Mother Nature’s Crayon Box.

Posted on April 19, 2019 by Linda Schaub

I’m a little disappointed in Mother Nature these days. I think she is rather bullheaded, as she forges forward with day after day of dismal and dreary weather. Today was a washout – an inch of rain, and tomorrow is looking rather ugly as well. Your roving reporter just sucked it up and stayed in bed later this morning, while listening to the birds on the back windowsill cheeping away, grateful for a safe haven. I was grateful they were grateful, even though they began murmuring around 5:30 a.m. I’m always happy to accommodate my fine-feathered friends. 🙂

I have no wit or wisdom to impart today as my brain may be moldy from all this rain. But, as I pondered this recent weather, while wrapping my hands around my steaming mug of joe this morning, I developed a theory about ol’ Ma Nature. It goes like this: I think the old gal has worn all her primary color crayons to a stub. (Either that or they all rolled under the bed or disappeared into the couch cushions.)

I think Mother Nature then hopped on Amazon and ordered these crayons:

I am tempted to quip that Mother Nature has left me high and dry as to my walking regimen, but that would a misnomer, wouldn’t it? After all, that’s what umbrellas were invented for.

I’m still trying to embrace the walking-in-the-rain concept, but I’m not quite there yet. On a positive note, since I gleaned an extra hour not walking, I spent that time researching, then ordering some waterproof walking shoes and writing this post. Woo hoo! The worms and I can have a good ol’ time together.

Onward and upward on this walking regimen!

[Images from Pinterest]

About Linda Schaub

This is my first blog and I enjoy writing each post immensely. I started a walking regimen in 2011 and in 2013 I decided to create a blog as a means of memorializing the people, places and things seen on my daily walks. I have always enjoyed people watching, so my blog is peppered with folks I meet or reflections of characters I have known through the years. Often something piques my interest, or evokes a pleasant memory from my memory bank, so this becomes a “slice o’ life” blog post. I respect and appreciate nature and my interactions with Mother Nature’s gifts is also a common theme. Sometimes the most-ordinary items become fodder for points to ponder over and touch upon. I retired in March 2024 after a career in the legal field. I was a legal secretary for almost 45 years, primarily working in downtown Detroit, then working from my home. I graduated from Wayne State University with a degree in Mass Communications (print journalism) in 1978, though I’ve never worked in that field. I would like to think this blog is the writer in me finally emerging!! Walking and writing have met, shaken hands and the creative juices are flowing in Walkin’, Writin’, Wit & Whimsy. I hope you think so too. - Linda Schaub
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79 Responses to Mother Nature’s Crayon Box.

  1. Shelley says:
    April 19, 2019 at 5:06 pm

    Nice Gutenberg post! Funny and very clever, too! YAY that they now have gray colors…sorry, that made me smile seeing them! I’m right there with on not wanting to walk in the rain. I wear glasses and that’s just so messy and not fun for me to try and see through, just not worth it. More power to those who want to do so. If it is any consolation, the weather here is gorgeous today, and it is heading your way, so soon you’ll have sunny weather to enjoy! xx

    Liked by 1 person

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 19, 2019 at 5:10 pm

      That makes me happy to hear. One more day of rain, then we’re there … I just did a post to launch for Earth Day and I did a slideshow but looked at the instructions – was leery to do JetPack. So I did a hybrid post – I did the large title, justified text but switched to Classic Editor and did a traditional slides how – yay me. 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 19, 2019 at 5:38 pm

      Something odd for my hybrid post for tomorrow and mentioning it since you’re still there – when I looked at the preview after I reset the time, the pictures appeared gallery style … in the preview it was a slideshow. Perhaps I should redo it, but I’ll wait and be surprised.

      Liked by 1 person

  2. incahootswithmuddyboots says:
    April 19, 2019 at 5:42 pm

    I can deal with a drizzle, but real rain not so much. We had a gorgeous day yesterday but rain is on the way now. The grey crayons have been put in the back of the drawer here in Portland. Spring has arrived in bright colors! Happy Easter, Linda! 🙋

    Liked by 1 person

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 19, 2019 at 6:43 pm

      That’s good you had bright colors -your flowers will be cheery, even if your skies are not. We have one more day of rain, so I’ll accomplish some things indoors anyway. We’ve had rain every day since last Sunday.
      I took the bus too many years in inclement weather and had no choice but to go out in it, so that is what is holding me back, but maybe a walk in a light drizzle in warm weather is fine, not so much when it is just in the 40s, like we had all week and will have tomorrow. (Snowflakes in the northern suburbs.) Happy Easter Sabine!

      Liked by 1 person

  3. Tom's Nature-up-close Photography and Mindfulness Blog says:
    April 19, 2019 at 6:31 pm

    The wind here in Illinois today is like Martian wind… crazy and violent. This is manmade weather (i.e., caused by humans); we need to change.

    Liked by 1 person

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 19, 2019 at 6:36 pm

      I don’t like the new normal for the weather. We had torrential rain last Sunday, it’s rained every day since and tomorrow as well. A one-day reprieve then rain again. We had the big winds yesterday. More tornadic activity in Florida and Georgia and all the flooding. People will think about the environment tomorrow and thats it until Earth Day 2020.

      Liked by 1 person

  4. AJ says:
    April 19, 2019 at 6:50 pm

    Well it sounds like you put your time to good use:)

    Liked by 1 person

  5. Ally Bean says:
    April 19, 2019 at 6:57 pm

    Shady gray crayons just may be the colors of life! Just saying, no disrespect to Mother Nature intended.

    Liked by 1 person

  6. ruthsoaper says:
    April 19, 2019 at 7:20 pm

    Yes I think high and dry would be good for your walking – at least the dry part. The gray crayons are funny. I never would have guessed they came that way. I have some (yellow) daffodils blossoming. That makes me happy but I’m sure looking forward to the return of warm weather next week.

    Liked by 1 person

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 19, 2019 at 7:52 pm

      I was starting to think we might need an ark soon. It finally stopped raining here. In looking for pictures of crayons on Pinterest for this post, I came across different sets of one-color only Crayola crayons – like all these shades of gray, or a box of all shades of blue. Things have come a long way since the 8-pack of primary colors I had for my first coloring book. I am looking forward to warm weather too – and no rain. Tomorrow will be rainy – at least Easter will be nice. They canceled today’s marshmallow drops at Nankin Mills and Elizabeth Park as the helicopters couldn’t go airborne.

      Like

  7. Anne Mehrling says:
    April 19, 2019 at 8:27 pm

    We’ve had torrential rain today, enough that our son may be confined to his home because of flooding. Off and on we had thunder and lightning, interspersed with brilliant sunshine. Weird weather.

    Like

  8. indianeskitchen says:
    April 19, 2019 at 9:25 pm

    Cute post Linda! I’ll be curious as to if any of your critter friends will be out if you walk in the rain?

    Liked by 3 people

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 20, 2019 at 8:16 am

      I’ll have to ask the other walkers as they walk rain or shine Diane – but only one walks in the rain plus feeds the squirrels – there are only three of us that feed the squirrels (and birds). We have rain again today – I am running out to run the car and getting back in before it gets heavy.

      Liked by 1 person

      • indianeskitchen says:
        April 20, 2019 at 11:04 pm

        You need a remote start!

        Liked by 1 person

      • lindasschaub says:
        April 21, 2019 at 9:18 pm

        Ha ha – I do have a remote start that came with the car, but I’ve never used it. My garage must be pulled up manual, I don’t have an electric garage opener. My friend had problems with her remote starter – she started using it, then her car started dying and had to be towed. It was almost brand new. So, she stopped using it and the car was okay then.

        Liked by 1 person

  9. susieshy45 says:
    April 19, 2019 at 10:24 pm

    Linda
    Sorry about the rain. It seems really grey there from the colours of your crayons but as the others say, warmer weather is on the way.
    Susie

    Liked by 1 person

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 20, 2019 at 8:17 am

      I think we can salvage Easter Sunday and then maybe more rain after that. It is raining lightly now – going to run out and run the car and come back in as heavier rain is expected within the hour.

      Liked by 1 person

  10. Joni says:
    April 19, 2019 at 10:38 pm

    That was very creative Linda! I always loved a big new box of crayons….did they come in 64? But no gray….maybe a box of blue hues. I am curious as Diane mentioned above, would your furred friends be out and about in the rain?

    Liked by 1 person

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 20, 2019 at 8:25 am

      Thanks Joni – I have never walked at the Park in the rain before and there is only one of the three of us who does walk in the rain (that feeds peanuts to the squirrels). I will ask when I go there next (hopefully tomorrow) … I’ve not been to the Park since last Friday or Saturday – walked in the neighborhood on the days it didn’t rain. I have to find your comments … I had three of your comments go to spam – I rescued them and they did not go into my unread comments – neither here in the “Comments” section for my blog, nor the “Notifications” section. Hmmm. I will find them again. I have to go outside as it is only raining lightly and heavy rain expected soon. Have to run the car. But I saw you asked a question about Gutenberg – you can switch back and forth from Gutenberg to Classic Editor until 2020 when you will be forced to use Gutenberg. I did a post to launch around 4:00 today (I have to do some housework so offline most of the day) … I started it in “G” and was reluctant to try the slideshow in “G” as you had to use Jetpack plug in, so I switched to “Classic Editor” … I did a slideshow but it retained the large typeface for the title and the justified margins. Hopefully it launches okay as the preview in one browser it looked like all separate pics and in another browser the preview was the slideshow (all my favorite park nature pics through the years). I will find the other comments later to respond – why did 3 of your comments go to spam?

      Liked by 1 person

      • Joni says:
        April 20, 2019 at 12:03 pm

        I see my Dutch Inheritance post now has 111 comments, so I am wondering if my comments which went to spam, did so because maybe it limits the number of comments on a particular post? (Maybe in proportion to your followers?) That may be why some of your comments went to spam for me, but none lately, but you often have lots of comments on your posts. Maybe it’s a type of regulation by WordPress, not that I think they will admit it, as when I asked the Happiness Engineer about it, he said he didn’t know and just to let him know if it did regularly. I bet he does know and just isn’t saying. That’s just my theory though. Don’t worry about it, I’m sure my comments weren’t important. Wow, torrential rain out there, so depressing for running errands….

        Liked by 1 person

      • lindasschaub says:
        April 20, 2019 at 8:45 pm

        I have found the comments, but I have recently switched browsers as I was having issues with Chrome (like I could not do captions, but I can with the Opera browser). And the other day I was trying to send a video to Ally about Southern women from YouTube and it did not display the link … I thought that was odd, and I went back there later and discovered that in Opera, YouTube just says “YouTube” … you have to do another click to send it to someone and then you get the actual link. Opera is supposed to be quicker and safer but it is different. There are two ways to access comments. I do not recall if I was in Opera this morning, but the comments looked different – I clicked “approve” and instead of going to “pending” it flew off the screen. All three of them – I have since found them in Notifications. All this tech stuff has me fizzed. I did the post for today and then had the news on and they said Earth Day was Monday. I always thought it was observed on the 3rd Saturday of April. I just left it to launch today but had to go edit it. I did half of it in Gutenberg and half in Classic Editor – I wanted the slide show in there. We had light rain until about 10:00 a.m., then it came down in buckets non-stop until about 2:15, then just light rain. It was the same yesterday and last Sunday. Not likely this weather – it is just like last year. As to the comments, I had a lot of my comments going to spam about a year ago. It was happening 3/4s of the time and sometimes you know you replied, but there is no “reply arrow” in the notifications or it doesn’t show up after you put it there. This happens with Shelly a lot and we don’t know why. Anyway it was bad a year ago and someone else wrote to WP before I did and was told it was because she replied to a comment with record speed and it sent the comment to spam. She wrote back and said that was unlikely as she doesn’t pounce on each comment when it arrives – it may be hours before she answers it.

        Liked by 1 person

      • Joni says:
        April 20, 2019 at 9:21 pm

        I think comments going to spam is WordPress’s way of limiting the number of comments on a post, between two people…..just my theory though, I have no proof. None of your comments have gone to spam lately for me, so maybe it is just entirely random. I do type fast, so maybe I am replying too fast! I always thought Earth Day was a Saturday too, so people would be off work and plant trees and clean up etc.

        Liked by 1 person

      • lindasschaub says:
        April 20, 2019 at 9:50 pm

        That could bee too – I wonder if that is Googable to find out even if they say not. I think it was on a Saturday because people aren’t going to do things on a Monday. Maybe because it is the Easter weekend?

        Like

      • Joni says:
        April 20, 2019 at 10:52 pm

        Could be….as the schoolkids here get Monday off, but not many working people.

        Liked by 1 person

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 20, 2019 at 8:25 am

      P.S. – I am glad you liked this – I am out of new nature photos, so had to resort to Pinterest – there is a ton of stuff on that site, more so than Pixabay.

      Liked by 1 person

      • Joni says:
        April 20, 2019 at 12:04 pm

        I didn’t know you could use Pinterest for pics? In the New Editor, do you add photos right from your computer Picture file, or do you still have to add them to media file first?

        Liked by 1 person

      • lindasschaub says:
        April 20, 2019 at 8:34 pm

        I am finally getting back to finish responding to comments and for the life of me – why did the three comments go to spam again? As to the pictures, as I understand it, for blogs, especially personal blogs, you can use pictures that are part of Creative Commons and if it does not have a copyright symbol or warning about a copyright, it is fine to use it. I have used pictures from Pixabay and Pexel. I like Pixabay and they have the photographer’s name on it and I’ll attribute to the photographer’s name and to Pixabay. That is how I found Jill Wellington. I used her photos on Pixabay for years and then discovered she lived right here in Michigan. I never noticed the bio page for each photographer, I just searched images. You don’t even have to attribute to Pixabay. It is the same for Pinterest, but if it says copyright or has the symbol steer clear of it. I used Pinterest because I was specifically looking for Crayolas and found them. In Pixabay I didn’t care for the crayons they had at all. I happened to find the picture of the girl in an area called “melted crayon art” and it fit the post. I usually save the images to my photo file and then upload them from there to Media. Sometimes, like for Tuesday Musings and Friday Frivolity, I will just go back to my last post and save some space by grabbing that photo. This slideshow I did today, I went ahead and saved all the pictures and reloaded them again … it would have taken forever to go through again. I have the same photos in a gallery on the front page of my blog (actually a few more that were taken in the neighborhood). I have saved all the posts and pictures I’ve used since day #1. At this point, nearly 1,300 blog posts, I don’t know that I would want to recreate the blog from scratch, but I would have it on a flash drive anyway. I usually archive the posts (which I do in Word) and the photos quarterly. I was so behind though, I had not archived them since June 30th! I finally did it last weekend in anticipation of using the new computer.

        Liked by 1 person

      • Joni says:
        April 20, 2019 at 9:16 pm

        I don’t have anything archived, I draft in Word but it’s a rough draft, so I mostly edit in WordPress, sometimes I just compose the whole thing in WPress, so I guess I’m dependent on their server never crashing….but I’m only working towards 100 posts this summer, almost 2 years. 1300 posts is impressive, and every one so creative! It’s a good thing you have them archived.

        Liked by 1 person

      • lindasschaub says:
        April 20, 2019 at 9:48 pm

        Thank you – I should hit that in the next few days. Depending on whether I just do a “Happy Easter” post or not. I am very behind in Reader but tomorrow I’ll get here much earlier even if walking … I hate getting here so late in the evening as I never catch up. I did the last two in WordPress and did not post them in Patch (oops) … last night I shut down, then remembered I forgot and hopefully I can still do it – maybe not, it is late and I don’t have the Word document as I did today’s and yesterday’s right in WP. I don’t know if I’d put it all together though – that would be a massive undertaking – hopefully their servers never crash.

        Liked by 1 person

      • Joni says:
        April 20, 2019 at 10:55 pm

        When the teenager who helped me with the printer comes back sometime to help me do a general backup, I’ll ask him again, but he said the WPress servers back everything up…..I guess they’re would be a lot of angry people if that happened and it crashed. If I could back it up from WordPress I would, but I don’t know if there is a way to do that? I should ask a Happiness Engineer.

        Liked by 1 person

      • lindasschaub says:
        April 21, 2019 at 9:09 pm

        I don’t know how to do that either and keep thinking I should learn – I wonder if it is Googleable – or on a YouTube video. I’m sure they have a lot of back-up solutions because it is not only personal blogs but business blogs.

        Liked by 1 person

      • Joni says:
        April 21, 2019 at 10:44 pm

        They must, teenager told me not to worry about it, so I won’t. I do know a guy who has a little retirement business where he transfers data over and maintains blogs for people or businesses. He charges $500 per year to maintain and do updates etc, so I could have help if I decided to self-host some day, which I really can’t see myself doing.

        Liked by 1 person

      • lindasschaub says:
        April 21, 2019 at 10:47 pm

        I’m not sure how that works and I don’t think I’d do it – this way is easier, it is enough learning how to do new things on WP and being on shaky ground til you get used to it.

        Liked by 1 person

      • Joni says:
        April 21, 2019 at 10:50 pm

        At least with WP you have Happiness Engineers and some support if you run into difficulties. I’m not sure why people self-host, there must be some benefits to it? I never expected my blog to get big enough to attract that much attention.

        Liked by 1 person

      • lindasschaub says:
        April 21, 2019 at 11:00 pm

        I was surprised in Shelley’s blog that she had to pay extra for WP help … I don’t understand the whole concept. Mine won’t get that much attention either.

        Liked by 1 person

  11. writerinretrospect says:
    April 19, 2019 at 11:50 pm

    I love the rain! I don’t like being soaked, as I generally wear jeans, but a nice, light storm makes me want to twirl and dance through the raindrops. 😌

    Liked by 1 person

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 20, 2019 at 8:30 am

      I need to get into that mindset and perhaps I would embrace the rain more. I bought those waterproof walking shoes, and with the warmer temps, will need less clothes … so bare legs – I hate getting jeans sopping wet or any pants – sweatpants too, especially when shoveling snow … you get home soaked. So a longer waterproof coat and waterproof shoes and I’ll just deal with it … today the “real feel” is 26! The weather is so erratic that I think I just need to be more adaptable to continue my walking regimen. This is the 8th day in a row we have had rain here in SE Michigan!

      Liked by 1 person

  12. Andy Finnegan says:
    April 20, 2019 at 1:05 am

    We are lucky to have good bright warm weather here in the South of the UK just listening to weather on the TV and “cracking weather will continue”. hope your weather clears up soon.

    Liked by 1 person

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 20, 2019 at 8:31 am

      Thanks Andy – I hope so too and we can enjoy some bright sunshine … I miss my walks, as I’ve just walked in the neighborhood and just a couple of days at that due to the incessant rain.

      Like

  14. AnnMarie R stevens says:
    April 20, 2019 at 9:43 pm

    Miss Linda………………………….That’s pretty clever……………………ordering the box of shady gray crayons………………………………..I do umbrella walks……………………………..yes my lower legs get quite wet……………………………….

    Liked by 1 person

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 20, 2019 at 9:45 pm

      I have a big umbrella from work Ann Marie and I’m going to make an effort like you do, but let it warm up a tad more first – it was a real feel of 26 degrees this morning for goodness sake!

      Like

  15. Pril says:
    April 22, 2019 at 10:01 am

    The Rain as much as it sucked helped my lettuce get started… My garden loves it. My feet don’t like it much so waterproof shoes are great. I really got into the Hiking in the rain last year. due to every weekend being not so wonderful. If it is a light rain Free your hands and get a rain hat. I love my rain hat. It also protects your face from the sun.
    I have a not so waterproof rain jacket for warmer days and i just got a nicer rain-jacket a few weeks ago. so far the weather seems to be nice in the weekdays and goes to grey crayon box by Saturdays. and since i work office hours it sucks!
    good luck!!

    Liked by 1 person

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 22, 2019 at 5:25 pm

      I remember last Spring, weekend after weekend of rain. I went to Lake Erie Metropark to the boat well area as I was going to take one of the interpretive cruises on the “Clinton” and I wanted to check the boat out. I spoke to a couple who said they didn’t take their sailboat or kayak out for 9 weekends straight. I said I was bummed it rained to much when I look forward to the weekends and longer walks, but had truly lost count. Was this when you went to REI – I saw that in your post where you explored the nearby park? I looked on their site after I read your post for the waterproof shoes – I wanted something that was going to comfortable, but good support as well for long walks (hopefully). You have a new post too – I am very behind in Reader as I posted 6 times in one week’s time … unusual for me!

      Like

  16. Laurie says:
    April 22, 2019 at 4:41 pm

    I love the photos you used to illustrate this post! Rain-walking is definitely an acquired taste. I like it if it is warm enough. Walking in a cold rain? No thanks!

    Liked by 1 person

    • lindasschaub says:
      April 22, 2019 at 5:09 pm

      Thanks Laurie – I was out of new nature photos and hadn’t been to the Park in over a week, so I decided to be creative in another way. We’ve had too many cold rains and my inaugural walking-in-the-rain treks have to wait until warmer days. I’m hoping the new waterproof walking shoes will spur me on!

      Liked by 1 person

  17. thesecretblind says:
    April 28, 2019 at 6:12 pm

    I hope mother natures primary colour crayons come back into your life really soon Linda 😘❤

    Liked by 1 person

  18. sunniesmybunnies says:
    May 12, 2019 at 1:36 am

    Beautiful post , lovely reading . Do find time to read mine here https://sunniesmybunnies.wordpress.com/2018/05/13/a-letter-to-mom/

    Liked by 1 person

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