Winter Pictures, Kefir Woes, Giveaway Tomorrow

Happy day to everyone! I wanted to share some of the scenery with which we're being blessed around here.

Last Saturday, we went birdwatching on a beach about 15 miles north of here. We saw some unusual birds, including redwing blackbirds who have no business this far north at any time of the year!... And we got very close to this juvenile bald eagle, who was conserving energy and looking haughty. (Out of respect for the bird, we didn't try to get real close, but this is closer than I'd normally expect to be.)

Yesterday and today, we were hiking on beaches near here as the sun came up around 9.45:

Isn't that glorious? The temperatures have actually been dropping after sunrise these past few days: it seems that at night there is some cloud-cover, which warms things up, but when the sun rises and the sky clears, even though the sun is bright and beautiful, it doesn't warm things up.

Speaking of warming things up, Homer has a lot of coal: in fact, it was originally a mining town as much as a fishing town. Unfortunately, the mining out of coal seams is a big factor in the terrible erosion problems along the seashores around here now. But as you hike along the beaches, you'll often find deposits of coal, and sometimes great patches spattered with smaller coal chunks. You'll often also see 'petrified wood,' which is semi-fossilized wood that hasn't quite turned into rock or coal yet. I adore it: it's just so beautiful. Here's a huge chunk we saw this morning:

We also found a stranded jellyfish. This was about as big across as my foot. Doesn't it look just like a giant hard candy? (despite being so soft itself)

Just for fun, because I thought it looked so funny: here's a shot of our cabin after we did laundry two days ago. It's a ventilation issue, because those wet clothes represent a lot of water that needs to go somewhere...

So we opened and flapped the door periodically through the day, which cooled things down faster than you'd believe.

Now for my kefir update. Remember my very time-consuming coconut kefir-making process using Wilderness Family's coconut milk powder?

Well, between my concern over the trace of dairy in the coconut milk powder and the time-consuming factor, when we finally got home from our travels, I decided to try making water kefir for a while instead. In fact, I tried out Amanda Rose's suggestion of making water kefir, adding nettle tea and fermenting for one more day as an extra mineral boost together with the probiotics.

Well, it made wonderful tonic kefir for a few days, but then, the grains simply ceased to convert the sugar! (I was using pure evaporated cane juice.) I'm at a loss, and unfortunately, Marilyn Kefirlady, from whom I obtained the grains, hasn't been forthcoming with any suggestions as to whether I could revive them. She suggested that keeping them warm enough is very important, but every time I've gone traveling,  I've left them in the fridge while I was gone and they've bounced right back afterwards.

Meantime, I'm missing my kefir. Both the effervescent, bacteria-sour-yumminess, and the wonderfully creamy sour coconut that I used to have in the fridge. I'm missing the coconut version even more so since, for reasons I'll be talking about soon, I'm experimenting with cutting all nuts and seeds, including the chia and flax that I mostly eat (with the exception of coconut and mac nuts), down to a minimum or nothing for a little while, and when I get hungry for a snack and am not going to eat a chia cracker, coconut kefir was often a go-to item, at least when at home. So, I'm putting my hopes to the universe and my feelers out to get kefir back into my life soon!

Have you ever quit something and then really missed it?

Stay tuned for a giveaway tomorrow!
much love.