SEQUIN-LINED FIREWOOD BAG

Fired up the woodstove for the first time today, enjoyed anew how wonderfully it takes that edge off the mountain cold, right from the first flicker. Then when it warms up and fills the house with the scent of camphor (I put a slab of camphor wood on top this time, to warm up), if you stand near the stove the heat is like slipping into a hot bath, for woodstove heat has body and power, warms right through you, unlike the drifty-wafty derivative kind of heat from something that wimps out of a vent somewhere and dries out your eyes, doesn't even know you're there.

There are other delights involved. When I went out to get the old canvas firewood bag and fill it up with golden chunks of last year's oak to bring inside (good muscle work all round), I opened the bag and found that it had been unanimously chosen as venue for what looked like the ladybug Woodstock. The entire bag was lined with red-dotted black sequins all huddled together, shimmering with news of summer experiences.

I've never seen so fashionable a firewood bag. But no way I could fill a bag of ladybugs with a bag of firewood, and it was that time. So I gently redirected all the sequins onto a nice fernbed we have beside the deck, where they can party on, under, in and beneath the curling leaves. Pretty interesting the sound, a large steady stream of ladybugs on a dried-up bed of ferns. According to the local folkery, so many ladybugs means it will be a warm winter. Especially likely now that the stove is warm.