The gray days of November reveal mostly barren trees and grass turning brown from the freezing temperatures at night with Old Man Winter coming around the bend and will cover everything white soon.
Coming Around the Bend
Picture of the Day for November 2, 2014
While this not the typical white rural church picture I normally would post on some Sundays, this church is still a rural church in a small village of less than 800 people in the farming community of Plain in southwestern Wisconsin.
It is actually the fifth Catholic church built in Plain after a cyclone in 1918 destroyed the the third church, leaving only the steeple. The parishioners decided not to rebuild on the site where the first church was built in 1861 and the where the second and third church had also been built on, especially after a visiting priest made this comment on the old location, “A location, which even seemed to draw down the disapproval of God in destroying the third attempt to build in the poorest place in Plain – to erect a beautiful House of God in a hole surrounded by unsightly horse sheds.”
My great grandfather was one of the majority who voted yes to rebuild at a new location and so a combination church and school was built in 1919 on a new location and served as the fourth church until this fifth and current church was completed in 1940. On the left of the picture, a corner of the combination church and school building can be seen which still serves as the elementary and middle school now but also served as the high school in the past where my mom and her siblings attended.
St. Luke Catholic Church
Picture of the Day for November 1, 2014
With the temperature getting down to 16 last night, I think the last lonely hollyhock blossom got rather stiff since the pail of water outside had two inches of ice in it. I rather be seeing the first blossom of the year and not the last one.
End of the Blossoms
Picture of the Day for October 31, 2014
Today is Halloween so the streets will be filled with children dressed up in costumes collecting candy this evening. Pumpkins, ghosts, witches and even black cats are often a symbol of Halloween.
Black cats have served as objects of superstition for years, with Medieval Germany, France and Spain associating bad luck with them. Although in some cultures black cats were worshipped like in Ancient Egypt.
But in the United States, the Puritan Pilgrims distrusted anything associated with witches and sorcery including black cats and they would burn black cats on Shrove Tuesday to protect the home from fire and so black cats have been associated with the Halloween witches.
The bad superstition of black cats have caused them to be the least likely to be adopted (so I guess no one will want the two little black kittens at the farm). But some animal shelters will not allow adoption of black cats near Halloween as some ‘owners’ use them for living decorations and then abandon them.
Course you can’t believe this cute face on this black kitten, as moments before I had to peel it off my head where it was having fun racing around my back and head and it was living up to the Halloween tradition of being a monster.
Halloween Monster
Picture of the Day for October 30, 2014
This rake might have to come out of retirement since there is a lot of leaves on the ground to clean up after a windy week. The rake will be ‘re-tired’, as well as person using it, after this fall’s leaf cleanup.
Re-tired Rake
Picture of the Day for October 29, 2014
The winds yesterday left stripped almost all leaves off the trees except for a very few oaks, when normally the oaks hang on much longer into the winter, so I think winter will be a very long, tough road and a long time before there are leaves on the trees again.
Faded Fall Road
Picture of the Day for October 28, 2014
Other than the dark, gray skies, this scene nothing looks like it did last month as the trees are mostly bare and the corn is being harvested.
Colorful to Barren
Picture of the Day for October 27, 2014
This 98 year old school hasn’t had children passing through its doors for an education in a long time, even though inside the school, the blackboards still exist with a piano in one corner and a big pot bellied stove in another corner. I wonder why the school closed after only 32 years as it seemed like such a nice looking school.
Retired King School
Picture of the Day for October 26, 2014
Last Sunday a rainbow appeared but I was too slow getting to a nice scenic area to photograph it, partly because I was also watching and taking pictures the cloud formation which was bringing the rain for the rainbow.
Colorful Evening Sky Over a Lake
Picture of the Day for October 25, 2014
One of the waterfalls in the Amnicon Falls State Park is called Snake Pit Falls and I can see why it was named that as it snakes and winds around the rock walls. I couldn’t get all the twists in the picture – apparently it is a long snake!
Snake Pit Falls
