We’re supposed to get another epic storm today. Amazing. I’m just happy that today is a telework day for David and I went grocery shopping on Wednesday so we are pretty well set for the upcoming Snowpocalypse. Or Snowmaggedon. Or as the title suggests, my personal favorite – Kaiser Snowze. Or that today is the Day Before the Day After Tommorrow. I love snarkiness and nothing like a good snow storm with panic shopping, long lines and shutdowns to bring out the snarkiness in people everywhere.
I’m still fretting about losing power, like I fretted in December. And we’re running around getting prepared but I’m also reading more about chickens
We got the expected 2 inches of snow on Saturday, plus 6 more unexpected ones along with temperatures that hovered in the teens for most of the time. It turned a “work-on-the-garden” weekend into a “cozy-hunker-down-inside” weekend and we made the most of it.
I made the “Sunday Dinner Hostess Apron” from Weekend Sewing
David took the kids and the puppies out for several romps in the snow.
I started a new knitting project. I love the start of a project, such possibilities. I’m using a baby alpaca yarn and its really soft and lovely. Its been hard to put down!
And Bernie worked on being cute the whole weekend and succeeded admirably.
We’re making progress on the garden plot. Turns out that horse farms have lots of manure they want to get rid of for free. That’s right, they’re giving that stuff away for FREE! Who knew? :)
David found a guy off of Craigslist with a dump truck who would haul it for us – which cost some money but saved us driving the pickup back and forth 6 times and about 6 hours of shoveling. We’ll probably get about 2 more loads delivered and then I think the ground will be as ready as we can make it before time to plant.
I’ve started obsessing over seed catalogs and also trying to keep my hopes for this year’s garden very small. But oh, its so hard. I really want to grow everything! Baby steps, baby steps…
We got a new puppy! His name is Bernie and he’s a Saint Bernard/American Bulldog/Mutt mix
We’ve been wanting to get a new dog for awhile now, but the stars just hadn’t lined up right for it to happen. We found Bernie on Petfinder.com and adopted him through a local rescue group called Rescue Angels. Its neat – basically these folks are all volunteers and they work with volunteers in Tennessee to adopt dogs from high-kill shelters, put them in foster homes, and then find permanent homes for them.
He’s a great dog – very people oriented, loves to cuddle and comes when called. He and Kirby have been getting along great, especially considering that Bernie is only 14 weeks old but is already slightly larger than Kirby (he’s a full grown Cairn Terrier – tough, but small).
So while I feel slightly crazy for adding another small mammal to the mix in the house, we couldn’t be happier and we have all started settling in to the new routine. And I think the chickens will like him too – we have at least two foxes that stroll bold as brass through our field now. Two dogs, one of them quite large, should at least make them think about going the long way around instead. Bernie just might lick them to death! :)
I finished Katie’s baby blanket yesterday and while it was advertised as an 8 hour baby blanket, it took me considerably longer than 8 hours to make. So much longer that I’m not even going to tell you how long – instead, lets focus on the end product instead! Kind of like pregnancy – forget the limited diet, the waddle and the difficulty sleeping for months on end and focus instead of the beautiful baby that’s the result! Way more fun 
Its not the blanket’s fault that it took me a long time to knit. Its actually a very fast, straightforward pattern and I think if I ever had time to sit down for more than 2 stitches before another small mammal need a glass of water, I probably could do it in 8 hours (or close to it, I’m a slow knitter).
All my complaining aside, knitting is a great craft for me to do while I’m with the kids. Its very portable, is fun to do and I can generally keep an uncomplicated pattern memorized so its easy to pick up whenever I have a couple of minutes. And now that this one is done, I get to start browsing knitting patterns again to see what to make next!