Blizzard 2016

... and winter come with a vengeance: it started with arctic temperature the week of January 18 and it ended with 30" some inches of snow by January 23rd.  Bernie hold down the fort at Howard Lodge, taking care of the horses and cats.  Francesca spent the week-end at Blanchette's house to take care of Max and Hallie, while said Mr. Blanchette was sun bathing in Tortola!  As of this writing, Bernie is hard a work with some of the neighbors to dig the Private Road out: the last picture I received was not very comforting and I am sharing it with you all:

Happy 2016!

Quiet first day of 2016 here at Howard Lodge: Bernie and I took it easy, and so did our pets: Mr. Jones had a long relaxing nap on the sofa, Pixie and Spritz shared the attic room, and Luna and Nash enjoyed their day in the new field close to Wendy's horses.  
Happy New Year everyone

...Long time without writing

It has been a really long time since I last blogged about our life here at Howard Lodge.  We have been really busy and lots of things has happened, some very nice some not so nice.  At the time of this writing Nicoletta is back in Italy, hopefully for only for a year.  We miss her very much, Spritz miss her even more.  Two years ago we lost Shadow, mostly due to age, and this past winter we lost Bricks.  This summer was a hard one for Messy and Luna: Messy lost an eye, Luna broke her hip, and then the worse event of all was Messy fracturing her right hind fetlock.  We still miss Miss Messy, but we got a new horse to keep Luna company... Things are still settling between the two: I believe that for now they tolerate each other.

I will try to post more often since I had fun looking back at the old posts and remembering things.

R.I.P Brooke

Unfortunately Brooke passed away on June 8th after a long illness. Bernie, Nicoletta and I are surely going to miss her, but we know she is now in a better place and not suffering anymore.  We are going to host a Memorial in her honor on July 8th. 

Thanksgiving 2011

Quiet Thanksgiving spent with Patricia.... of course the meal was great

Waiting for lunch

Group photo

Let's have a drink

Popovers

Apple Pie

We made the news...

We decided even before moving into the house that we were going to try and add it to the National Registry of Historical Homes.  The Howard County historian spent about 6 full days during the summer of 2010 taking pictures and documenting the features of the house.  Last October, the Governor's Historical Committee officially nominated the house, and we should hear sometimes before the end of the year if we made the Registry.  Meanwhile, last Sunday this nice article was published in the Baltimore Sun - Howard County Edition

Beautiful October Day

Today was the perfect autumn day..  and we got to enjoy it a little bit.. 
The several animals that live on the property got to enjoy it too...

The pond had beautiful colors this afternoon

the Canadian geese had fun relaxing

Jones check that we were doing a good job!