SNOW!

Hooray! Finally, some snow! It only took until February for us to actually have a couple of days that resemble winter… but it snowed. And boy, did it! Have I ever mentioned how much I love snow? I even like to shovel it… for about 5 minutes. 😛 There’s just something about it, especially when it’s fluffy and sticks to me and everything else. There’s nothing quite like looking out my back door at the woods, with all of the tree and plant branches coated with snow. It makes such a delicate, lacy scene with all of the wild raspberry bushes we have in the back. And the front yard becomes this wonderous, soft, rolling landscape of pristine whiteness. I always hate to have to disturb it by clearing the driveway and the sidewalk, so I’m glad that Terry isn’t awake yet.

It started to flurry sometime yesterday afternoon, getting heavier as time went on. We had the big, fluffy flakes that I like in the beginning and then as it got later into the night, the flakes got smaller and smaller. Terry told me why and it made sense when he said it at night, but for some reason, I can’t recall it well enough to not make an idiot of myself, so I won’t go there. 😉

I have no idea how much snow actually fell during the night. I think we had 4 to 6 inches on the ground by the time we went to bed at 1:00 AM. We were just at the edge of a forecasted 8 to 12 inches total accumulation on the weather maps, and the snow was still falling when we went to sleep. Sometime during the night, though, the wind kicked up, causing all of that gorgeous white stuff to drift. There’s snow plastered against my back door like it’s been sand blasted and it drifted so deeply in the front that it’s about at the level of the front porch.

Imagine my surprise and then displeasure when I realized that I was going to have to shovel in order to let the dog out when I went to the back door this morning! Terry had shoveled out a spot for her last night that should have been reasonably usable, if the snow hadn’t been blown around. There was no trace of it left this morning. The back steps were piled high with snow, so I opened the door and went to grab the shovel that was right near the door when Phoebe ran past me, with no leash, no harness and no tags on – ACK! Fortunately, she only got as far as the second step because the snow was so high, so she stopped long enough for me to pick her up to bring her back in. Little brat! So, with the dog mildly chastized and standing far away from the door, I took the shovel and from the back door, I started shoveling the steps. Okay, good, no problem. I didn’t even have to put shoes on. Woot! Great, three steps cleared and I’m down to the top level of snow on the ground. I reached a little further (still not wanting to put any shoes on and actually go out there) and started to push the shovel to clear out a piece of grass for Phoebe to use and abruptly came to the rude realization that what I thought was the ground was actually another step!

Change of plan, I was actually going to have to stop, put shoes on and go out in that windy mess. Ugh. Did I mention that I love to LOOK at snow? 😆 I do like to be out in it a bit, but usually as a planned, well-dressed endeavor, not with me in my husband’s sneakers (because they were still near the door from when he shoveled last night), a pair of sweat pants and a short-sleeved T-shirt. Yep, that’s me. Too lazy to go retrieve my coat and put it on, I just slipped on Terry’s sneakers, tied them loosely, grabbed the shovel and stepped out. Of course, every time I tossed a shovel full of snow to the side, some of it would come blowing back at me. No matter which side I chose. I only shoveled out a small spot, figuring Terry can shovel out some more later today. Phoebe wasn’t too happy, but she wasn’t able to do what she normally does when she doesn’t like the shoveled area, which is hop out onto the snow and bounce around. No, the snow had drifted to be about as high as she was, so she was going nowhere except this little channel that I had shoveled. Since it only consisted of a shovel’s width, with me just taking a few chunks out of the snow in a straight line, she could barely turn around and wasn’t very pleased with the lack of space in which to do her business. Sorry girl!

I hear a bird tweeting now. I would say that I wish we had filled the bird feeder so that I could see all of the colorful birds flock to it for some food after the snowstorm, but it fell victim to the wet, sticky snow and the overnight sand blasting, as well, so it would not be in very usable shape at this point. I hope that the garage side of the house isn’t too badly drifted, though I know it will be, because Terry will have to shovel himself a path to the shed so he can get the snowblower out. We were supposed to go out to dinner tonight with a couple of other people, but I’m already starting to wonder if I care or not.

Well, for now, it’s stitching time! 😀 Isabelle was wondering what I would be stitching on today. And the answer is… (drumroll please) several things. I need to do the backstitching on the second tuffet piece so that I can put the two together into a tuffet pincushion today. I would also like to stitch part 4 of the mystery sampler, which was released yesterday morning. And then it will be a toss-up between obligation stitching (I’m doing another panel for the WTC quilt, but not with names) and the needlecase SAL. That will be a tough choice. The fun and newness of the needlecase SAL has captured my attention for a couple of nights so far, but my strong sense of obligation will probably tell me that I really need to work on the WTC quilt panel so that I can get it done and back to Mary in the next week or so. Regardless, it’s off to stitch I go!