Today we will experience our shortest day with 7hrs, 7minutes and 53 seconds of daylight. It is , though, not the latest sunrise nor the earliest sunset. Our latest sunrise will be Jan 1-3 at 9:20am and our earliest sunset was Dec. 10-17 at 4:25pm.
We had a beautiful sunrise to start the day. I took this at 9:03am.
There is a certain quiet magic being outdoors on the shortest day of the year.
You can stand outside, breathe in the cold air and hear blissful silence. Any movement by even the smallest of creatures can be heard. A chickadee pecking a sunflower seed sounds like a woodpecker in summer. A moose moving through the bush sounds like an elephant (to be fair, I have never heard an elephant moving in the wild).
The snow drifts in interesting ways creating a slightly mogul type landscape.
We went for an afternoon snowshoe.
An afternoon ice fog had settled in and the sun was already low in the sky even though it was only 2:33pm.
Our previous path was blown in again so Chris went ahead to blaze a new trail. I conveniently had not brought my walking stick so I could trail behind. Blazing the trail is usually my job.
I stayed out a bit longer feeding the birds.
Lots of chickadees, Downy Woodpeckers, Red Polls and Pine Grosbeaks out today. As usual, only the chickadees would come to my hand but we have so many now that sometimes there are fights for position on the glove.
Even though I appreciate the quiet, serene beauty of this short winter’s day, there is this wonderful feeling knowing that the days will only get longer from now till June.
Happy Winter’s Solstice and a Merry Christmas to everyone in just four days!
Beautiful photos!