This week’s 24 seconds from the front door is gray, gloomy, bare trees. The weather prognosticators are warning of snow flurries and wind tonight and tomorrow morning. I guess it is that time of year. I’ll lay the two fires in case we lose power.
It has been a fairly productive week getting ready for the Heritage Craft Barn Bazaar on December 4th and finishing this month’s official square for the Breed Blanket Project. A cowl was knit, soaps and salves finished, photographed and put on the website, a square of Jamtland wool from Sweden was combed, spun, and knit into a beautiful, soft, dark chocolate colored square. More of that fiber is being combed for another square and while I am prepping it, I am spinning Zwartbles, a Norwegian wool that is also dark chocolate to become a single square.
A very Christmasy skein of wool was plied yesterday and wound off this morning. It is BFL, an extremely soft wool, spun to fingering weight and about 267 yards of yarn.
With the onset of “winter” here this weekend, I will lay low, spin, try to finish a knitted gift, cook a nice hot meal for dinner and perhaps sit by a fire with a cup of tea.
A blogger friend challenged to begin Sunday morning with a 25 second video from the front porch/door to show the changing season from Autumn to Winter. Here is this morning, a mostly clear, sunny, but chilly 43 f (4.1 c), quite the change from the past few weeks. We aren’t getting the pretty fall colors this year, most of the trees are yellowing or browning and the leaves dropping already. Some are already bare or nearly so. I don’t seem to be able to link it as a video, this is just the opening shot. The video can be viewed on my Instagram if you follow me there at spn_knt.
The last time I mowed, I had hoped it would be for the last time this year. The mower needs an oil change and the blades sharpened or replaced. I picked up a chunk of erosion fence in the blade last time and it was quite the challenge to get to free from the blade it wrapped around. Day before yesterday in late afternoon, I brought the mower and line trimmer out again and though I didn’t do all the acreage I usually mow, I got around the house and coop and trimmed around the flower garden in the back. The chickens love when I mow and run into the area I have just passed, gorging on newly clipped grass and the insects it disturbs. I am always amused when the Perdue chicken commercial comes on TV and the actor tells the family what chickens from other breeders are fed and to go down to the Perdue booth, that Perdue chickens are given only clean grain feed. If you have ever watched chickens, they are Velociraptors, they will eat snakes, mice, frogs, bugs, grass, seeds, and just about anything, they are definitely not vegetarian and chickens fed that way are not healthy.
We have two aging pups, the younger of the two has never been a healthy dog and for the past three mornings, I have had major accidents to clean up while they are outdoors and before I can feed them. That is not the way I prefer to start my day and though I really dislike scented candles, I have had to use a wax warmer with a sliver of eucalyptus scented wax with a chunk of beeswax to clear the air.
Our daily schedule generally involves a walk after lunch, today we are headed out this morning, so hubby can watch a football game and I can prepare Sunday dinner for Daughter and her kiddos. I think this will be the first walk of the season where I don my jacket that hubby gave me for my birthday a few years ago, maybe a knit hat as well. At least it is sunny and not wet and windy.
We live in a Village in a county of only about 15000 folks, but are closer to a town in the next county than to our county seat where Walmart has run most of the local business out of business. The town is a University town and other than a couple grocers, fast food, and CVS, it is locally owned businesses.
Several years ago, Main Street and College Avenue were renovated, with brick sidewalks, old style lamp posts that each have two hanging basket hooks and a flag pole holder. In the spring, every post is adorned with baskets overflowing with flowers, the medians are planted with flowers and a crew maintains them with weeding, pruning, and watering regularly. The flag holders hold flags for various events. For the local high school football games and graduation, each has a flag that has BHS for Blacksburg High School. On national holidays, American flags are displayed. Virginia Tech flags for their home football games. International flags when the University is celebrating international events.
This is the town I moved into while our house was being build and while hubby was still across the state until he retired. We consider it our town. It is where the Farmer’s Market is, where the restaurants we frequent are located, and a small single screen movie theater that has been there since my father was a student here in the 1940’s.
This afternoon, we spent a few hours staining the ceiling and posts of our front porch and after all was done and cleaned up, including us, we went to town for dinner. About once a week since the weather warmed and we can dine outdoors, we have reinstated that into our lives. On Friday nights there is live music on the hill in the first photo.
We love the local feel of this town and the opportunities for plays, concerts, and sporting events if we feel the urge through the University. The adjacent town to this one has all of the big box stores and chain movie theaters, so if we can’t find what we need in town, it is a short drive over.
As we sat with our drinks, awaiting the service of our dinner, I pulled out a spindle and did a bit of spin in public time. My spindles are often pulled out around town for a spin time. Sometimes it draws a question or comment, sometimes I just see someone watching from a distance, tonight, one of the ladies from my spinning group and her hubby arrived to dine on the same patio. Small towns, the best.
