All Over The Place........

The "duck platter" is what we called it.  It actually is more than one duck, as it is a Mallard duck and hen floating among  the cattails.  It belonged to my Grandmother Brooks. One can even see trees in the background with a small mountain in the background.  I have never noticed that before just today while posting it. We never ever used it while I was growing up.  I don't know why we didn't use it except that it had that special family thing about it.  I guess my mom had smaller everyday cafeware platters that she used and definitely we didn't want to break it. I never dreamed that it would be mine but it was there for the taking and the other brothers were not taking anything.   The yellow creamer was also a special thing for my parents to store their silver dollars.  The depression era did cause one to hoard things when there wasn't any money left in the house.  I remember the cotton on the bottom of the piece so the silver dollars wouldn't break the piece. It was the all out final emergency fund as if there wouldn't be a drop of money left in which to spend.

Tom Tom, here on the car, we believe is living inside of the house which is attached to the garage in the background. Tiny Tim the next smaller yellow cat that would eat at our backdoor apparently is being kept in all winter by the other neighbors because he hasn't been by for a couple of months to eat a bit of  dry cat food.

Now we have two darker colored cats that are sneaking in and grabbing food to eat.  They are very hungry and we are glad they are stopping in to eat.  The one cat looks like he could be a Maine Coon cat.  The other is more short haired and almost black in color.  Sadly they both are feral cats and they run and hide if anyone comes home in his car.  They are so scared of humans and yet will fight over the food on the porch without hesitation.

We are glad to be able to feed them but would like to see them living in better conditions as it is so very cold and snowy out there.

I looked up the spelling of feral and I see that the cat is considered to be a domesticated cat that has returned to the wild.  In this case the parents may be domesticated but the offspring so many times were left in the wild or I should say outside in town.

 This is a photo I took a couple of years ago as a challenge to arrange and shoot an all white still life. The antique things in the photo are the dogs, noxzema containers, and the one small bowl that is from a cafeware collection. The Phalzgraff jelly bowl is from a set of dishes my wife bought when were first married.  It is an all white set called the "Heritage" pattern. The penguin is not an old piece.

Finishing with a photo with more color is the old barn that my dad made for his grandsons back in late seventies. I honestly don't know where it is right now but it must be in the basement somewhere. My dad was a farmer and the boys never were on that farm as he had sold it and moved into town.  They had farm things given them like tractors and wagons, but they really didn't ever identify with that way of life.  Both of the boys do plant things and the young guy has a garden to grow vegetables in the state of Maine.

I graduated up to high school today being in the math room.  They are all getting ready for tests that they will be taken tomorrow or Friday.  So I don't have to teach, just maintain good behaviors and stay pleasant myself.  I am really tired today and I do notice the kids seem slow today too.  I think we are all getting worn down from the weather.  The second round of a different kind of cold is going around also.

 We will be into a thawing temperature tomorrow but I don't think it will help much as the snow keeps things pretty cold.  I know that all of my blogging friends are experience so many different things.  Flooding in England is a very bad thing as well as severe cold in places where they don't have that kind of weather all make everyone less safe.  I hope we can get to spring soon and all of us will have better health and attitudes.  Thanks for stopping by today.