Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope all of you enjoyed your Thanksgiving meal.  And I hope you were able to get out to enjoy this wonderful day.

Medford Leas

Last week several Foulkeways residents went over to New Jersey to visit Medford Leas CCRC to have a look at their enclosed courtyards.

It was a rainy day, but these courtyards were impressive even in November.

Each one is different, with an interesting mix of trees, shrubs, and flowers.

None have grass, but may have grass substitutes that do not need mowing.

Most of the courtyards had pathways, and sometimes benches, which were pleasant to look at, even if you never ventured into the gardens.

There was often paving stones used, and drains in each as they experienced a need for draining the water away from the apartments.

At My Feeder

Under the weather today, so I enjoyed my backyard feeders, and captured a few photos.

Goldfinch

Downy woodpecker

Cardinal

White-throated sparrow

Seed stealer

Late Fall Color

There is still some lovely late fall color to be seen on campus.

By the back door.

Where everyone can see.

Chokeberry.

Mums finally in bloom.

Deer

How do they know it is Sunday?

I spotted some deer in the meadow, but they saw me first.  The buck was already gone.

They must have walked right under this tree stand, where the hunters might be any other day, but not on Sunday.

There were deer tracks in the mud on the Maris Trail.

There are many trees down on the upper Maris Trail loop, and I do not recommend walking there.

Sandy and Clean-up

There are some areas that I haven't photographed before, mostly because they are not as near to the community and frequently travelled paths.

This is near the entrance to the Maris Trail and the path to Evans Road.  One very large tree came down here, and I have not walked the Maris Trail, where there are some other trees down.

Here is a tree down in the picnic grove, but it is easy to walk around it, or over.

There is a creative stick pile down near "N", which residents created by cleaning up in their yards.

New Try

Here is the firewood photo that was meant to be included in the last blog.  I attempted to erase some of the earlier blogs, but that did nothing.  Then I tried opening a new blog in Wordpress, but such as steep learning curve it is not worth it.  Now I am trying resizing the photos to see if that works.  But there are only three followers who are still with me, because no one else has reported that they want me to continue.  We shall see.

Clean-up from Sandy

On Friday our crew began the clean up.

Yesterday the tree people were here.
Unfortunately I have run out of free space for inserting photos.  It will cost me a monthly fee to continue, or I might want to continue on another site.  I will keep you posted.  If you want me to continue, let me know.

Robin Invasion

About noontime today I had an invasion of robins in my holly tree.  There were at least a dozen robins, all eating the holly berries.

That one looks good.

Down the hatch.

They stripped the tree, so there are only about a dozen berries left.  It seems early in the season to strip the holly trees.  What will they do for food in March?

Honey is Here

Our Foulkeways honey will go on sale on Monday afternoon in the Gift Box.  We have about 100 jars for sale.

More of Sandy

There were trees down in many backyards.  Here is one behind R-1.

The ferocity of the wind can be seen in trees that were snapped off.

Not all the trees appear to be shallow rooted.

Trees were down in the far corners of our campus.  That is Rte. 202 in the backgroud with the traffic now moving on it today.

One of the many trees down near S-3.  These cottages are still without power.

Sandy

This large evegrren tree came down in the pre-school playground.  It is amazing that the tree did not damage the nearby buidings.

Near the Beaumont House there were many trees down, and even across Meetinghouse Road.  There was an extimate of 40 to 50 trees were down.

The garage did sustain damage.

Meetinghouse Road and Rte. 202 were closed, and this power line snapped into three parts.

We were able to get a hot lunch, and the CEO was pressed into service in the Meadow Cafe.

Autumn here and there

G Courtyard

Beaumont parlor

D courtyard

Witch hazel tree on Loop Trail

Witch hazel bloom.

Any Afternoon

Or morning too, it might be time to take a walk at Gwynedd Wildlife Preserve, A Natural Lands Trust Preserve on Swedesford Road.  It is just over a mile from here.

In the afternoon you might see a buckeye, rather than a bird.

There are so many wonderful paths to follow.

But be sure to look up and down.  Down so you don't miss this orange sulphur.

Up, there might be a bird in the pear treee.