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Category Archives: The house

Snowy Sunday morning

I’m sure that everyone who lives in the Blue Ridge Mountains and the foothills are very glad that the winter’s first snow fell on a Sunday morning. There’s no excuse for leaving home.

Still life with roses

Eight days ago at Trader Joe’s, on impulse, I bought a bundle of 20 roses because the price was agreeable. I expected them to last four or five days at best. But, more than a week later, they’ve opened nicely and are still going strong. Pots of flowers always remind me of San Francisco. If […]

You mean you can cook with fire??

My first primitive efforts at cooking with fire The abbey’s back deck has been woefully underused in the seven years that the abbey has been occupied. This is because there was no furniture and no creature comforts. I had been on the lookout for deck furniture, but I never seemed to come across something that […]

Wild persimmon blossom

They’re very shy and try to hide behind leaves. They’re small, and they don’t last long. The abbey has lots of young wild persimmon trees that volunteered in the ditch along the roadside after the old pine trees came down seven years ago.

The new painting is on the wall

Some months ago, Ken commissioned a painting of Acorn Abbey from Frank Duncan, a local artist. The painting is now hanging on the wall at the abbey. It’s a large piece — 56 inches wide. We put a lot of thought into the painting, and we chose to submerge the house into the woods and […]

And a Happy New Year too

The abbey in oil: a work in progress

Frank at work Several months ago, Ken commissioned a painting of Acorn Abbey from a local artist, Frank Duncan. Frank is a celebrity in these parts. He’s also a neighbor. We asked Frank to unapologetically get in touch with his inner Thomas Kinkade and do interesting things with light and imagination. The painting will go […]

Abbey photography update

The abbey’s venerable Nikon D1X was starting to have occasional shutter malfunctions, so I went on eBay and bought a D2X, the model of professional camera that succeeded the D1X in 2004. The pros have moved on to D3’s and D4’s, so the D2X is now an affordable camera. I found a practically new one […]

At last, a free day

I apologize for the long absence from the blog, and I appreciate the emails asking if everything is OK. I’m heavily involved in a local political campaign, trying to bring a little progress to Stokes County. Things will get back to normal after the election. Today was the first day in many days that I […]

First snow of the winter