From my kitchen window

I took all of the pictures in this post from my favorite chair at my kitchen window. It faces west, and in the winter you can see the sun setting through the trees along the edge of the property.

 

Taken at sunset last night.

 

Taken as the sun was waning, in beautiful late afternoon light.

In fact, it was so beautiful that I couldn’t believe that snow was forecast for the following morning.

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Yes. Snow. And some parts of Maryland got it today, but for us it was all rain although we had a snow day anyway, in preparation for the storm that was to come.

The rain was accompanied by strong wind gales, and several times the windows in the house seemed to shake with the force of it. I feel safe enough in this old manor house because I know that it’s been standing here through the centuries and am sure that it has suffered resolutely through many storms. But one gust today nearly knocked me off the chair. Upon investigation, we discovered that it had demolished the entire widow’s walk and left the heavy hatch to its roof entrance lying on the front yard.

The owner came to assess the damage, along with our trusted fix-it man, John. But until they came, my husband and I had to rig up a way to keep the rain from coming in. Honestly, with that wind sucking everything up, it was a little hairy at times today.

But it’s all fixed. Well, except we don’t have a widow’s walk anymore . . .

Here are a few posts that show what the widow’s walk used to look like:

Views from the widow's walk

It is accessed through an opening in the roof on the third floor of the house. One must climb up a ladder, then through another set of steps above the top of the ladder, removing the heavy hatch to get to the prize at the top which is a lovely view. The railings are all gone now and all that remains is the copper top with its hatch covering.

 

 

While the hatch was being worked on, I amused myself by taking photos of birds out the kitchen window. They were resting on the branches of the dogwood tree and trying to keep from being blown away.

 

An example of how windy it was for a tufted titmouse.

 

 

 

 

Now that is windy!

 

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I’m glad I was home today because my husband would have been by himself when this happened. And I’m really glad that all is well now.