Gathering

Instead of participating in the hustle, bustle, and craziness that is Black Friday, I love spending my day after Thanksgiving at home and in our own quiet little town.  Yesterday, I spent about an hour driving around and cutting winterberries from the swampy areas.  The winterberries are particularly bright, beautiful, and plentiful this year, so finding them is easy.  Cutting them is not.  They like wet soil, so they are frequently just out of reach in the marshes.   Armed with a pair of loppers and outfitted with rubber boots with good treads (the better to keep from slipping on the frost-coated leaves and grasses, AND the better to stay dry when  if a misstep lands me in the water), I set out on my quest.  My reward was a huge armful of them!