Snowy Saturday

Hey, the weather guys finally seem to have gotten it right! We awoke this morning to 10 inches of snow in our driveway, which we had to clear out before Jim could drive to Syracuse to pick-up Corey. Just before they returned home, I went out and snow blowed 2 more inches with a sleet crust. For the afternoon, it continued to sleet, quite heavily at times. And now it is snowing at a rate that will bring significant accumulations. Ahhh March, in like a lion, out like a lamb.

But the weather did not deter Jim from bringing the boy back to the nest. Actually, Syracuse did not get this storm and once Jim was 30 miles east of Rochester, the roads cleared. 

Haircut review: I like it! Corey's teammate, who serves as team barber, did a nice job on giving Corey a buzz-cut. The short hair does take some getting used to-I still do a double-take when he walks into a room.

This afternoon I had to make a quick trip to church to

 rehearse with the choir for Music Sunday tomorrow. I am ringing chimes with 2 other bell ringers as an accompaniment to one vocal solo. Our part is not hard, knowing when to start ringing is the challenge!

All the grandparents joined us for dinner tonight and we had a fun evening. Bob and Sally joined us for Grape Pie later in the evening. One topic of conversation was Jim's new found interest in recycling yarn. He is now working on unraveling his second old sweater to recover the yarn for another project! He seems to enjoy figuring out how the sweater was constructed so he can unconstruct it and then finding the yarn end to start pulling to unravel the sweater is another challenge.  I will let you know what I end up doing with this "used" yarn. 

I have been knitting on my Noro scarf and really like the way the striping looks. I am almost halfway done and will post a photo of the finished product. 

I usually spin on Saturdays, but there was no time today. I did give Gram and GrandDad a quick demo of my spinning wheel, but will hope to do some serious spinning tomorrow. 

The crack in the van windshield got about a foot longer on today's Syracuse excursion. Hopefully the windshield will stay intact until its repair appointment on Tuesday. 

Tucker called tonight just as we were sitting down for dinner. I chatted with him for just a minute and he said he would try to call again tomorrow. 

It is good to have Corey home. I imagine sleeping and eating will be top priorities for him for the next 3 days. 

Hope all is well.

MId-Week Update

Well, we made it to Thursday night, with the weekend in sight. 

Jim has a new project. Yesterday he came home from work and I noticed that he had a hole in the sleeve of his wool sweater. I told him he needed to throw it away. I jokingly added that he could unravel the lambswool yarn and I could knit something else out of it! By the time I came home from bell rehearsal, he had cut the sleeves off and was trying to find the yarn end that would allow him to unravel the sleeves. He found it and my knitty knoddy is now quite full of yarn. He is back at the project tonight working on the body of the sweater. I'm not sure what I will do with the yarn but maybe a hat and scarf for Jim. 

I came home today and discovered this ditch digger in my neighbor's yard, ready to dig up our yard. The town engineer has not called us back about a start date, but it looks like it is getting closer. 

Yesterday I got re-certified in CPR and in the use of an AED (Automated

External Defibrillator). It is an annual certification and I hope that I never have to put my skills to the test.

 

My annual Women's Weekend group is struggling to find a date to go to Jenny Lake this year. When we all had kids at home, it seems we were more available to get away for a long weekend. This year we cannot find a weekend that we are all available and that camp is open. Some of us are going out to dinner on Monday to try to come up with another plan, ironically enough, we cannot even all get together here in town for dinner! I keep telling myself that this will all work out and we will get away. It has become an important time for all 6 of us. 

Terry is supposed to come to town this Saturday with Kenn, but the weather guys are calling for a winter storm to roll through here Friday night and Saturday. If their recent track record is taken into account, the storm probably won't amount to much! We are supposed to go to Syracuse on Saturday morning to bring Corey home for a few days. It is the start of his Spring Break and it will be good to have him home. I guess we'll have to wait to see if the weather impacts our plans. 

If you have ever ridden in the passenger seat of our van, you may have noticed that there was a star-shaped ding in the windshield. It has been there for the last four years (or so we guess) and it has always passed inspection. Jim came out to the van at the end of the work today and discovered that the ding had morphed into a 4 foot crack! Not sure how come it happened today, while the car was sitting in the parking lot, but it did  and now Jim needs to look into getting it repaired.

Hope all is well. 

Monday's Notes

I posted this entry and 2 minutes later Corey sent us an e-mail with this photo of his new haircut! He decided he needed a change so the guy who is going to be one of his roommates next year played the role of barber. Leave me a comment about what you think of Corey's new 'do!

First a Sunday summary: We had a nice dinner with Grandma and Grandpa (pot roast, Grandpa loved it!). While they were here, I gave them a tour and demonstration of my spinning wheel. I think they were amazed that I could turn a mass of jumbled fibers into a fine yarn. But, I guess, I'm amazed sometimes too! We also showed them our San Diego photos which was fun for us. 

Last night I finished my Rockin' Sock Club socks and they are quite unique. The first sock I knit had these wonderful stripes, evenly spaced from the cuff to the toe. On my second sock, the colors and stripes started pooling just after I turned the heel. Couldn't figure out why, but keep knitting on because it had an interesting effect. When I went to start the toe decreases, I discovered my problem-I had 5 too many stitches after I finished the heel part! Who'd have guessed that 5 extra stitches could have such a dramatic effect on the self-patterning yarn. I figure that when I wear these socks my feet will be in shoes, so no one will see the different foot parts, and the cuff parts look the same. So, I learned something with this project and that is one of the many reasons I enjoy knitting. The next sock club sock kit arrives later this month so I'm feeling pretty good that  I'm not behind from the start!

Last night Aunt Terry called us to see if we were going to be home this Saturday. She and Kenn are coming this way for a quick visit before going on some college visits. They will be spending Saturday night with us, as Kenn is another grandson who is allergic to Grandpa's cats. I'll see if Grandma and Grandpa want to have dinner here on Saturday. It will be good to see Terry and Kenn.

 

We had a teasing taste of Spring here today, with temps reaching 67 degrees (I need to figure out how to do the degree symbol here so I don't have to type the word out-anybody with a Mac know how to do that?). The snow/ice in the driveway melted and there are flooding concerns in the area, not at our house though. Alas, tomorrow we return to typical March weather with snow, freezing rain, sleet, and rain in the forecast. Once again the weather guys are pretty hyped up for the potential with this winter storm, but they have gotten a reputation for blowing things like this way out of proportion. 

The town is getting ready to move on our storm sewer project. They have placed a pile of sewer pipes in the parking lot of the jewelry store behind us and we came home today to the 4 cement sewer connectors pictured below. They are on our neighbors' yard across the street, poised to be moved into our yard. A town engineer left a message on our machine today asking us to call him so he could update us on this project. 

We got news from the Lincoln University crew. The big news is that Uncle Jimmy got a job with a construction company and will be starting next Monday. Congratulations, Jim! We know that you will be an asset to that company. Zach is a good news/bad news kind of guy right now. He severely sprained his wrist while skiing (no doubt done while trying some high-flying hotdog move!!), but won a new Xbox 360 game system at a school fundraiser!

 

If your family has something of interest to share, just let me know and I will spread the word.

Hope all well.