought home some of the bird "extras." Pretty little birds like what you find in craft stores these days but it was my first exposure to to the little fakes. Just a little creepy.

And the movie was pretty scary too! Thousands of birds aggressively attacking humans. You would never look at a flock of birds the same again.

Hilton Head Island is a bird lover's paradise. From stately Blue Herons to Cardinals, Bluejays and Carolina Wrens, there are birds everywhere.

And then there are the birds who stalk you when you eat at one of the outdoor restaurants. If you mistakenly hold up a french fry and hesitate before taking a bite you just might lose it to a dive bombing bird. And once you vacate the table, they swarm over it in a race to gather the leftovers before the table can be cleared.

But there is no bird greater at finding food than the inimitable sea gull. Just stand on the beach, hold out your hand with a cookie crumb and they will come.



An even better picture would have been the sea gull who grabbed our orange rubber baseball and flew off with it in his beak. Fortunately little Tai's Daddy was fast enough, loud enough and threatening enough that the gull dropped the ball before he flew out to sea.

Or else the bird just figured out his prize was inedible!

It's cold but it's not freezing!

We come to Hilton Head Island every winter to escape the bitter cold of Western New York. I keep weather reports for both locations on my Google desktop so I can monitor the temperatures in both places. Like all snowbirds, I gleefully celebrate the snow and frigid temperatures that I am avoiding by being here.

Today, for example. At 7:30 am it was only 5 degrees (without calculating for wind chill) in New York but a tolerable 30 degrees here - and that's very cold for this neck of the woods! I layered on a couple of fleece shirts and my down vest and took my usual 40 minute walk.

At 12:30 Al was ready for a walk; it was now 13 degrees back in New York and a balmy 47 here! We bundled up and set out, quite comfortable when we were on the sunny side of the path. Unfortunately, probably only half of the distance is in the sunshine, the rest in shade, and Al felt the cold.

We were cheered, however, at the sight of the azalea blossoms. The shrubs in the sunshine are bursting with the first color of spring and those in the shade are ripe with buds promising to bloom in the coming weeks.

Yes, it may be cold here, but it's not freezing. Spring is in the air!

Wordless Wednesday

HHI Sand"condos"