They're a pair of mischievous imps and it is useful to keep an alert eye and ear on their silences. Immediate absence from view and surrounding quiet usually spells some kind of mischief. But not always. They're swift and stealthy, and sometimes sneak past us when we're absorbed in doing something, so we aren't aware of their immediate presence, where they shouldn't necessarily be. But their unending curiosity about everything we do and their impulse to be right there as direct witnesses ensures their impulses.

We keep the door to the laundry room closed during the winter months. The laundry room has one door at the side of the house leading to the outside. And the other door leads to the garage. Two doors in a fairly limited space means that the room can get cooler than the rest of the house, and we prefer to keep that cool atmosphere limited to the laundry room itself; the difference in ambient temperature is marked when we do open the door for access to the laundry machines or when we're preparing to exit the house into the garage.

The thing of it is, the ceramic floor there, in the passageway from the kitchen to the laundry room is, like the kitchen and the laundry room, dark blue with black markings. And since our two little rascals are black, and small and quick, we don't always see when they slide past us on our heels into the laundry room as we enter it briefly for any reason. If we are aware they're there, we usher them out and they know what "out!" means. The reason they love going in there is that by leaping about strategically they're able to access mittens, woolly socks and headgear which they love to swift out of the laundry room and into the family room to play with.

As soon as we see what they're energetically trying to pull apart between them in a game of gnaw-and-destroy, we retrieve the item, depriving them of that particular game, briefly. But other opportunities always present themselves sooner or later. The thing of it is, we don't always notice when they've been in the laundry room after us, particularly at night, and often when we're absorbed in other things, we simply exit, closing the door behind us. Leaving one or another of the little mites locked into the room.

Some time afterward we will hear a short, sharp bark. They often emit those barks when they're taunting one another to come and play, and it will take a little while before we realize that one of them is sitting calmly beside us while the other is nowhere to be seen, intermittently barking, until the bark takes on a frantic-puppy tenor, and we realize where the absent puppy happens to be, and take steps to liberate him/her.

At which point the released puppy's gratitude is expressed in wildly ecstatic kissable form.

So then, what qualifies as respect for and love of nature? Is it those people who venture out into natural surroundings to find themselves embraced by the natural world and the freedom to embark on personal recreational adventures using all the resources that nature allows us to, without impairing in any conceivable manner the veracity of her handiwork?

Say, for example, hiking in mountain settings, straining to reach the heights to enjoy the peerless views, the clear, clean air, the series of landscapes encountered through the endeavour.

Or planning a canoe excursion that will require patience and energy to negotiate a series of lakes and rivers, the necessity of camping within raw nature in a preserve geared ensure that humankind disturbs the landscape as little as possible, embarking on a series of paddling and portaging whose close-up of natural surroundings can be achieved in no other way.

Over the years we've been exposed to the presence of bears, of deer, coyotes, wolves and of moose in places where we've taken ourselves to enjoy nature. Those represented high adventure for us, venturing out to areas that are geographically remote, far from 'civilization' as we know it, prepared to be resilient and capable of looking after our immediate needs while pursuing the completion of a journey into nature.

The majestic and soaring mountains of the Cariboo range in northern British Columbia, in a circuit of the Bowron Lakes gave us an experience that transcended all the less ambitious journeys we had experienced in Algonquin Park over the years, spending days and weeks at a time canoeing-portaging to the interior of that vast area. The Bowron Lakes was that experience magnified immensely.

This afternoon I overheard an interview with a man who was identified as the leader of the British Columbia Conservative party. But the interview was anything but political in that sense, though it might have been, in another. The man was waxing ecstatic over his love for nature and how he was instilling that love and respect for the natural world into his eleven-year-old daughter's inner core by introducing her to the values that mean the most to him.

She had recently shot her first moose, an event that thrilled and excited her, solidifying her love of nature, to hear her father describe it. He had taken great pains to teach her how to handle a rifle, and had arranged for her to have tuition in handling firearms for the purpose of hunting. Killing an animal, he averred, was his way of tucking himself into nature's embrace. And so, he was dedicated to hunting, or as the conversation repeatedly mentioned, 'killing'. For there was, as far as he was concerned, something deeply sombre and noble about it all.

The weekly bird column that appears in our local newspaper stated yesterday that as a result of the extreme prolonged cold weather we've experienced this winter, birds that have in the past migrated but of late years many of which have hung around rather than flying off to more moderate climes, may have perished in some significant numbers.

It also made reference to fewer birds now at local feeding stations, but that in a few weeks' time migrating birds will begin their circuit back to this area and beyond; that up to 200 species will in fact nest here and raise their young before heading off further afield. As a result we're likely to see a proliferation of birds, some of them seldom-seen, if we're fortunate enough.

We have seen, since the arrival finally of milder temperatures, fewer birds at our own feeders. It seems strange that when the days are crackling-cold, there are many more birds taking refuge and feeding than when the weather relents. We can always depend on the doves, however to keep arriving, seating themselves calmly, resting after they've taken what they need of the seed offerings.

The cardinals are less often seen now, but do occasionally grace us with their brilliant presence. The fidgety juncos, nuthatches and chickadees and a variety of sparrows like the redpolls are no longer seen in numbers and as frequently but they will no doubt return, along with others we're less accustomed to seeing. As well as the occasional hairy or downy woodpecker.

Bringing them comfort brings to us a feeling of serenity in the hope that the little we're able to do for area birds represents a needed assist to bring them through our harsh, and this year particularly so, winters.

She's completing a political science essay. So when she called, that was the essence of our discussion. Along with a few other items of general discussion. Hard to believe that the infant we helped raise by providing our grandparent services as caregivers during the working day is now attending university. Not only attending the university of her ultimate choice but doing so far from home.

Of course she wanted to know what we were up to. It's a ritual; at one time she knew intimately what we 'were up to', since she was here with us, sharing our days. Now they're updates, asides from her own preoccupation. She can imagine what we're 'up to', since her memory serves her well enough to recall the details of the home we shared, and her memory dredges up the things we ordinarily do. Including those daily ravine walks which began in her young life when she was a passenger on my back, inserted into an infant backpack and hauled along the trails.

Eventually she grew old enough to learn how to negotiate the trails on her own sturdy little legs, the experience giving her the ability to naturally and easily traverse natural challenges as a skilled bipedal walker ambling daily through forested trails. Now she has been transported within a forest of highrises in downtown Toronto and the daily walks she takes are from her residence to the university campus for classes.

So, what did we do today? Nothing very exciting. We did give our two little imps haircuts, and they turned out well enough. This is the third time we've undertaken that little chore, and their acquiescence has improved somewhat but not wonderfully; they still fidget, but uncomplainingly. And we did have a ravine walk during which they were introduced to a very friendly bull mastiff and its large and very hairy Newfie companion.

When our granddaughter called this morning her opening question was, as always, what were we doing? My response elicited a groan of agony from the child. I informed her that I was in the process of preparing Chelsea buns to bake for dessert for this evening's dinner. She agonized that she just loves them and compared to what she's been exposed to in the food department anything sounds good to her. In an attempt to mollify her I mentioned I'd baked a batch of the same last week, and they'd turned out awful. But of course, trying to convince her that her Bubbie can have cooking/baking disasters is quite the challenge to her belief that everything I prepare is mouth-watering.

My husband loves Chelsea buns, and I bake them occasionally. The thing about raised dough is that you must have the patience to prepare it properly, and I'm forever in a hurry. Last week, it's true, happened to be an anomaly; usually most everything I bake does turn out well. But last week I hurried the rising dough along, and began working with it much too soon before it had rested and risen adequately. And the result was as I should have expected.

So I thought I'd give them another go today, exercising restraint, allowing the sweet dough adequate raising time. Our granddaughter just happened to call when I was about to punch down the risen dough to roll it out to a rectangle to be sprinkled with cinnamon, brown sugar, pecans and raisins. Then that rectangle rolled like a jellyroll, cut and fitted into a prepared baking pan.

Only this time around I thought I'd try something different. I would nestle the buns separated into extra-large muffin tins. And so that's just what I did. And they look just fine. The taste-test will occur this evening.

As for the food our granddaughter is eating; since September she has been resident in a fairly upscale student residence at University of Toronto. The residence is a converted hotel which retained all its original chefs and the claim is that the food served in residence is excellent; a cut above the usual. Our granddaughter begs to differ. It's one of the reasons we bought a mini-refrigerator for her room so she can stock things like yoghurt and fruit to supplement the prepared meals.

The fact that she's a committed vegetarian no doubt accounts in large part for her opinion of the food served at the residence. Which is why she has concluded she would prefer next year to look for off-campus residence, a small utility apartment where she will prepare her own food. "Utility" isn't quite in her lexicon actually, it's ours. A small apartment is what she would like but she would also prefer that it reflect a bit of the upscale style she has become accustomed to.

Jack and Jill were very well behaved this morning, permitting me to get on with the baking and other evening meal preparations without behaving in their usual brattish manner. It was only when they heard me chopping vegetables that their wistful inclination in hoping that something might descend to the floor level brought them around to the kitchen.

This household of two people who enjoy fresh fruits and vegetables as primary ingredients in our diet produces quite a bit of compostable waste. We generally end up with at least two pailfuls of kitchen waste which are placed into two backyard composters that we've maintained for decades. That compost eventually makes its way into our gardens to enrich the soil and help to produce the floral delights that we anticipate throughout the spring, summer and fall months.

Using yesterday's meal preparations as an example, we had two banana peels and two orange skins from breakfast, along with a teabag and coffee grounds to load into the compost pail. We don't eat lunch, so nothing was added for a mid-day meal, but at dinnertime we ate a Shepherd's Pie and Harvard Beets. I'd also prepared a fruit compote comprised of pear and apple chunks, but since I never peel apples or pears, only the pits went into the compost pail. We usually end up with two kitchen compost pails-full of waste weekly. The kitchen compost pails hold about 7 litres (roughly 3/4 cubic foot) of waste.

I also never peel potatoes, simply scrub the skin and cook them since most of the vitamin C is just under the skin; same with fruit. The beets do get peeled after they've been par-boiled. The onion and garlic peel went into the composter. But throughout the course of the week there are waste products like asparagus stems, the inedible leafy portions of cauliflower, melon husks, broccoli stalks, mandarin orange peels, grape stems and other like waste.

Usually during the course of a winter we experience a few periods of milder weather constituting enough of a thaw so that the contents of the two backyard composters are reduced, giving us room to place additional waste into them. Sometimes it seems iffy, that we may not be enabled to continue placing compost from the kitchen into the backyard composters, but just when it seems we'll be stumped, a spate of warmer weather ensues and the full bins become compacted.

Not so this year. It's the first time we can recall having to dump the kitchen compost contents into a plastic bag to be placed in the garage where it will freeze until such time as the backyard composters once again become sufficiently compacted and reduced in height to enable us to add to them. A minor irritant of this colder-than-normal winter, but quite obviously nothing compared to the folks whose household water pipes have frozen.

Certainly Jack and Jill would appreciate the arrival of more balmy days of spring, to allow them to more fully enjoy the comfort of warmth alongside the opportunity to romp in the out-of-doors. But they will be puzzled at the absence of all that delectable white stuff that they enjoy gorging themselves with.

Since the arrival of those two little black imps to our household the attention they receive from us has hampered our leisure time somewhat. Since we have no end of 'leisure time' it presents as no great obstacle to maintaining the quality of our lives. Considerably enabled by their presence, in fact.

For my husband it has meant sometimes having less time left in the day to devote to his many projects when quotidian and additional household tasks are also taken into account. But he manages to get away to his workshop from time to time, to catch up on whatever it is that most latterly takes his time and his imagination.

Most recently it has been his decision to add to the glazed layers on our dining room windows. He had constructed shutters years ago, both for privacy with achieved with beauty attached, and more practical reasons; additional shelter from the winter cold penetrating the house interior. Now, he decided to add another layer for all the same reasons; the inner stained glass windows to swing out when we want an unobstructed view of the gardens.

So that project is coming along and in fact almost completed. And then he will have to wrack his creative mind to find another project to take up any slack time in his daily schedule.