Home By Another Way

The Star
up on Lewis Mountain, Virginia,
as seen from my backyard.

As February yields to March, Epiphany has given way to Lent. When that transition came for the Three Magi, what did they do? Realizing that the old paths no longer served their purpose they went home by another way:

"For we have seen his star in the east . . .

When they saw the star, they rejoiced with exceeding great joy.

And when they were come into the house, they saw the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down, and worshipped him: and when they had opened their treasures, they presented unto him gifts; gold, and frankincense and myrrh.

And being warned of God in a dream that they should not return to Herod, they departed into their own country another way.

Matthew 2:2, 10 - 12

For a lengthier treatment of this theme,
see essays & gift book
by Barbara Brown Taylor
With a little help from our friends and spiritual advisors, we too will seek -- and hopefully find -- a better way. That's what Lent is all about -- and today we near the halfway point.

As I have said before, Pastor Nadia Bolz - Weber and Architect Duo Dickinson are two of my perpetually reliable sources for inspiration, both during Lent and all year round.

Recently, for example, Dickinson shared an observation that reminded me of an easy - to - remember definition of "God's Will" that I heard long ago: "With our without." That's it. Duo says it this way:

"The idea that any thing can wreck a life
we have been given is the definition of entitlement."

from the essay
"Description is not Creation"
by Duo Dickinson

Three Kings
by Richard Hook (1938 - 2010)

Light: Like a Slowly Opened Gift

Recent Full Moon With Airplane
Charlottesville ~ March 1
Now that it's March, we say goodbye to Standard Time, after a mere 4 1/2 months (November, December, January, February -- and a fraction of March); and hello to 7 1/2 months of Daylight Savings Time (-- the remainder of March; then April, May, June, July, August, September, October).

That means barely 1/3 of the year on Standard; almost 2/3 of the year on Daylight. That means Daylight Time is really our Standard. So lets just stay on Daylight Time all the time, and rename it as Standard. Of course, a lot of citizens -- Donald Trump included -- can't even tell the difference. As The New York Times ponts out, Trump has stupidly called for the elimination of both Daylight Time and Standard Time:

"Trump has called for an end to the biannual time changes, posting on Truth Social in March 2019 that “Making Daylight Saving Time permanent is OK with me!” In December 2024, however, he called daylight saving time “inconvenient, and very costly to our Nation” and said the Republican Party would try to “eliminate” it."

~ from the article "Why Do We Change the Clocks, Anyway?"

Sunrise and sunset, even as they shift, are the only constants. There is no such thing as an "original" time zone, aside from what humans have imposed in their eternal quest for order out of chaos (to put it nicely) or their endless mania for control (to put it less nicely). Changing clocks, “controlling” time. Did you wake up an hour late and miss church this morning? Well, you can make up for it now by reading this excellent meditation on Daylight Time by Duo Dickinson:

"The need to control has meant everything is later today. Somehow light can be “saved” – like life, we say – when light is totally, completely beyond our understanding. As is life’s passing. But we do control the hours we try to put over light, and the scales that we define gravity with – without understanding. Measuring is not knowing, but in ignorance it is all we have. "And we judge based on our creation, not creation. With the dark authority of the idiot. "And today the world is pissed. Fog has rendered light to tone. Air has mass, as does time. "Because it suited some, everyone becomes late. The sun does not care, it’s there when it’s there – and today, is not."

~ from the essay "We Only Control The Hour"

It is indeed true that shifting the time in March is totally unnecessary. As we approach the Vernal Equinox, the sun is already giving us up to three additional minutes of light per day. Why must we hasten what is already occurring naturally, at its own pace? According to The Old Farmer’s Almanac:

"This gain will be minuscule at first, just a matter of seconds a day, but will steadily grow until daily daylight expands by 3 minutes per day in March. The exact amount of brightness gain depends on your location. . . . in most of the lower 48 states, the extra daily sunshine in March is closer to 20 minutes after each week, the most the majority of us ever experience, like a slowly opened gift package."

~ from the article How Much Daylight Do We Gain
After the Winter Solstice?

More Lght & More Facts

The Gradually Increasing Evening Light
Kansas City ~ February 21

March Hare

By Jenny Gregory

March Hare ~ 2025

from Alice in Wonderland
by Lewis Carroll

"Then you should say what you mean,"
the March Hare went on.

"I do," Alice hastily replied;
"at least--at least I mean what I say
--that's the same thing, you know."

"Not the same thing a bit!" said the Hatter.

"You might just as well say
that 'I see what I eat'
is the same thing as 'I eat what I see'!"

"You might just as well say,"
added the March Hare,
"that 'I like what I get'
is the same thing as 'I get what I like'!"

"You might just as well say,"
added the Dormouse,
who seemed to be talking in his sleep,
"that 'I breathe when I sleep'
is the same thing as 'I sleep when I breathe'!"

Winter Woods by Bex Parkin

March Deer ~ Epiphany

Previous March Posts

Forever Stamp

As John Cheever (1912 - 1982) once said:
"I dream that my face appears on a postage stamp."

Betty White (1922 - 2021)

Meryl Streep (b 1949)

Okay, Meryl and I have yet to be featured on a
Forever Stamp -- but we used the app
on our headshots to look like the new Betty Stamp!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In hopes of a better world to come,
here is an amazing poem about
racism, sexism, and a woman on a postage stamp.
Give me Betty White anyday --
and so many more, all stripes and colors!

Stamps

Back when I was nearly blameless and could visit the zoo
and admire the tigers not for what they actually were,
but as monstrous man-eaters that deserved to be caught.
Back when I thought I had already tasted life's worst
disappointment, because I'd fallen in love right after college
and it hadn't worked out. Back when every attractive man—
gay or straight, it didn't matter yet—getting off the bus
caught my eye, I was a Republican. And I went to work
in Washington D.C., and met all the suited villains
I'd been warned about. Still reading about Goldwater's
conscience. Thrilled by the idea of bombs. Strangling
themselves in Limbaugh's neckties. Certain our own
country needed to stage a coup. (Clinton in the White House
doing what Clinton did.) One day, I set off to buy
a thousand dollars worth of stamps. The stuffing
of envelopes would soon follow. The best way to get
money is to send a letter and ask for it, they said. Halfway
to the post office, a breathless boy chased me down.
Red-faced. Panicked. His dizzying tie swung over his shoulder.
He told me what my boss had forgotten to say. We can't
use stamps with women or black people on them. The world
toppled me that day in a business park—so young
and dumb—I left in an instant to become who I really am.

By Kristen Tracy

P.S.
~ March First ~
Rolls Round Again

Superb Owls

Silver Coin ~ 5th Century Greece
449-413 BC ~ Tetradrachm Athenian Owl

It turns out that owls are not just for coins
and full moons,
they are also for football:
you say Super Bowl; I say Superb Owl!

A year ago, I learned of the relatively
new and delightful tradition of celebrating
the Super Bowl with a Superb Owl -- or two.

Time to reshare my favorite poem
containing the word superb:
"Summons" by Robert Francis

& repost

my favorite owl poem . . .

If the Owl Calls Again
at dusk
from the island in the river,
and it's not too cold,

I'll wait for the moon
to rise,
then take wing and glide
to meet him.

We will not speak,
but hooded against the frost
soar above
the alder flats, searching
with tawny eyes.

And then we'll sit
in the shadowy spruce
and pick the bones
of careless mice,

while the long moon drifts
toward Asia
and the river mutters
in its icy bed.

And when the morning climbs
the limbs
we'll part without a sound,

fulfilled, floating
homeward as
the cold world awakens.

poem by John Haines (1924 - 2011)
American poet and professor
Poet Laureate of Alaska, 1969 - 1973

Find both "If the Owl Calls Again" & "Listening in October"
in Haine's collection: The Owl in the Mask of the Dreamer

Rest in Peace John Keats

John Keats
Born on All Hallows Eve: October 31, 1795
Died on this day: 23 February 1821

Portrayed here by Ben Whishaw
with Abbie Cornish as Fanny Brawne
in the biopic Bright Star (like the sonnet, 1819)

In a slightly earlier sonnet (1818),
Keats describes what, sadly, will become
the truth of his life, cut short by illness:

When I have fears that I may cease to be
Before my pen has glean'd my teeming brain,
Before high-piled books, in charact'ry,
Hold like rich garners the full-ripen'd grain;
When I behold, upon the night's starr'd face,
Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance,
And think that I may never live to trace
Their shadows, with the magic hand of chance . . .

Previous blog posts: FN / QK

Most recently:
"Half in love with easeful Death"
&
Sitting Down to Read Keats

~~~~~

Click to read what other poets
have written about Keats!

Valentines, Vanessa, Virginia

Wild Tulips

Paintings by Vanessa Bell
-- perfect for February,
especially if you prefer red & pink
flowers for Valentines.

Flowers on a Balcony

Still Life of Dahlias,
Chrysanthemums and Begonias

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

More paintings by Vanessa Bell
on my recent post:

The Beginning of Happiness

@Kitti's List

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Two great novels and the film version of each:

Mrs. Dalloway (1997 movie)
& The Hours (2002 movie)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And a collection of Valentines:

Your Broken Heart

@The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker
A literary blog of connection & coincidence;
custom & ceremony

More about Mrs. Dalloway

Presidents Not Kings

Wish I knew the artist . . . ?
Compare to Currier & Ives
"Star Spangled Banner"

Boston Hymn

[Read in Music Hall, January 1, 1863]

The word of the Lord by night
To the watching Pilgrims came,
As they sat by the seaside,
And filled their hearts with flame.

God said, I am tired of kings,
I suffer them no more;
Up to my ear the morning brings
The outrage of the poor.

Think ye I made this ball
A field of havoc and war,
Where tyrants great and tyrants small
Might harry the weak and poor?

My angel — his name is Freedom —
Choose him to be your king;
He shall cut pathways east and west,
And fend you with his wing.

Lo! I uncover the land
Which I hid of old time in the West,
As the sculptor uncovers the statue
When he has wrought his best;

I show Columbia, of the rocks
Which dip their foot in the seas,
And soar to the air-borne flocks
Of clouds, and the boreal fleece.

I will divide my goods;
Call in the wretch and slave:
None shall rule but the humble,
And none but Toil shall have.

I will have never a noble,
No lineage counted great;
Fishers and choppers and ploughmen
Shall constitute a state.

Go, cut down trees in the forest,
And trim the straightest boughs;
Cut down trees in the forest,
And build me a wooden house.

Call the people together,
The young men and the sires,
The digger in the harvest field,
Hireling, and him that hires;

And here in a pine state-house
They shall choose men to rule
In every needful faculty,
In church, and state, and school.

Lo, now! if these poor men
Can govern the land and sea,
And make just laws below the sun,
As planets faithful be.

And ye shall succor men;
'T'is nobleness to serve;
Help them who cannot help again:
Beware from right to swerve.

I break your bonds and masterships,
And I unchain the slave:
Free be his heart and hand henceforth
As wind and wandering wave.

I cause from every creature
His proper good to flow:
As much as he is and doeth,
So much he shall bestow.

But, laying hands on another
To coin his labor and sweat,
He goes in pawn to his victim
For eternal years in debt.

To-day unbind the captive,
So only are ye unbound;
Lift up a people from the dust,
Trump of their rescue, sound!

Pay ransom to the owner,
And fill the bag to the brim.
Who is the owner? The slave is owner,
And ever was. Pay him.

North! give him beauty for rags,
And honor, South! for his shame;
Nevada! coin thy golden crags
With Freedom's image and name.

Up! and the dusky race
That sat in darkness long,—
Be swift their feet as antelopes,
And as behemoth strong.

Come, East and West and North,
By races, as snow-flakes,
And carry my purpose forth,
Which neither halts nor shakes.

My will fulfilled shall be,
For, in daylight or in dark,
My thunderbolt has eyes to see
His way home to the mark.

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 – 1882)

More excellent
advice from Emerson:
QK ~ FN ~ KL

And for Presidents Day
2010 ~ Fridge Magnets
2011 ~ Pew #41
2016 ~ Taught to Love Lincoln
2018 ~ Duty to Posterity
2024 ~ Mindfully Mismatched Socks
2026 ~ Presidents Not Kings

To Be the Home

Artwork by Jacquie Lawson

A few thoughts about home:

. . . we want
. . . to be sheltered
to be
the home
and be in
the home
at the same time
(p 196)

. . . to
build
a home
you can invite

the
whole world
into
p (212)

from
Heart Talk
by
Cleo Wade
(excerpts from the longer poem
"I think about love," 193 - 212)

On self - acceptance:
"befriend your ingredients"
(p 12)

On reciprocity:
"whatever you want
must be held
in the same
hand
as what
you
give"
(p 180)

Artwork by Mabel Lockerby

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My best takeaway from Cleo Wade:
Where to Begin

Called to be Ordinary

"Down, down into the midst of ordinary things."
~ Virginia Woolf ~

Simpkin Goes Out (c. 1902)
Helen Beatrix Potter (1866 – 1943)

Message to the 14-Year-Old Me

Believe in yourself.
You can do anything you set your heart on –
except A level physics, perhaps.
Well, all the sciences really.

DIY is a bit of a no-no, too.
See also: driving; skiing; map reading;
cooking pasta in the right quantities;
relationships; origami.

Don’t even think about running
your own business. Or singing in tune.
Best to steer clear of all activities which require
good hand-eye coordination.

Forget ice-skating, tending house plants,
dealing with spiders, the correct spelling of the word
‘enjambement’. I could go on.
But do not despair – for given time

and with a little luck on your side –
you can achieve a basic level of competence
in a limited number of simple, unremarkable things,
you just need to believe in yourself.

by Brian Bilston (b 1970)

French Postcard, 1913
Caption: "Porte Veine" = "Bringer of Luck"
~ Artist unknown ~

There are Mornings

Even now, when the plot
calls for me to turn to stone,
the sun intervenes. Some mornings
in summer, I step outside
and the sky opens
and pours itself into me
as if I were a saint
about to die. But the plot
calls for me to live, be ordinary,
say nothing to anyone.
Inside the house,
the mirrors burn when I pass.

by Lisel Mueller (1924 - 2020)
from her collection Alive Together

Krampus Cat Postcard, 1901
E. Dölker

And here is a picture of a cat!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Let us not take it for granted that life exists
more fully in what is commonly thought big
than in what is commonly thought small."

~ Virginia Woolf ~

Year in Review

My friends are so amazing! Their Christmas missives describe so many travels and adventures, astonishing accomplishments for every month of the year! I knew I could not rival their descriptive prowess, so I opted instead for a minimalist version of the year in review:

2025
January: rewrote our will in accordance with the State of Virginia. Memento Mori.

February: Flew down to Key West, Florida, for a few days --
someplace we had never been (as recommended by the Dalai Lama).

March: Stayed up all night for the lunar eclipse.

April: Read Hamnet (RE Shakespeare & family).
Now it's time to see the movie!

May: Flew up to New York City to see "Hamilton" (1st time),
"Glengarry Glen Ross" with Kieran Culkin,
and "Good Night and Good Luck" with George Clooney.

June: Attended my 50th high school reunion.

July: Babysat a lot for Ellie, Aidan, and Dean.

August: Swam laps (1/2 mile) every single day.

September: Back to NYC for "Wicked" (3rd time),
"Hadestown," " & Juliet" (recommend),
"Operation Mincemeat" (highly recommend).

October: Dressed as a Bronte Novel for Halloween

November: Helped Sam re-locate from Chicago to New York City.

December: flew to West Lafayette, Indiana,
for old time's sake in the old neighborhood,

And now the cycle recommences . . .
so wags the world away . . .

So Wags The World

Memory cannot linger long,
Joy must die the death.
Hope’s like a little silver song
Fading in a breath.
So wags the weary world away
Forever and a day.

But love, that sweetest madness,
Leaps and grows in toil and sadness,
Makes unseeing eyes to see,
And heapeth wealth in penury.
So wags the good old world away
Forever and a day.

Ellen Mackay Hutchinson Cortissoz
(1851–1933)

The key line is quoted by Gilbert
in Anne of the Island, Chapter 29

"Anne laughed and sighed. She felt very old and mature and wise—which showed how young she was. She told herself that she longed greatly to go back to those dear merry days when life was seen through a rosy mist of hope and illusion, and possessed an indefinable something that had passed away forever. Where was it now — the glory and the dream?

“‘So wags the world away,’ quoted Gilbert practically, and a trifle absently."

Gilbert knows a lot of poetry by heart.
Earlier, in Anne of Green Gables,
Anne is impressed when Gilbert recites
"Bingen on the Rhine."

2026
January: NYC again for "Ragtime" and "Chess"

February: Snowed in for half the month!
Then to Kansas City . . .

Driving With Ellie

Ellie in the Car

Ellie: When will I be 18?

Daddy: In 12.5 years!

Ellie: When will Aidan be 18?

Daddy: In 14.5 years!

Ellie: Yeah, I am older than Aidan.
Who will live the longest?

Daddy: I don’t know.
I hope you both live long lives
and do lots of fun things.

Ellie: I think Dean will live the longest --
since he’s still a baby.

Daddy: Good thinking Ellie;
that makes sense!

Ellie: Does Santa die?

Daddy: No, he lives forever.
[as explained by Chesterton]

Ellie: What about when
the sun eats the earth --
in a million billion years?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Thanks to my son Ben for these
deep questions from our Ellie --
Ever the wise one!

Ben, in the back with the kids.

These Two!

New kaleidoscopes for Christmas --
the perfect car toy!

Ellie, Aidan, and Dean
sleeping it off in the car . . .

The Greens: Their Time Past

". . . above the pictures the living green . . . "
Rosemary and holly, from our yard, atop
a 1974 blueprint of our 1890s house in Indiana,
along with some old scraps of wallpaper that we
discovered under the surface when repainting in 2010.

"How is it . . . that a piece of paper -- a letter, a photo, a ticket stub, a sketch, a painting - is suddenly transformed by placing it in four bits of wood beneath a pane of glass? What does it mean that we place permanent boundaries around transient moments? What does it say of humankind that we take such trouble to freeze specific memories, that we devote such energy to capturing and preserving the 'minute particulars' of our lives?" (p 128)

from Theo of Golden
by Allen Levi

******************

Burning the Christmas Greens
[on February 2nd]

Their time past, pulled down
cracked and flung to the fire
—go up in a roar

All recognition lost, burnt clean
clean in the flame, the green
dispersed, a living red,
flame red, red as blood wakes
on the ash—

and ebbs to a steady burning
the rekindled bed become
a landscape of flame

At the winter’s midnight
we went to the trees, the coarse
holly, the balsam and
the hemlock for their green

At the thick of the dark
the moment of the cold’s
deepest plunge we brought branches
cut from the green trees

to fill our need, and over
doorways, about paper Christmas
bells covered with tinfoil
and fastened by red ribbons

we stuck the green prongs
in the windows hung
woven wreaths and above pictures
the living green. On the

mantle we built a green forest
and among those hemlock
sprays put a herd of small
white deer as if they

were walking there. All this!
and it seemed gentle and good
to us. Their time past,
relief! The room bare. We

stuffed the dead grate
with them upon the half burnt out
log's smouldering eye, opening
red and closing under them

and we stood there looking down.
Green is a solace
a promise of peace, a fort
against the cold (though we

did not say so) a challenge
above the snow's
hard shell. Green (we might
have said) that, where

small birds hide and dodge
and lift their plaintive
rallying cries, blocks for them
and knocks down

the unseeing bullets of
the storm. Green spruce boughs
pulled down by a weight of
snow—Transformed!

Violence leaped and appeared.
Recreant! roared to life
as the flame rose through and
our eyes recoiled from it.

In the jagged flames green
to red, instant and alive. Green!
those sure abutments . . . Gone!
lost to mind

and quick in the contracting
tunnel of the grate
appeared a world! Black
mountains, black and red—as

yet uncolored—and ash white,
an infant landscape of shimmering
ash and flame and we, in
that instant, lost,

breathless to be witnesses,
as if we stood
ourselves refreshed among
the shining fauna of that fire.

By William Carlos Williams (1883 – 1963)

Old Woman and Boy with Candles (c. 1616 - 1617)
by Peter Paul Rubens (1577 – 1640)

******************

Willams advice of taking down
the Christmas greens today echoes that of
17th C poet Robert Herrick
English Poet (1591–1674)

Down with the rosemary, and so
Down with the bays and mistletoe;
Down with the holly, ivy, all,
Wherewith ye dress'd the Christmas hall;

That so the superstitious find
No one least branch there left behind;
For look, how many leaves there be
Neglected there, maids, trust to me,
So many goblins you shall see.

Down with the rosemary and bays,
Down with the misletoe . . .
Thus times do shift: each thing its turn does hold;
New things succeed, as former things grow old.

excerpts from "Ceremony Upon Candlemas Eve"
and "Ceremonies For Candlemas Eve"

******************

Groundhog Day Review
On February 1 / 2, we move from Yule to Imbolc [aka Candlemas; Groundhog Day] the Cross - Quarter Day that falls half-way between the Winter Solstice and the Vernal Equinox, a time of clear vision into other worlds and festivals of purification, including St. Brigid's Day.
2010 ~ Imbolc

2011 ~ Prognosticator's Dilemma

2012 ~ Candlemas Eve

2013 ~ Dave

2014 ~ Behold the Boy

2015 ~ Happy Both

2017 ~ Dark Days

2017 ~ Incredible and Amazing

2018 ~ The Least Important Day

2019 ~ Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!

2020 ~ An Irish Lament

2021 ~ Clearer Vision

2022 ~ Snowy Snowy Night

2024 ~ Real Live Groundhog

2025 ~ Wintry Synchronicity & Imbolc Angel
Facebook & Letting Go

2026 ~ The Greens: Their Time Past

P.S.

Today is also my brother's birthday,
and the 144th birthday of James Joyce

One Month In

Fuqua & Lester know how to spend a snow day!
If you’re not watching TV, you should be napping!
More on my recent post:

Television Cat

@The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker
A literary blog of connection & coincidence;
custom & ceremony

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And for something to read
when you're snowed in by the fire

Theo of Golden

@Kitti's List

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

These Two

ALSO
Charles Dickens

The Range of Joy

Blue Jay Patrol

A Winter Blue Jay

Crisply the bright snow whispered,
Crunching beneath our feet;
Behind us as we walked along the parkway,
Our shadows danced,
Fantastic shapes in vivid blue.
Across the lake the skaters
Flew to and fro,
With sharp turns weaving
A frail invisible net.
In ecstasy the earth
Drank the silver sunlight;
In ecstasy the skaters
Drank the wine of speed;
In ecstasy we laughed
Drinking the wine of love.
Had not the music of our joy
Sounded its highest note?
But no,
For suddenly, with lifted eyes you said,
“Oh look!”
There, on the black bough of a snow flecked maple,
Fearless and gay as our love,
A bluejay cocked his crest!
Oh who can tell the range of joy
Or set the bounds of beauty?

Joy

Joy
I am wild, I will sing to the trees,
I will sing to the stars in the sky,
I love, I am loved, he is mine,
Now at last I can die!

I am sandaled with wind and with flame,
I have heart-fire and singing to give,
I can tread on the grass or the stars,
Now at last I can live!

both poems by Sara Teasdale
both illustrations by Charley Harper

Bird Watcher

Coincidental blue jay connection:
"You know what they say about blue jays?
They say blue jays go to hell on Fridays. . . .
William Faulkner said it one of his books."

from the novel Theo of Golden (256)
by Allen Levi

A couple more
Sara Teasdale poems,
short and sweet:

The Look

Strephon kissed me in the spring,
Robin in the fall,
But Colin only looked at me
And never kissed at all.

Strephon's kiss was lost in jest,
Robin's lost in play,
But the kiss in Colin's eyes
Haunts me night and day.

Faults

They came to tell your faults to me,
They named them over one by one;
I laughed aloud when they were done,
I knew them all so well before,—
Oh, they were blind, too blind to see
Your faults had made me love you more.

Forever Young: 2026 Calendar, Part 3

Calendar for 2026
Sept - Oct - Nov - Dec
Inspired by T. S. Eliot & Bob Dylan
♥September ♥
"And the children in the apple-tree . . .
half-heard in the stillness . . .
for the leaves were full of children,
Hidden excitedly, containing laughter."
~ T. S. Eliot ~

♥October ♥
"May your heart always be joyful
May your song always be sung . . . "

♥November ♥
"May you build a ladder to the stars
And climb on every rung . . . "

♥December ♥
"May you always be courageous
Stand upright and be strong . . .
And may you stay forever young."
~ 1973 lyrics by Bob Dylan ~

************************

Editor's note: Because this is a very dense calendar,
with a collage of many photos for each month,
I am dividing it into 3 segments for easier scrolling.

January - April

May - August

September - December

********************

PREVIOUS CALENDERS
Everyday Custom & Ceremony ~ 2012
Mona's Clothes ~ 2012
Moons of Wintertime and Beyond ~ 2013
Never Quite the Same ~ 2014
Homes That We Love ~ 2014
814 ~ Where It Was Almost Always Christmas ~ 2015
Time for a Moondance ~ 2015
Love Me, Love My Cats! ~ 2015
A Day in the Garden ~ 2016
Team McCartney ~ 2017
Full Moon Night ~ Full Moon Year ~ 2017
Wishing You Were Here ~ 2018
Time to Travel ~ 2019
Panama Bag ~ 2020
Swimming Pools ~ 2022
Moving to Virginia ~ 2023
Great Grands for Great Happa ~ 2024
Calendar for Another Year ~ 2024
Then & Now Family Photos, Part 1 ~ 2025
Then & Now Family Photos, Part 2 ~ 2025
Then & Now Family Photos, Part 3 ~ 2025
A Rebirth of Wonder ~ 2025
Forever Young, Part 1 ~ 2026
Forever Young, Part 2 ~ 2026
Forever Young, Part 3 ~ 2026