Long Reflective Post

 The list of things for me to do this week is about fifteen items long.  TF and I each have about the same size list that we are helping each other be accountable for this week.  I broke my list up to try and do at least three of those things each day.  Early in the afternoon I had two out of my three things done.  The third was to make dinner.  I took a walk on the property and then took a drive before making dinner.  

Dinner was a hit.  I just made pasta, but the sauce was not just out of a jar.  I also made garlic bread.  The garlic bread came out really well.  Everyone loved it so here is the website with the recipe.  There is a story behind the sauce.  Many years ago, I came up with a recipe for pasta sauce that was super easy and the kids and my ex husband liked it.  I made this for years, until after the divorce and I had a boyfriend who didn't like it.  Then we bought sauce.  So it has been close to twenty years since I made this recipe, a recipe that if I ever wrote it down, I don't know where it is.  Things change, this wasn't the same.  It was close.  I'll have to keep working on it.

Other happy things for today:

• My walk on the property today didn't reveal any new footprints.  For a brief moment I thought I saw a bear track, it wasn't.  The grass had melted snow into lines that looked like the claws and the rest was a sideways deer print.  That first quick glance though!

Not a bear print.

• I stopped and watched the water flow down the brook for a few minutes.  Just listening to the water trickle down the hill can be relaxing. It is amazing how dark the water seems.

Reflections.

• The crystal shapes in one section were so pretty that I took a close-up.  Swirling patterns plus what seem like tiny little icicles.  They almost look like ice needles, but I am pretty sure they are going down, not up.

Ice Crystals.

• One of the things I like to do is to play Pokemon Go and Harry Potter Wizard's Unite.  These are both games on my phone and are produced by Niantic.  They use GPS and locations that the player can travel to where certain game options can happen.  With Pokemon there are gyms, stops and pokemon that can be caught.  The game also allows use of a pokemon to be like a pet that the player can feed and play with.  Turns out, the pet walks around collecting gifts from nearby stops when the player isn't looking.  I found this out when there were a few things in my inventory from places I haven't been.  During my drive today I set out to find some of them.  That is one of the good things about these types of games.  The player is encouraged to walk to different places as part of the game (exercise).  They are also encouraged to play with others (socialize).  I'm an adult in a small town, I drove today.  This was fun and I found a couple of new places to walk.
• I also drove to a place I've gone before, Hooksett's Lilac Bridge.  I was surprised to see that the parking area had been spruced up to include a couple of new signs with some bridge/rail-themed art.

Rail Art.

History!

• The walk across the Merrimack River here is very picturesque.  Parts of the river are frozen.  The water is black and oh, so refective!  The river appears to move slowly and looks like spilled black ink as it moves towards the distant ocean.

The train bridge (B&M RR) as seen from the walking bridge (Lilac Bridge).

☮

Currently reading: The Backyard Homestead Seasonal Planner, by Ann Larkin Hansen.

Currently listening to: The Nightingale, by Kristin Hannah.

Stay safe.