White Stuff

Look what we woke up to this morning :-

It was 3 or 4 inches deep in most places.  This is the first snow we've had for two years, and Bailey's first ever snow.

Apparently, this morning all the alpacas were standing around looking rather bewildered.  I don't think they could work out where the grass had gone!  By later this afternoon it was melting, but in the meantime, Tammy had been and cleared some grass for them to eat.

All the alpacas are looking pretty dirty, but Babycham (in the centre next to Hope) is absolutely filthy.  She's supposed to be white!  The cockerel wasn't too happy about getting his feet wet either :-

Who Said it was Spring?

This is what we woke up to on Tuesday.  That was Tuesday 19th March.  It's supposed to be spring - our local farmer told us, so it must be true.

Thankfully, normal service resumed yesterday (the 21st) :-

This is my almond tree, the one that was completely covered in snow just a few days ago.  The flowers seem to have survived OK though.

Today was HOT!  Maybe I won't be needing these after all :-

New socks, just finished

Snow Joke!

OK, enough's enough.  When is this snow going to go away.  It's not particularly the snow that bothers us, it's the ice it's turned into.

Today was the first time we'd ventured out in the car since the snow arrived last Sunday. We live at the top of a hill which has now turned into a steep ski slope of ice.  The post hasn't been delivered all week because the post van can't make it up the hill, and we were running short of food.  Soup and pasta is great, but not every day!  Something had to be done.  So today Eric managed to fit some chains to the wheels of our car, quite a feat as they are actually for a smaller car.  Anyway, it enabled us to get down the hill and into town to stock up.

The problem came when we tried to get back up the hill!  He put the chains back on at the bottom of the hill and we inched our way up the slope.  Three quarters of the way up, at the steepest part, we lost one of the chains which had wrapped itself round the axle. Luckily, he'd had the foresight to put some spare chains in the car (which also didn't fit!) and spent the next 20 or so minutes trying to fit those as it got darker and darker. Anyway, we managed to get the rest of the way up and put the car to bed.

We're now fully stocked with food, we collected the post, delivered provisions to the neighbours and look forward to the end of the cold snap.  That was until Eric phoned a friend tonight who calmly informed him that we've got more snow forecast on Monday!

The daft thing is, we only got about 3 or 4 inches of snow - when we lived in Scotland we usually had 2 or 3 dumps of snow at least 18 inches deep each year and had fewer problems!  Mind you, they were quite good at clearing the roads there.  They don't seem to bother here.

So, if we can't get out for a while, it's a perfect opportunity for sitting in front of the fire knitting and spinning.  Nothing's as bad as it seems is it?

Winter at Last

OK, so today we got the real thing.  No messing about with light salt pot dustings, today we had snowballs falling out of the sky.

This was about 10 o'clock this morning, and it's continued snowing since then.

Look at the sky!  We don't often get them like this :-

A little bit later, and all my footprints had been filled in, the cat refuses to go outside, and the washing machine won't work because the water supply feeding it is frozen.  We have two log burners in full swing, so we're keeping warm inside.

So, now that we've had winter, can we have spring tomorrow please?


This afternoon has been given to spinning my mohair and silk - it's too cold to do anything else.  I'm having to wear a face mask while I'm spinning though because otherwise it gets up my nose and down my throat.  This is as far as I've got, it's taking a while.

It looks thicker here than it actually is (honestly!) but it's spinning up nicely with a lovely soft halo which doesn't show up on these photos of course.

Will it be too thick for that cardigan?  Probably a bit.  Am I giving up on it?  Not a chance, I'll adapt the pattern, and anyway, I've got a reputation to keep up :-

Christmas present from Katharine, I think it's a napkin, but I'm not sure!

Snow

It's snowing!!  OK, so maybe the photos below aren't that dramatic, but it is snow. Probably not even enough for a snowball , never mind a snowman.  But there's more due over the weekend.  And it's -4 deg C today.  Chilly!

That might look like just frost to you, but I saw it falling out of the sky - definitely snow.

Pathetic isn't it, getting excited about a vague dusting of snow at my age!

The borage picked a bad day to decide to flower :-

As for us, we're huddled in front of a log fire keeping warm (no central heating), especially as I started with a cold on Monday as we were travelling home.  Lots of hot toddies for me!! (plus the occasional sherry).