Yes, I am alive and well

A friend reminded me that I had been silent for a few days. Time spent with hubby and via phone and video chat with family, time spent finishing my December spinning challenge, trying to finish a shawl as a finished project for the same challenge, and getting ready for the start of the new year, spinning challenges and mentally preparing for even more isolation as we are seeing about a dozen new cases of COVID in our county each day (56+% of the cases in the county since December 1) and between people travelling and gathering for Christmas and New Years, it will get worse.

When I went to the Farmers Market on the Saturday before Christmas, part of my goal was to obtain a Christmas roast for our Christmas dinner, we still have Thanksgiving turkey in the freezer. The vendor apologized that his abattoir had not gotten his latest beef back to him, but he expected to pick it up on Monday. He made a stop on his way home and let me buy a 3 pound rib roast. It was a much more expensive cut than I would usually purchase and wanted it to be cooked perfectly. When we have family here or that we can visit with, we usually have Italian food at Daughter’s on Christmas Eve, and Turkey, ham, and all the sides on Christmas day here. As a younger married, I would prepare either Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner, my Dad doing the other and extended family gathered. The Christmas dinner was always on Christmas eve and we grazed on left overs and other goodies on Christmas Day. Traditionally, I make Huevos Rancheros for hubby on Christmas and New Years Day mornings. Because it was just the two of us, I did prepare the breakfast then later in the day, prepared the roast that I had seasoned the day before. It was perfect and delicious. We have eaten about half of it over two days, the other half frozen to be pulled out in a week or so and enjoyed again.

We woke to a white Christmas with continued snow showers all day. Gifts had been exchanged with our children and grand children via distanced meetings or mail. We celebrated with just the two of us. My gifts included items lovingly chosen based on my interests, fiber to spin, a Jumbo flyer for my wheel, a travel Lazy Kate, a leather tooled pocket notebook cover, counter top herb garden with grow light, hand made pottery planter made by DIL and bee barn from them as well, wool socks and a wool tee shirt to keep me warm. It was a calm, lazy day filled with too much food, but no in person family except hubby.

My December spinning got side tracked when I started knitting the Peacock shawl, but I still finished with plenty for the challenge.

Yesterday was spent plying yarn, the “Redbud” ended up about 450 yards of light fingering weight and the Jacob (the gray) is this month’s and last month’s plied together to about 115 yards of light fingering weight.

The fiber hubby gave me is the left of this photo and will be the breed I begin my January challenges with, both the “Something New” challenge and a Breed Blanket.

After several frigid icy days, the sun is out and the snow and ice are melting, the temperature finally above 40 degrees, so we ventured out to take a walk, figuring the paved rail grade being the safest path. For the most part it was clear or wet, but there were some areas like this below.

Some of the areas that looked wet were black ice, but it was good to get out and stretch our legs and get some fresh air.

I have about half an ounce of yarn left before I have to use the rest to do the picot bind off. I’m hoping it is enough to finish the repeat I am on.

I’m very pleased with how the gradient blends until it gets to the purples and the gradient isn’t as subtle there, almost like the purples were reversed, but I spun this yarn on spindles and was very careful to keep them in the order they came off the braid. It is still a pretty shawl. Once finished, washed and blocked, it will go in my shop.

I hope you had a safe Christmas and will have a safe New Year.

Weather forecast?

Years ago when I worked in Virginia Beach, one of my co-workers had a short knotted rope with a small square of wood suspended at the bottom. On the wood was printed the forecast. “If it is wet it is raining, if it is white it is snowing, if it is swaying it is windy, etc.” That was probably as accurate as a forecast can get. We were told it would be a mild and wet winter. I know, technically winter started yesterday, meteorologic winter began a few weeks ago. I disagree with the mild part. We have had some very cold weather already and an early ice/snow storm. Several days, the high has occurred sometime between midnight and dawn with the temperature falling all day like today.

Our farm is in the Virginia Mountains, southwest in the state, so not as subject to snow as farther up the Shenandoah Valley and east enough to miss the Greenbrier and Highlands cold and snow, but still in the mountains. We often get wind advisories with the wind gusting in from the northwest, like today. Our farm did not come with a farmhouse and we built our home here, so it does have modern heat, a heat pump, but we also have a Rumford fireplace in the living room and a woodstove in the basement with heavy stone masonry done by Son1 and DIL, so if we keep fires going for a few days, the stones hold some heat.

All of these stones came off our farm and were hauled most without the benefit of the tractor, though some of the ones in the basement done later did have the benefit of hauling with the tractor.

So this first official week of winter is all over the place. It got up into the upper 40s yesterday, today, and tomorrow and predicted to go into the low 50s on Thursday with nights in the mid 20s until Thursday when we will see mid teens, rain turning to snow, and only 21 as a high on Christmas Day. White Christmas’ are rare here, but it might happen this year. In preparation for this, I went out and wrapped the fig with a lined cloth shower curtain folded to make several layers, then rewrapped the plastic so that the wind can’t blow it open again. We have a rolling wood rack and it and my garden cart were piled high with firewood, additionally, a dozen and a half short logs carried to a stack in the basement, the kindling basket was filled with sticks from a dead tree that came down across the fence. Both the fireplace and woodstove were set with fires that just need to be lit to hopefully keep the cold at bay until late in the weekend when warmer temperatures will prevail again.

I don’t think I want to be outside on Christmas Day, even to make a trip to the woodpile, so I hope enough is in the garage and basement to keep the fires burning.

When I was working outside in the cold wind, I realized that all nine of the hens were inside the coop, so I turned them out into the yard to forage. They will have to spend Christmas Day inside, especially if there is snow on the ground and 21 degree temperatures with wind.

I am glad we are on the day lengthening side of the Solstice, maybe we will start seeing eggs again in a few weeks. When they started molt, they quit laying, then a couple started again with a few eggs a week until a couple weeks ago when the amount of daylight was just not enough to stimulate egg production. I have actually had to buy a couple dozen at the Farmer’s Market in recent weeks.

I hope all of my readers have a Merry Christmas and go safely into the new year.

Gifts of Love

A year or two ago, DIL took a favorite photo of Jim and a compilation of other photos and did a beautiful pen sketch for hubby as a gift.

She is a very talented artist and wanted to do something special for him. He loves the gift and it hangs on the siding wall of the steps to the loft in our living room.

In August, right at his birthday, hubby made the very difficult decision due to health issues to sell his beloved Harley and give up his “Zen” riding as he called it. In the years since he learned to ride, two months after his 70th birthday, he had collected patches, buttons, poker chips, and pins that never made it onto the iconic leather vest and as he was no longer riding, a vest he wouldn’t wear wasn’t an option.

I had an idea as a gift for him. It isn’t a surprise, but done out of love as part of his Christmas. The photo that was used as the focus of DIL’s sketch was printed as an 8 X 10, his license plate from the HD was saved, and the idea came to fruition. A large frame, some black cotton fabric, a piece of corrugated material for the pins to stick into and it was all put together with patches and other treasures.

A collection of memories.