Sketchbook Saturday: Drawing Birds I've been watching videos this week of John Muir Laws showing me how to draw birds. He's one of the founders of Wild Wonder and a master at nature journaling. The thing I'm loving about his teaching is the repetition of drawing lines to get you started on the…

Reflections on Montana and An Intentional life A few weeks ago we visited our friends Mike and Melissa in Montana. They live just outside Yellowstone National Park, so our days were filled with wildlife watching from dawn to dusk. One day as we were recalling our time filled with bison, wolves,…

Blue Grosbeak A couple of years ago I was looking out my bedroom window and saw a strange bird on the ground in the back yard. I grabbed binoculars and identified it as a male blue grosbeak. Soon, the rusty-colored female landed near him and they searched for bugs among the grasses. They were…

Summer blooms amid an exceptional drought

Wild places are being commodified in the name of wildfire prevention open.substack.com/pub/ourpubli...

The OMB is trying to break science. open.substack.com/pub/yourloca...

Birds of a feather at the Cape May Birding Festival Recently I got to spend time with my son. It was just the two of us, for the first time in years, and we attended the Cape May Birding Festival in Cape May, NJ. We went on field trips and boat rides, wandered the woods and beaches looking for…

It’s a bird’s pose I've been paying more attention to the birds in our woods and gardens lately. As migration ramps up and summer birds are starting to arrive, it's a good time to be more observant. This week I have seen or heard summer tanagers, hooded warblers, Louisiana waterthrushes,…

This girl is up for adoption at Beautiful Together Animal Sanctuary in Chapel Hill, NC. Meet Opal. #dog #rescue #adoptme

Do the laws not apply to the rich and wealthy? Kleptocracy? Quid pro quo. Bribery. You name it. All of this is wrong and illegal. Shameful.

🔈NC: Join us May 14 at 6pm as we discuss: ➡️ How the US Supreme Court’s outrageous ruling in Callais gutted the Voting Rights Act, what it means for NC, and how we’re responding. ➡️ Harmful new voting rules proposed by the State Board of Elections and how you can speak out. RSVP: ccnc.me/VRAcall

A garden walk Sometimes I walk through my backyard gardens out of habit, A daily stroll just to check on things and note changes or needs. Other times the gardens summon me like a siren song, Calling, cajoling, compelling me to come, telling me to look closer. And when I answer that siren song, I…

An Earth Day tribute to life on Earth Happy Earth Day, all. For the past few weeks life has been crazy busy - preparing for and commenting at a public hearing, preparing to host a 3-day reunion of my writing group, touching base with family and friends, volunteering, and keeping up with general…

Thank You: Celebrating 17 Years of Connection through Blogging Wow, y'all! WordPress just told me I've been blogging here on this site for 17 years now! Part of me thinks, "Yeah, so what?", but part of me is kinda proud of this little achievement badge. Why? Because it means I've persisted. I've…

Where do you find comfort? In times like these, when our country feels fragile, its leadership inept, unhinged, angry, incompetent, often downright mean and scary and disingenuous. When our climate is shifting, changing everything about how we live and how things work. When living beings and…

252,756 Earth and moon as seen from Artemis II, NASA photo 2026. 252,756 miles. That's how far away from Earth the Artemis II astronauts were this week - the farthest distance any human has ever been from our home planet. Our son texted us photos from the mission. The one of the back side of the…

Hummingbirds welcome here The smorgasbord is laid... columbine, coral honeysuckle, azaleas, sugar water feeders. We are ready and eagerly awaiting the arrival of the ruby-throated hummingbirds. We heard one buzz through a few days ago. The next day, Mr. EndlessSeeker had one nearly fly into his…

A Music Monday #song about #water #wisdom...

What natural systems support your life everyday? Welcome to April! Our yard and woods and gardens are coming alive with color as the spring wildflowers burst forth. This is the month in which we celebrate Earth Day (April 22nd). Earth Day started back in 1970 and is said to represent the beginning…

Music Monday: Say Can You See This past weekend I saw this bumper sticker on a car... It fit with the mood of the No Kings rallies scheduled for the weekend. And it made me think of protest songs. A few years ago, I had the distinct pleasure of seeing Scott Cook perform in an intimate acoustic…

Sketchbook Saturday On a bright, warm, sunny day this week, two bronzed metallic wood boring beetles showed up on the deck stairs. They hung around long enough to let me sketch one ... Then I saw a click beetle. Early emergers as the temps rose above normal again. Another unexpected sighting was a…

Reflections

Spring critters and a celebration Green frog hanging out by the pond The warm weather and longer days, along with the regrowth of plants are making a lot of spring critters show up on the homestead right now. This green frog has started basking in the sun each day by our little pond in the back…

Good morning, world. Make it a great day. #morning #poem #sunrise #clouds #gratitude

Things that weren’t here yesterday Spring is here, y'all. Mr. EndlessSeeker and I have been rediscovering the gardens after their long winter's nap. As we've trimmed old stems, raked leaf litter, added compost, and mulched during the past week or so, we've been checking for opening buds, signs of…

Music Monday: Living in the Moment Happy Music Monday, y'all! How about a song from the ever-positive Jason Mraz about peace and love and living in the moment.... Make it a great day, friends. Living in the moment. Jason Mraz

Field Notes: What to love about February The love month... There's Valentine's Day and President's Day and snowstorms followed by springlike weather. There's gray skies and sunshine, poems about love, and chocolates to go around. There's early voting amid political restlessness. Sweet, caring…

Political effects of X’s feed algorithm "Exposure to algorithmic content leads users to follow conservative political activist accounts... initial exposure to X’s algorithm has persistent effects on users’ current political attitudes and account-following behaviour.." www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Music Monday: What would love do? What I'm listening to right now... Franko Heke's What would love do?

Patience with the unseen; love in action February is when I get impatient. Winter is still here, but I'm ready for spring. I want to dig my hands in the dirt, plants seeds, watch buds unfold into a bright green portrait of life. But the dirt is still frozen. The seeds are still folded up in…

Sketchbook Saturday Heart of the forest Just a little playful page exploring my love for plants... What are you creating this week?

The Essence of Love Love is the first snowflake kissing a naked tree limb, the soft cooing of mourning doves leaning against each other on a branch, a gentle touch of water flowing downstream in summer,sunshine peaking over the eastern horizon each morning, reminding us we have another day to…

Snowed in Music Monday: All you need is love Well, it’s February folks, and that means it’s time to explore LOVE. Not romantic love and the capitalist-driven celebration of Valentine’s Day, filled with chocolates, hearts, and flowers, but love for one another as living beings on Earth. Love for…

Sketchbook Saturday: Fragmentation and Unification Scraps of cloth, ripped, painted printed with leaves, sticks, and fingers thread sewn with abandon, stitching togetherWhat was never meant to be one thing but becomes one, a whole, something never seen before something new, something textured,…

Democracy and Nature: A Call for Water Wisdom A winter storm came, and I walked in the woods. The creek was frozen. Water stopped in its tracks, frozen in time. Ice had grabbed a hold, impeding the water's forward progression downstream to bigger creeks, rivers, and the ocean. Impeding its path to…

Music Monday: Imagine I'm playing this song on repeat today... Of course, it takes more than imagining a world where people live in peace. But it's a start, an intention worth pursuing. "Flowers appeared where Alex fell. Candles flickered against the cold. People stood quietly because sometimes…

Kindness is the calm within the storm A winter storm is coming. They are forecasting a big ice storm here - a storm that may cause more power outages and damage than any winter storm we've seen in decades - with record-setting cold for days to follow. So, Mr. EndlessSeeker and I have been…

Icy Morning

Music Monday: Simple Kindness It snowed a little here yesterday, and I was so grateful for it. Snow is rare for us these days, but when I watch it floating down from the sky, my whole being settles into quiet centered-ness. The atmosphere is hushed and reverent. The flakes begin to stick and cover…

Sketchbook Saturday: Still Life

Embracing Grief: How Love Deepens Our Care Yesterday, after I published the post about Courage to Care, I had the opportunity to witness a beautifully courageous circle of people sharing their grief, expressing their love, and showing how deeply they care. It was a circle of memory for lost lives,…

Cultivating the Courage to Care I have found that the greatest degree of inner tranquility comes from the development of love and compassion. The more we care for the happiness of others, the greater is our own sense of well-being. Cultivating a close, warmhearted feeling for others automatically…

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Music Monday: What we all need right now It feels like we all need a little more of this right now in a world gone mad... We need to put a little more love in our hearts...

Sketchbook Saturday: Winter’s quiet A place for deep listening Winter woods, still and quietBut not reallyIf you're still long enoughVoices come, stories unfold.Wisdom so ancient, so profoundThat it changes everything you thoughtYou already knew.Listen. © 2026 Deb Dorsett Hanson

Video: ‘Possum Pantry Last weekend, we took our Christmas tree outdoors and set it up in our bird feeding station. We then decorated it with orange and apple slices, Cheerio garlands, and pine cones covered with peanut butter and bird seed. We do this to give our tree a second purpose as winter…

Deep Listening: Noticing Nature’s Quiet Signals We are here, and we should live our lives deeply. - Thich Nhat Hanh I sat in the woods listening as the morning unfolded, the sun inching its way above the horizon. Wrapped in a blanket, I sat contentedly, waiting. I closed my eyes. Traffic hummed in…

Music Mondays: Listening during Winter’s Quiet I looked out my back windows yesterday morning, and saw gray. The yard was hidden by the porch floor. The pine tree tops were above the roof line. All I could see at eye level were leafless, gray tree limbs in the sleepy dawn, reaching skyward in…

Embracing Intentional Living for 2026 Happy New Year! Sunrise at Pokeberry Pines, January 1st 2026 Last January, my good friend, Meredith, started texting me each day with the statement "you know life is good when...." and she'd share something about her life that brought her joy in that moment. I…

Embracing Boundless Love in Tough Times Life is messy, for sure. And, at any given moment in someone's life, it feels as if the world is falling apart. You might get a phone call and find out that someone you know is sick, someone died, or someone is in a mental health crisis. Scroll social media…