Bill’s friend of 30 plus years, Joey, and his wife Janet drove all the way from Northern Illinois to get a bit of Florida sun and warmth…

Why all the coats, long sleeves, long pants you ask???? Yikes!!- a series of thunderstorms rolled through the night before they arrived making the sand roads just wonderful to drive on…. AND the cold front behind the storms whooshed through to the tune of a cold, breezy day of barely 50 degrees with their first night here dipping down to 23. We had installed them in the Magic Bus as Janet was particularly cold and Bill and I (OK ME, ME, ME!!! mostly) like the house cool at night. (Lest you think I am freezing the man, I also introduced him to down comforters which he LOVES…) Anyway, guests in the bus mean everyone has a bit of privacy and each couple can keep the temp whatever makes them happy.

BUT…when we went to bed, the temperature was forecast to get to mid-30’s so we had the bus set to heat with heat pumps. Heat pumps are good to 40ish and then less efficient as it gets colder to usually no heat at all below 30. When I woke and it was 23 I panicked a bit…but good news - for whatever reason the heat pumps spewed out heat all night and kept the bus at a cozy (HOT) 74 and all were happy.

It was a bit warmer the second day so a 4 wheeler trip was taken. A good time had by all and a great visit all around.

ORS friend Carole, who lives in Texas - east-southeast of Dallas - emailed me that she had daffodils up and was planting pansies next week and commented “Spring has sprung!”

It took me unawares…it is still February!!! However, here in north Florida, the azaleas are blooming and the camellia are leafing out and OMG!!! - it looks and feels springlike!

hmmm…maybe it is “spring”? It was 75 yesterday, although the forecast today is for wind, and thunderstorms and then a cold front and freezing temps the next 2 nights before it returns to the 70’s.

And I thought Montana weather was fickle….

And Bill has 4! They are not so little anymore and all have little girls or boys of their own - some of them (grandchildren) not so little either.

Youngest daughter, Nicole, visited this weekend. They traded a few choice comments about each other’s hair and other things…ya know…father-daughter stuff! We ate Bill’s spaghetti - one of Nicole’s favorites - and watched a movie. Nice!

I had fun starting to get to know Nicole. Having no children of my own, I often thought that if I had a relationship at this point in my life, “the man” would likely have grown children and I would get the benefit of knowing grown children and the grandkids by association…and so…it has come to pass!

I walked out this morning into air that was thick, wet and drippy - kind of like my sinuses (sorry for that picture!). It started raining yesterday afternoon and was one squall after another until sometime in the night. This morning it was not actually raining but Karl and I still got wet just walking out in the thick air. Today is forecast to be the same with a few possibly severe thunderstorms thrown in the mix.

Bill went gallantly out in the mess to fetch me some cough drops…and I think get a break from my general crankiness. I noticed this morning that the truck is parked out of the carport. I haven’t had a chance to ask but I’m thinking it was left out to get a “wash”…

As a lover of the night and all things lunar, I could hardly miss trying for some photos of last night’s lunar eclipse. Bill’s Nikon has a more powerful zoom lens than my Canon, but I know my Canon… I set both up on tripods plenty early to experiment with settings. Bill set the Nikon for me and he took the gorgeous full eclipse photo at the end of this post.

And while all of the event was spectacular and it was a beautiful night, it was the start of things, when the moon was low that was the most spectacular and exotic to me. The moon through the tree branches, the soft rainbow of color from the light refracted through the clouds - those were the fleeting moments of exquisite beauty for me.

I’ll be quiet now and let the photos speak.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Genesis 1: 1

And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth.” And it was so.

God made two great lights—the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars.

God set them in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth, to govern the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness.

And God saw that it was good. Genesis 1: 14-17