It amazes me how many of you responded to my last post by saying how lucky we are and how jealous you are that we have snow! Ok, yes, I blame myself, I guess I've mislead you all into thinking how lovely and magical it all is, and it is, for about 10 minutes. I guess if you don't ever get to experience it, it is quite the novelty that evokes a certain amount of longing and romanticism. I was taken in myself, as always happens during the first snowfall of the season. But let me tell you, you must immediately dismiss that Currier and Ives scene in your head. I guess for the first couple of hours, it's quite beautiful and otherworldly, as it's puffy eiderdown clusters, like tiny fluffy bunnies drift and float in the fridgid air, but it soon reveals itself as the icy, dirty monster that it really is once on the ground for days and weeks, made compact and unyeilding, it's molecules sticking together like eggs on a badly greased frying pan. Am I being overdramatic? Maybe. But enough with the bad metaphors. Needless to say, we are left with pitted, rutted streets like a third world country, due to not being sufficiently plowed, and being driven over a gazillion times, the 'Person Responsible for Snow Removal In Our Fine Town' being fired, my only solace. He should be flogged and made to eat Chinese food leftovers, in my opinion. Leaving the house for a drive around the block without an empty bladder is not for the fainthearted. Don't even get me started on the state of our driveway. I love my dear husband, and he is ideal in almost every way, but the man hates to shovel. Thus we are left with a path around our car large enough for only a very skinny person on a skateboard to maneuver around. I am quite smallish myself, and have a problem getting past the door, to open it, and get in, my new Kenneth Cole down jacket getting smeared with road salt and general ick, having to awkwardly step half-way up an icy bank of snow at a 60 deg. angle, and then, very ungracefully, doing a sort of half-double axel move into the now cold interior of a previously warmed up car. Don't even get me started on the entrance of the driveway after the plows (from the first storm, as we got slammed back to back) went by, lets just say once you get a "running start" it's a breeze flying over the huge speedbump of snow. I am not being the least dramatic with that dramatization though. (an unrelated, but somewhat contextual story of my husbands leave raking technique will be described in a future post. Let's just say it involves putting all the backyard leaves on the front lawn and allowing them to "blow away". Hopefully none of my neighbors read this blog because then they'll realize why leaves magically appeared on their newly raked lawns one morning. Sorry Melissa. But truly, I guess unless I'm willing to step foot outdoors and pitch in, who am I to complain right?)
Ok that previous ranting was just a set up for the following pictures and text, which actually makes it look like we were having quite the good time keeping ourselves occupied. I assure you, we did not have a bit of fun. Especially after the 4th day.
Firstly, I kept Olivia occupied for a record 3 hours with a lovely little project from the beloved Doodle Stitches:
I couldn't keep track of the tears, needle pokes and whines of frustration after the umpteenth time the floss got tangled, but we soldiered on, and she finished it. I bound it with bias binding (oh, no amount of bias will suffiently wrap un-distorted-ly around a true circle, do not attempt)
I helped her out with the birdie and red flower blossoms, but truly she did the rest of it, (including picking out all the colors, which at first I viewed as suspect, but in the end grew to love the random and somewhat primary colors) and at the risk of sounding like a proud Mom, i think she did a great job, for a 6 year old lacking any sort of pain threshold but possessing a high frustration level. Thus-ly, what should have taken merely an hour to make took me nearly 4 hours to complete this very simple but fetching cocktail purse in the process:
Later that day, I completed this simple linen tote:
I've lost track of time and space, but at some point, this bag was also made:
You can find these listed in the SHOP. While my endeavors were restriced to the indoors, because I despise the cold, Jeff got a little antsy and got it in his head to make an igloo. (I'm still holding my tongue, trying not to suggest a better use for that energy and digging, the first word being "shoveling" and the last being "driveway", but we have our priorities. Like Laundry vs. sewing or Cleaning the House vs. sewing or Paying the Bills vs. sewing, you get the idea.) For all you bona-fide Inuit's out there, look away.
Liv thought it was the coolest thing, and she wanted to move in immediately. Which proved problematic due to the fact only half her body could fit. Otherwise, I was on board.
Ok, maybe we had a teeny bit of fun...
