Henny Penny Farmette

As winter approaches, it seems counterintuitive to embrace the cold and dark, especially as we hurry indoors to seek light and warmth. But winter brings the gift of time and circumstances that force us to slow down, rest, reflect, and renew ourselves.

Here on the Henny Penny Farmette, the honey bees remain in their hives until their DNA tells them early spring has arrived. The hens slow their laying of eggs during the cold, dark days of winter. And the soil in the gardens rest as the sap stops flowing in the trees during the months when winter’s chill comes on early and leaves late.

During the current age of telecommuting or arrangements that include some work from home, lying an extra few minutes in bed until the house warms can feel luxurious. After a hearty, healthy breakfast or lunch, a thirty-minute winter stroll across a field, down the road, or to the mailbox and back elevates the feel-good chemicals in your brain, stimulates your sense of well-being, and helps you feel restored.

The winter season is perhaps the best time of year to reflect on impermanence and cyclic change. Start a journal in which to capture your thoughts, hopes, dreams, questions, and ideas about self-evaluation and soul reflection. Learn something new. Sense the charismatic presences around you in nature. Allow your own radiance to flow outward to others.

Winter is a time to think about what you do and don’t want in your life and how you’ll clear the clutter. Is it a person, a habit, a thing? What is it that you want to leave behind in the old year and what do you want to manifest in the coming new year? Before winter is over, make an intention to manifest your deepest desire.

Use the the dark days of winter to reflect on your physical health and mental well-being. What bad habit could you eliminate? What lifestyle change would be healthier for you? How might you gain more self acceptance and self love? What does a picture of great health for your body and mind look like?

Snuggle up in a chair with a warm throw and read a good book when the winds are howling and the cloud ceiling is low. Reading stimulates the mind. Expand your horizons with an arm-chair travel book. Enjoy a fictive trip through a novel. Solve a mystery. Read about the history of food and try a new recipe. The possibilities for indulging your interests are expansive.

Practice mindfulness. Let new ideas emerge from the depths of your consciousness. Winter is the perfect time and you can do this practice in any setting. Take advantage of the gifts the dark offers.

If you enjoy reading about country living topics, check out my series of cozy mysteries available online and in bookstores everywhere.

When this yellow jacket dropped in on my Sunday morning brunch plate, I took off

I welcome visits into my yard by honey bees–they are not interested in me or my plate of food (unless it has honey on it), but hornets, wasps, and yellow jackets are not welcome.

This past Sunday morning, I was enjoying a plate of food on my patio when a yellow jacket made an unwelcome appearance. These are the yellow and black predatory wasps you find on your soda cans and sweets at picnics. Some people call them “meat bees” but they are actually wasps.

What value are they to gardens, you might wonder. I did. Although I loathe them, I did a little research and discovered that yellow jackets are predators of insects that many of us gardeners consider pests. But try as I might, I just can’t make myself like yellow jackets. The females don’t just sting and die. They can sting multiple times. And wasp stings hurt.

About those stingers–they are like lances with barbs, injecting venom into you during a sting. The stings are not dangerous unless you happen to be stung repeatedly or you are allergic to bee and wasp stings. In that case, you might carry a epinephrine autoinjector (known as an EpiPen) in the event of a life-threatening sting to treat anaphylaxis.

Keep a lookout for yellow jackets in the spring when the queen seeks a place to construct a paper nest. These wasps (related to hornets) live in social colonies with female queens and workers, and also males, known as drones. They like to establish their nests in hollowed logs and human structures (like houses with holes for entry into attics or walls). They enjoy a diet rich in sugar and carbohydrates. Don’t we all? But take care when enjoying your al fresco Sunday brunch. You never know who might drop in!