Friday, December 26, 2008

The slushy lining to the silver clouds

Rick spent a lot of yesterday shoveling off the sidewalk and cement pad in front of the garage so Brian could ride his new bike a bit, and then plowing more of the slushy snow off our driveway and the gravel road we live on. The county does no maintenance on it, so I'm sure the neighbors appreciated his efforts. It's raining now, so the snow is slowly melting away, revealing the extent of the damage it did. I still can't believe how completely I spaced the damage potential, damage that could have been prevented if I had been on top of the situation from the git-go and swept the snow off shrubs and trees! After picking up all the debris and pruning back all the damage, we are going to have a huge burn pile. Veggie hot dogs and marshmellows later, anyone?

But yesterday WAS Christmas Day, and it was not all work and no play. Rick left the snow on the north steps that lead toward the barn, and he and Brian tubed down several times. Although I cut off Rick's head in the last photo, I couldn't resist including it because it shows Brian's glee and Jackson's reaction to all the excitement (click on any photo to biggify).

Besides cooking and cleaning up yesterday, I worked on my impulse from Christmas Eve. By the end of the day, "baby makes three" - and I still have enough yarn for more! (I might, too, because it's a fun little knit that makes good use of the recycled silk.) Next week when I can finally get out and about in my car, I'll pick up some fabric to line these so I can give them to the girls. In the meantime, I am busily knitting away on their mother's birthday cardigan. Although I've been rather obsessed with knitting lately, I also want to skein off that lovely alpaca/lavendar yarn so I can start spinning something new by the new year.

That's it for now from . . .

11 comments:

Sharrie said...

Brian is soooooo lucky to have a father who will sled with him. Memories!

Deb said...

Love the little bags - they are adorable.
Will all your snow melt away soon? Glad Rick & Brian had a chance to sled together - father and son time is precious for sure :)

Jamie said...

Looks like you are having lots of fun in the snow. Congratulations on the rain, I'm still waiting for the promised rain and warmer temps. 13 days of snow is enough.

Love the bags, they are really cute!

Tina - omme i London said...

Sounds like you guys are really enjoying yourselves. :)
Merry Christmas to you and yours.

Sharon said...

Brian made memories that he will never forget. You'll get the damage under control and deal with the melt, but what he remembers won't have anything to do with any of that. My SIL emailed me today. As lovely as the snow looks, there's always the worry of floods in the end.

Gone2theDawgs said...

It has just started raining here...never thought I would say hooray! to that!!

I didn't do damage control either and didn't even think of it until I read your blog. I noticed my beautiful dogwood lost a large limb:( I'll have to wait until the snow melts some more to see what other plants are damaged.

Those pics of Rick and Brian really made me smile! :) What fun they had together.

Jackson was definitely trying to be the fun police there! Just doin'
his job, ma'am!

~~Sittin.n.Spinnin said...

How fun that looks! Gotta question; does Jackson bark like my Beamer? 'Arf' instead of 'bark'?

Anonymous said...

The pictures of the snow covered pines are beautiful. We tend to get ice storms and there is always alot of damage. My trees/shrubs seem to have come back alright. Last years split my redbud on top in the middle a bit, only time will tell if anything will happen because of that. My husband is Swiss, I Norwegian/German and we both opened Christmas Eve, but open now Christmas afternoon, after dinner. We do a Swiss fondue dinner Christmas Eve and the children put their gifts under the tree for Baby Jesus-and the traditional on Christmas Day. It's alot of fun for all of us and the children really get into doing something for our dear Savior. You are so lucky to sled and have fun in the snow. Brought back memories.

Michelle said...

Becky, I don't know without an audio comparison, but I would call Jackson's "vocalizations" loud and intense!

MaskedMan said...

Giver yourself a pass on the snow damage - You don't live in a region that normall gets heavy snow, so you can be forgiven for not anticipating the damage. People see snow, and they don't realize just how heavy it can get (I'm minded of the storm where, by rough calculation, I shoveled 13 tons of snow. No joke). This is why shoveling snow causes so many heart attacks. It'll pass, and the region is famous for growing things - The trees and bushes will recover.

Tubing down the stairs? Wonderful fun, though it may be an event difficult to recapture. Still, wonderful memories, and y'all've reset Brian's image of Christmas. He'll always have this image of a white Christmas in his head.

Lovely bags, too. ;-)

Tammy W. said...

Sledding down the steps looks like such great fun Michele. We had rain all day today and yesterday - so most of our snow is melted - we're left with lots of ice and water everywhere. I won't complain - it's the nicest weather we've had for the last 6 weeks.