A few days ago me and Diane were getting ready to eat our morning fruit smoothie and settle in for our morning scripture study when Diane looked into the back yard and saw one of only two bucks we've seen in our yard this past year. I realize to you Utah guys this isn't exactly a trophy buck. I'm sure some rabid hunter here in Tennessee would love to have this baby hanging in his garage. As a matter of fact, I wouldn't mind if he were hanging in my garage. If he were hanging in my garage what would I do with him? I would have to clean it, skin it, find someone to cut it up, then put it in the freezer and eat the poor thing. I guess I'm glad I'm not the rabid hunter I once was. Off to the right of the deer is the vicious slope that gave me "one heck of a hematoma" on my left leg. I knew the deer could handle the slope so I didn't try to warn him. For now we'll just enjoy watching them when they come into the backyard.
On reflection, I still have the antler's from the last buck I shot while living in Utah. That three point was larger than this little feller. With all the green shrubbery here to munch on you would think the deer would grow larger than they do. I am seeing the difference between the mule deer in Utah and the white tail deer here. One thing about deer here, there are a lot of them. Hunter's who are really serious about hunting can take multiple deer throughout the season. Tonight we were on our way to do a few errands and we saw what we call the mythical albino deer. We have heard people talk about albino deer since moving to Tennessee. We thought it was somewhat of a fairy tale. Tonight we can tell it is true. We saw with our own eyes an albino deer. No we weren't stunned, but excited to see a part of nature one rarely sees. The fur on this doe was not white, white but somewhat a creme color. It was very pretty to see. We were grateful the car ahead of us didn't hit it when it ran across the road.
We do enjoy seeing the various wild life that frequents our backyard and the surrounding neighborhood. We see squirrels, occasionally wild turkey, frogs, lizards, spiders larger than any spider I've seen in my life prior to moving to Tennessee, cardinals, blue jays, buzzards eating road kill, and more birds than I could possible name. Some animals are a little more adventurous than others. The squirrels seem to come out of nowhere on the roads around here. So now I feel bad about the dumb squirrel that ran out in front of my car one early Sunday morning. They may be fast but they can't quite outrun the tires of the car doing 40 mph.
Occasionally we hear coyote howling at night when we're outside. They sound like a rather large pack when you hear them howling.
I hope that squirrel forgives me for ending his life earlier than it should have.
Fortunately for me, he was no where near the size of the giant opossum Diane collided with shortly after moving here. We've returned to the scene of the crime each time someone comes to visit. Fortunately there are no such things as opossum ghosts or this one would be roaming the road looking for the car that ended his/her life.
What do you do when the weather is 10 degrees and most of your shoes look like this? First you dig for that coupon you know you had somewhere for $10 off any pair of shoes, and head for the mall. When you arrive, you find that the store you have the coupon for is nowhere to be found. Disappointed that you can't use your very valuable coupon, but also desperate for some shoes to wear to church, you decide you are desperate enough that you will actually pay the department store price. Much to your delight, upon entering the shoe department, you see they are having a sale on shoes! After admiring all the new fashions and picturing yourself in those sexy Stilettos that will make you at least 5 inches taller, and reasoning that the extra money you spend will save you the cost of altering the pants that are too long for you....you come back to reality. The only problem now is to find something in your size. There are plenty of shoes, but each time you request to try a pair on, you are told they don't have it in your size. You get the impression that the shoe salesman thinks you should settle for one size bigger where you will have a lot more to choose from. You compromise on one pair and get it in a size 61/2 instead of a 6, and tell yourself that when you're not cold, your feet will swell and they will fit just fine.
You head home with your sensible shoes in the bag, and are happy to have found at least one pair of something other than black. Navy blue dress shoes will give you a little variety right? Sunday morning comes and you decide on the blue skirt. You wait until the last minute to put the shoes on. When you do, you notice they don't feel quite right. You wonder if your right foot is really that much bigger than your left. You look inside the right and left shoe and discover they have given you a different size for each foot. You change clothes and put on the other pair that could pass as dress shoes, only to realize that the 6 1/2 are too big and would require thick socks to make them not slip up and down like flip-flops. Finally, because you are now going to be late if you don't hurry, you slip on the flats and call it good. You head off to church in your sensible shoes. You have saved the coupon.....maybe those sexy Stilettos are still a possibility. 
The next night (Dec. 26) we opened gifts and celebrated with Robyn and Joe. Parker came down with the flu and wasn't feeling very well for our last leg of our trip, but he was still excited about everything that was going on around him.
