We had snow!

We get a lot of cold days, and often rain. Not all the time do we get snow. This of course was snow that was around that night and a bit in the morning and was soon a distant memory. So I like to commemorate when it does show up:

Helps when you're letting the dogs out before bed to see the snow.

Yard decorations are great for showing up snow too

Just a dusting on this side of town

Leeloo out in the snow. Looking to see if there's something she should chase out of the yard

It's January and we have the possibility of more snow yet this year. Well until at least April anyway. We did have a week of very low, below 20 temperatures before Christmas. I do enjoy our mild temperate climate!

Capture December, Day 30 - Your Winter Wonderland

For the last few years we've been getting more snow in November and December. This year has kind of been odd and we've only had a couple of snowfalls to the valley floor. When you're only a couple hundred feet above sea level, you get shorted on snow. It's not really a problem since we're just an hour away from the Cascades and Mt Hood with its snow and there's often snow in the coastal range.

A few days before Christmas we did have a brief snow fall and I was fortunate enough to capture it:

Used to be a hazelnut orchard on the other side of the fence, it was probably only a 1/4 inch of snow and gone in a few hours

Norbert really enjoys the colder weather and does play in the snow when there's enough to play in

Houses instead of hazelnuts. I imagine next summer I'll have them on the other side of my fence. The roofs look pretty with the snow 

Wind toy, see the snowflakes falling?

Where the future houses will go, its all prepped for them to start building and it will be harder for me to see the snow on these trees, if at all.

We had snow today

We weren't planning on snow today. Last weather report I heard we were supposed to get some rain. I kind of wondered at that when I saw how long the frost on the grass was hanging on. Then I was knitting on the couch and through the curtains noticed some white stuff going by. So went to check it out. Sure enough big fat fluffy flakes were falling and because the ground was already cold, immediately set about sticking and accumulating. So here's the progression:

 

 

 

 

 

Normally the tables/chairs/BBQ are not out there. We won't talk about why they still are out. ;-)

The boys decided that today would be a great day to go snowboarding and had left before it started snowing here. They left the mountain at 5:30pm and I got a text message saying they were back at Luke's house at 10:30pm. A long day for them, but they're still young. ;-)

We haven't received the rain that was supposed to come in at 8pm to clear things up. Our mystery will be what we find in the morning. Is it going to stay cold enough that we'll wake up to the snow still here? Melted over night? If there's snow, most likely my spinning will be canceled for the day. We'll just have to wait and see. Hope all your loved ones are safe at home!

The shearing experience continues

So I came home with two bags of fleeces, one more than the other. What the heck comes next?

Washing them. I put back some of the nasty bits of the alpaca that PJ was loading me with but as you can tell from the previous posts pics, she did get some snuck in. I did a quick trip to the Dollar Tree for some mesh laundry bags - $1 three 12x15 inch bags. I then had to clean out the buckets that had been used with the pond fish and sitting out on the back patio all winter. Then since Duffy had shown the amazing results of the apparently clean but really not OFFF alpaca I decided mine should be washed too. This is the pretty apricot colored stuff I had gotten in case you didn't see it back in September:


I loaded up three bags with the apricot stuff and then took some of the worst nasty bits stuff of the white and then put them in the two buckets with some Palmolive (its what they had at the Dollar Tree) and hot water and let them soak over night. Oh my! The apricot water was just as brown as the nasty bits water. So I ran lukewarm water over the apricot stuff and then filled up the bucket with more hot water and detergent and let it soak again overnight. The white stuff took a little bit more work before it got its second soak. PJ had mentioned something about burrs and the alpacas. I found what she was talking about - there were burrs in the nasty bits besides the usual cause of the nasty. There was also a lot more grass and grass seeds and hay in their as well. I picked and washed, picked and washed and had the fleece come out looking much better. Still a little bit of darker areas where the nasty bits had been but looking like something that could actually be used now.

I rinsed out the second really dirty buckets today and got the water to run cleanly through them. I'm cheating with the drying process - I'm using the drying rack in my dryer and have the white fleece in the mesh bags going through a cycle. Then I'll run the apricot through. I figured the white if there was a problem since it was the 'nasty bits' stuff could be a better write off if something happened than anything else. Plus I don't have drying racks to setup to try to dry them any other way efficiently.

I used the cat flicker brushes that I had to try and get the 'blobs' back into a spinning shape. This also allowed me to get more of the vm still left in. So here's the progression, the middle row of the collage shows the same pic twice (Picassa does that if you don't have enough to make the collage) showing the nasty bits prewashing. The top and bottom rows show pics of the nasty bits after they have been washed and coming from the dryer and then the combed 'fluff'.


ETA: While working more with the white alpaca cleaned nasty bit bags I'm finding a lot of dead flea bodies in the mix. I've but those bags into a separate bag and on hold to decide it I really want to put the effort into picking out the bodies and the vm still in there.

I finished sock #1 of the "Band Stoppin' Boot Sock". I did a short row heel and a star toe as deviations from Sharon's "Traffic Stoppin' Boot Sock" pattern. I'm planning on giving the socks to my sister Jennifer I think.

This morning there was snow on the ground and I got a few pics of it with the previously posted crocuses (they were just poking through the ground):


The Cascade Lizard Ridge Blanket is shown on Cascade Yarns 220 patterns page! (Scroll to the bottom!)

Snow Again and more

The dogs woke me up at 2:30 am to go outside. They have a dog door but with the winter cold I've put in the block to keep things warmer in the house and critters out. The price I pay for this is middle of the night trips to go outside some nights.

Sure we had heard the reports that there were snow possibilities for Thursday but I figured since it had been raining and the ground cold that anything that made it to the valley floor would just melt. I got up to about 1/4 of an inch and big fat fluffy flakes falling.

It will be interesting to see how much survives until I get up.

Brandon and I enjoyed going through OMSI with adults only in their After Dark program. We didn't play with many of the games or their standard exhibits, just spent out time going through the Da Vinci exhibits. Pretty cool stuff. Not the actual things that Da Vinci created but replicas made by others and a few of his notebooks on display in glass cases. Some of the replicas had 'do not touch' signs, and I had to repeat the sign info to one gentleman with his hands on a display, it was a long handle up in the area and the sign on the display - he thought the sign should have been higher. They did have replicas that they did allow you to play with. Looking at his drawing of muscles and the digestive system blown up on the walls were fairly impressive. I also enjoyed how the various bits and parts of the Mona Lisa painting were explained.

The gift store was wisely left open to visitors. Brandon and went through and after looking at the various items related to the exhibit there was really nothing that 'had' to come home with us. The exhibit booklet was deemed just a repeat of the information he already had. I don't remember there being any signs about not taking photos, but didn't notice anyone else taking pictures, so no camera came out to show our visit.

There was a brief visit at Haggen's to pick up more ice cream for the boys and to get my bushing from Sharon. There weren't as many people there this week as last. The ebb and flow of people can be fun to watch. There was a lot of interest in Carissa's dyed roving that Kathleen brought in to share. The Cupcake Factory will probably be seeing some more business. Haggen's had a shopping cart with reduced price plants - purple calla lillies, of course one had to come home with me!

3:30 am, after spending time looking at updated blogs, replies in Rav since I went to bed and my Shelfari with the finished book, I'm about to stumble back in bed to get some more sleep and look out the patio. Even more fat fluffy flakes are falling and the patio that had been just wet is starting to get covered.

What will I wake up to find?

7:30 am I find that there are even more fat fluffy flakes falling.
9:00 am the sun is out. Now how quickly will it all melt away?

Snow Pictures as a collage in time order:


ps: Is it just my gmail spam box that gets LOTS of emails from women that are concerned about my orgasms and want me to buy the jack rabbit vibrator or what?

More snow?! Salmon Dave Sunset Highway Scarf

Well I guess its appropriate that I finish up a scarf and that its snowing outside. It's cold enough to snow, but the ground was wet/dry so not a huge amount of accumulation going on:

Here's Salmon Dave Sunset Highway Scarf. It's made with Stitchjones Superwash Dyepot Worsted in the Salmon Dave colorway and Kathleen Fajardo's Sunset Highway Scarf pattern. Both local ladies doing wonderful things with yarn. I ended up with 72 inches of blocked goodness using up all but 6 inches of the skein. I got a wrap around the neck and still nice chest coverage (no pics of that because I hate doing mirror shots):




That's scarf #2 out of four hoped for the month. I would like to also get a shawl going that's included in the scarf/shawl focus of the month. March is socks. ;^)

ps: something else is almost done as you can see by the progress bar, there's new pics, just can't see them unless you go into the project on Ravelry. Think its coming along nicely.

Cupcake review, Snow, Snowflake Stars

Cupcake reviews:
The mini cupcakes were okay but the Caramel Latte was more frosting than cupcake. Not bad after I picked off the coffee beans and they left their flavor behind, just way too much frosting. Gingerbread cupcake was pretty good, the little man had softened up by the time I ate it on Sunday. Wasn't terribly impressed by the PB&J mini. Peter's Mint Chocolate was minty and I loved the Ande's but the ganache was just a little too much for me. Luckily Brandon loves frosting. Just a little too rich for me. Not a bad experience overall and worth trying out others from their repertoire.

Snow:
When Brandon and I were going out to the cars this morning so I could get the Outback's brakes done at Royal Moore before he went to work it was little ice pelts coming down. Then it switched over to snow:




I was able to get one of the Snowflake Stars out into the beginning snow for a photo. I finished the second one this afternoon but it was already melted by that time. Snowflake Stars:


I then spent a couple of hours plying up the yak-merino. It's a 50-50 blend and deliciously soft. It's still resting on the bobbin before I give it a soak. Not sure if it will need any whacking but don't think it will:


Tomorrow is spinning with the ladies at Panera and then knitting with the ladies at Haggen's. It's a fiberlicious day. I'm trying to wrap up January's theme of ornaments. I just have one mini sweater to do, I think another hat and mitten set and I want to do a couple balls. I have until Saturday night to meet that goal.

He's not crazy

So since we've been getting the snow Norbert has been watching the sliding glass door and the dog door. At night I've been putting the cover in so that no blowing wind could come through. Saturday night Norbert was particularly barky at the door, and he didn't want to go out to potty. I finally had to lock him in the bedroom to keep him from keeping watch at the door.

Last night, at about 12:30, I got up to get some crackers to settle the acid reflux and stopped to look out the back door to see what it was doing. A shriek did escape and I was all girly, sitting on the foot of snow where the birdseed had been was a rat! Body length about six inches and with the light coming on it darted towards the house. Right where Norbert has been insisting that 'something is there'.

Freaked me out! I woke Brandon up to tell him about it. He assured me that there was rat poison under the house but nothing he could put out along the house because of the dogs. So glad that I've been keeping the cover on the dog flap, or I'm sure this brave rat would have tried to be inside the house. Ick!

I should trust Norbert's nose. It works really well. I just thought that he was 'hearing' things. Since I don't trust that his hearing is 100% from all of his ear infections, that's what I wasn't trusting.

Oh, we got another few inches last night and are supposed to get another two today. We're still in Oregon right? We didn't get mystically transplanted to some area that is supposed to get snow? Other than a few years as a small child I've lived in the Willamette Valley my whole life, I don't remember getting this much snow.

What I've been doing since its been snowing....(pic heavy)

I've cranked out six beaded necklaces. I'm getting good, I can now play with the bead placements. Here they are:
Showing the placement:
That's 1068 beads total that had to be pre-strung before knitting.....

I have a batch of German Mustard made from Tammy's homebrewed beer. I have a couple of small jars for giving, one for Tammy and one for us. I have another bottle of beer that she had for drinking that may end up being another batch.

In the fall I usually do some type of pepper jam. I've done peach, apricot and nectarine. I wasn't in the mood to can and put it off. Thanksgiving and I find that I only have a few jars of pepper jam left and people are demanding more. We talked about it and decided to try out an orange-pepper jam. Totally cheating and bought three containers of frozen oj, three habeneros and the zest from a little 'Cutie'. I ended up with 12 jars of pepper jam for holiday gift giving and some for the shelf for the year. They kind of brought some sunshine in while it was snowing this afternoon:
Those flecks you might be able to see in the jars are the habeneros. I roast them in the toaster oven and then scrape out the seeds and the pith holding them. Still gives a lot of heat to the jam but not as much as with those also in the jam. I don't worry about the blackened part just figuring they add to the rustic-ness of the jam.

I finally put together Bailey's flower girl wall hanging. I had cross-stitched this years ago and its just been hanging out. Then I saw threadbunny's use of her cross-stitch and quilting skills combined and thought - great idea for mine! I think it came out well and will look great in a little girl's room.


Still have two hats, fingerless gloves (one for sure, two possibly) and house socks to make. The way the snow and ice are working, I'm not getting out of the house soon. So lots of knitting will get done!

An idea of how the snow has been over the last couple of days:



Over those few days, I've been throwing out bird seed for the birds. I've had layers freeze. Today I was noticing that the Mourning Doves are particularly plump, think they knew something was coming?

Stay warm & dry and hopefully also knitting up your own storm!

Zoo animals have fun in the snow

KATU had this on their site so I thought I'd share the direct link to it on YouTube. Some video of the Asian Elephant baby playing in the snow along with the Amur Tigers and a Wolf. Makes you want to go check out the zoo!

we have hats & more snow.....

Sunday we had the snow drop a few inches on us. Then we spent the last couple of days with below freezing temps, thus ice on the roads. I haven't been out of the house really since Saturday. This morning it started snowing after 8am and other than maybe 15 minute periods it's been snowing steadily all day long in one form or another. (teeny, tiny snow flakes up to the big fat fluffy ones as a comparison)

Today, my couch potato (AKA Norbert) has been hearing things outside and so feeling the need to investigate these noises. While he can act like the biggest woos, be afraid of meeting new people, he finds moments of braveness (proven rat kill to his name).


Nessa joins him as backup whenever he leads the Charge! She, though she has that pesky cocker once past the lips forever on the hips, is the more active of the two overall. She's being a little more sensible about the need to really go out:


Over the last couple of days I've finished up a couple more holiday gifts - hats for an uncle and a brother-in-law. Same pattern done up differently than the one that I did for cousin-in-law Kyle - Turn-A-Square, a Jared Flood pattern:



What I still have left to make:
4 bead necklaces (I've done a ton of them already and if I'm lucky these will be the last ones I'll ever make!)
2 Swell hats
1 pair house socks (worsted weight, big needles, should go fast!)
1 pair of gloves

Wish list - mini socks, mini hats, mini sweaters ornaments (these are the last things I'll be trying to work on.)

We're supposed to get more either freezing rain or more snow this afternoon with lots more snow overnight. Looks like the winter vacation came a week early to the school kids in the area. ;^)

Back to the knitting!

Second Pair in Progress & Snow!

I stayed up late last night reading/finishing a book, so was up late this morning. By the time I was up there was a nice coat of snow on the ground. It's pretty much been snowing most of the day. I think we probably have about four to six inches on the ground in places. We're all staying inside keeping warm. I've been watching movies and working on the Piggy Mittens Pair #2:


Earlier in the day I took a few photos of the yard, there's more snow now but you can get an idea of how the wind has been blowing:




Nessa and Norbert ventured out this morning while there was less snow. Norbert is a bit of a priss in regards to his toes and getting them wet/cold. We'll have to shove him out in a bit. Nessa went out and snuffled around in the snow and then shivered over the snow balls that accumulated in the feathers on her feet:



We were supposed to go over to Judy's and help decorate her tree. She likes having the grandkids help. With the snow we opted to stay home. I'll let Brandon borrow the Subaru to go to work tomorrow. I'm supposed to give a talk at one of the high schools and pick up niece Kaisha from school and watch her for an hour on Tuesday. It's supposed to get colder and more snow on Wednesday. It's going to be an interesting week!