Squaw Mountain and Moon
The wind is bringing us a little snow storm today.
I don’t mind snow, but I prefer this.
I want Fall to hang on a little longer.
♥
Songs of Autumn
The sky is a busy highway with Sandhill Cranes flying from pond to pond, same with the geese. Seems all of the creatures are scurrying around getting ready for winter.
I took a walk through the meadows now that the biting bugs have all gone.
All that is left is tall grass swaying in the breeze and red-winged blackbirds swarming, swooping, and singing the songs of autumn.
The meadows will be full of cattle once we bring them home from the mountains this week. I love fall time in Wyoming.
Autumn Sunburst
I’m going to pretend that I haven’t been absent from this blog for two months and just leave you with this.
I just love a good sunburst through the cottonwood trees. It’s fall y’all!
Summer Evening Walks
I feel like I’m walking through a watercolor during our summer evening hikes. ♥
Under Lingering Storm Clouds
The radar was red, yellow and green with constant severe weather alerts on our phones throughout yesterday afternoon. I had my cameras and my storm emergency kit in the basement with me, bracing for impact. As I watched and listened, I heard a really hard rain then it was quiet. I refreshed the radar and low and behold, the storm took a turn from our place and headed straight to town. While we were spared the brunt of the storm, our little town was hammered with golf ball to softball sized hail. Many folks I know have broken windshields, broken windows, dented cars, and a lot of damaged property. As far as I know, we did not have a funnel cloud touch down near us although there were plenty that touched down around the state. The weather service did an incredible job of informing us of the bizarre weather patterns early on Monday and we were able to be prepared well before it hit.
We took a drive to the meadows in the evening to check on the herd while storm clouds still lingered over us.
The main reason we came down was the pluck this fella out of the meadow and bring him to the barn. He’s been “off-duty” for at least a year so as you can see, he’s put on a few pounds. Patrick needs him to do a little cattle work this weekend so Gray needs some saddling and warm-ups before Patrick gets on.
Amazingly, he let us catch him and Patrick walked him to the barn without incident.
No, that’s not dust on your screen, but cotton flying in the wind. It was a gorgeous sunset in spite of the crazy weather.
But while I was walking back the the house, there was another boomer forming in the southeast.
Today is cooler and the wind is blowing. I believe they are experiencing snow in the mountains Yellowstone. It’s not quite summertime folks. But soon, very soon!
Poetry in Motion
Poetry in Motion
Nothing much prettier than than a horse walking though the snow at sunset.
Wyoming Windchill
We are in full on winter mode. It is serious. We’ve had temperatures and wind chills well below zero. Like 20 and 30 degrees below zero.
It makes the horse frisky. He throws his head up and down while running alongside the truck.
And the cattle have become cowscicles. But just look at those round bellies. They are weathering the storm beautifully. We cake them daily and they get a fresh bale every other day.
At times, we can’t even see the mountains.
The deer are sporting their full winter coats.
At sunset a couple nights ago, when temperatures barely made it to zero during the warmest part of the day, the river looked like a hot spring with steam billowing out of it. Patrick said he’d be glad to watch me take a dip if I’d like to.
I passed.
November Supermoon
How ’bout that Supermoon last month?
It rose over the meadow during a family photoshoot and we were all pretty excited. We grabbed a few family photos with the moon before it got dark on us.
The clouds rolled in but not before I snapped a few in the complete darkness.
October Sunset
I know it’s cliché to say but I don’t care. October is my favorite color. 🙂
Here is a shot toward Laramie Peak at sunset to prove it. The wind has taken a lot of our leaves which means winter is coming. But I will hold on to this feeling for a while. It’s been a couple of really great months out here in the wild west.
Cheers!
Snowfall in Late June
Did that get your attention? Well, it wasn’t snowing the cold and wet stuff. It was snowing cotton.
We took a drive down to the meadows one evening to check the irrigation ditch and the water level of the river. We had already taken the cattle up to summer pasture so all was quiet except the summer wind blowing through the cottonwood trees.
Cotton was on everything. The barbed wire fence, tree limbs and blades of grass were covered. The scenes were out of a fairy tale.
This image is my favorite.
I ran around chasing the sun while trying to outrun the deer flies. We don’t frequent the meadows in summer because the bugs are bad. But wow. I’m so glad I went down there this particular evening.
Leaving Yellowstone
As I’ve already said, we had a wonderful time in Yellowstone and I feel confident in saying that we left it just as we found it.
The only things we brought home were a couple souvenirs, maps, memories, and lots of photographs.
I don’t have the high speed equipment to get a good photograph of a black bear AND stay safe so I kept my distance when we came across this fella. I’m fine with that.
We saw beautiful waterfalls and at this spot, we met a nice gentleman with his camera on a tripod shooting in the opposite direction of this waterfall.
He pointed out a baby osprey atop a pillar of rock in the canyon waiting for it’s mom.
There is a wolf den somewhere up in those hills but we never saw a wolf up close. Obviously.
This Bison crossed the stream nervously, looking back again and again. Not sure what was after her but she seemed quite nervous. She joined the herd after this.
One of our last stops was at the Grand Prismatic Springs…along with the rest of the tourists.
This is the largest hot spring in the United States and the third largest in the world.
It’s colors match the rainbow dispersion of white light by an optical prism: red, orange, yellow, green, and blue.
A great experience was had by the three of us. I’ll admit that I had a little separation anxiety when leaving Yellowstone. We just grew to love it so much and wanted to see more. Fortunately our next stop was Grand Teton National Park. So with butterflies in our bellies, we continued on for the adventures ahead of us!
Journey to Yellowstone
I’ve been travelin’.
My dad and stepmom came out a couple of weeks ago and we hung out around here for a couples days. Then we packed up their minivan and the three of us took off for an adventure in Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks that we will never forget.
What a drive, let me tellya. Dad drove through wind, rain, hail, sleet, and heavy fog. It was wild and I was so relieved to be the passenger.
We had to stop for this gorgeous view of Beartooth Mountain as we weaved in and out of Montana and Wyoming on Beartooth Highway.
We made it into the park by mid-evening and the light was beautiful. Right off the bat we saw Bison. What a great time of year because Bison calves were everywhere!
Pronghorn and Bison graze on the flats together.
When you visit Yellowstone, there is a lot of driving. I’m not kidding. It’s a HUGE park. So we had to get organized as to how we were going to tackle this place. We had a Geyser day, a wildlife day, a waterfall day, etc. They all kind of melded together and didn’t always go according to plan. In fact, the day we were headed to Old Faithful, the road was completely blocked by a herd of Bison so we had to turn around and change our plans. We were in a line of cars 10 miles long and didn’t even see the herd but it is obviously not an uncommon event (see above). This isn’t Disneyland. This is Bison, Bear, Pronghorn, Wolf, Elk, Deer; basically all God’s Creatures’ land. We did make it to Old Faithful the next day.
I’ll share more images from this trip throughout the next few days. It was a fantastic time and a wonderful trip to share with my Dad, also a photographer. I am so thankful to my stepmom, Debbie, for making this happen. She is a heck of a trip designer and orchestrated a spectacular adventure for the three of us. They just started their travel blog and you can visit it by clicking here: Travels with Skip & Debbie
🙂
Sunsets and Bunnies
I was just thinking that you hadn’t heard from Collins in a while. How have you been getting through your days without an update?! 😉
She’s my wild child outdoor kitty who loves to be loved. She enjoys long walks from the house to the hay bales to chase mice and grasshoppers. She loves rolling in the dirt and chasing me with her back hunched and her tail twice it’s size. I call her Halloween Cat when she does that. But here she is in a rare quiet and reflective moment admiring a gorgeous Wyoming sunset while watching bunnies hop across the yard, another favorite past time.
Phew! I know you need that, sorry it took me so long. Now you can carry on with your day. xoxo
And just like that…
…we’re back to dry meadows and snow covered hills.
Cow #10 had her calf a couple days after the storm last week so she timed the birth well, thankfully. They say we are in for another storm later today and tomorrow. We’ll see how many calves that brings us tonight.
Happy Tuesday, y’all! 🙂
Red-winged Blackbirds at Dusk
These guys chirp, blirp and fly down the road with me down to the meadows. I know it’s because there is a nest somewhere close by but I like to thing they are just leading me in the right direction. 🙂
A Horse of Course
We are having a nice break from the winter madness. The mud is drying, the temperature is tolerable and the sunsets are becoming more and more colorful. I’m not fooled though. I know winter isn’t over, I’m just expressing my appreciation for this lull in the winter chill. The old gray horse seems to be enjoying it as well.
I’m gearing up for my daily visits down to the meadow to check the cattle. Calving season is upon us and it’s my duty to watch out for girls in the meadow as well as the heifers (first time mothers) in the corral close to the house. There is one heifer that is really close and we are checking on her round the clock in case she needs assistance. It’s such a tense time of year full of worry and hard work. I’m up for it though I’m impatiently waiting on the song of the meadowlark.
Have a great weekend, friends!
Calm and Beautiful
The snow is mostly gone and wind will be arriving soon. It’s our typical winter cycle but this past weekend was calm and beautiful. I took a walk to check on the cows just before sunset yesterday. Looks like we need to do some fencing. Such is the life of a rancher. 🙂
Babyface
We got our first snow of the season a couple nights ago. But yesterday, the sun came out and the wind picked up to rid us of the white stuff. That’s okay, I’m not quite ready for it… although the forecast says I better get ready.
Anyway, I took a walk to the meadows and this sweet baby-face peeked at me through the trees. She was born early summer and I couldn’t get close to her all season! So this was a nice surprise. 🙂
Roaming at Sunset
This wild girl roams free. She often greets me after I wander around the river and meadows. She’ll jump out of the tall grass and wrap her furry paws around my leg. No claws, just love. She’ll do that at night when I walk down the hall. She’ll stand quietly in the doorway and jump out with arms flying. It’s nice to have a kitty around although she isn’t as snugly as my Baby Angel Matilda. That’s okay though. If she sticks around long enough, she’ll learn.
Have a great weekend, friends!
Uprooted Magnolia 
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