Still in Winter's Grip

 

Rowdy took a short walk with Grover and me last week

 

This time of year it gets so difficult to keep dealing with cold nasty weather.  We seem to forget from one year to the next that the arrival of March does not mean the arrival of spring-like weather, or at least not permanently.  I know I get my hopes up for warm sunny days spent outside getting the garden ready and walking the dogs without mittens, but in reality, while those days do exist, they are rare and fleeting in March.  We have had a couple of those days, and then we have days like this.

This was just yesterday morning.  I think we got off light, though, because the east coast got pretty hammered with snow.  One friend near Philly posted a photo of 15".  So I won't complain too much, but I am SO ready to be done with overnight temperatures in the 20's.  However, the forecast does not show much in the way of warming up for several more days.  It will come, spring.  It always has in the past.

Since my last post, Grover and I have had 4 days of agility trialing over two consecutive weekends.  Our first weekend was okay, with 2 qualifying runs out of 6 and no QQs.  Our second weekend was much better, with 4 qualifying runs out of 6 and our 17th QQ.  We also had good times on our runs and brought our point total up to 535.  We're getting close to that 20 QQ/750 point goal!  It is so exciting and I am very proud of the GroverGator.  We will have another 4 days of agility coming up in April.

Sam has been working very hard this winter to turn one large bathroom in the guest house into 2 bathrooms.  He is pretty much finished.  This photo is the wall that he built to divide the space.  He put a closet with shelves up against the back of the shower stall that is in the "new" bathroom, which is en suite with one of the bedrooms.  He was trying to decide how to make the doors and I suggested a sliding barn style door.  He built this beautiful door with lumber he cut from a pine log that he had sitting out next to his sawmill.  It came out so well!

This bathroom also got a new vanity, which I purchased before we decided on the sliding door or I might have chosen a lighter color.  But I'm okay with it.  Both bathrooms have fresh new drywall and ceramic tile flooring.  Such a huge improvement.

Sam pulled the taps on the maples last weekend.  We never got another run, due to that very warm snap we had a couple of weeks ago.  The sap never really ran again after that sadly.  So once again, we will not have any syrup to sell, but we did get a couple of gallons for ourselves and family.  Maybe next year will be better.  I hope so.

I finished a few projects recently, including this hat.  I also finished the baby sweater and the woven baby wrap.  My son and daughter-in-law know about these things, but I won't post photos until after I send them to them so that they will have a little bit of a surprise, just in case they read this.

I have started knitting a lightweight summery cardigan for myself and I plan to start warping my rug loom today to weave the Pendleton selvedge rugs.  I would like to take one with me to Oregon in a few weeks and I would also like to see if I like weaving with them enough to acquire more of them while I am in Oregon.  I'm quite looking forward to getting to work on them.  These selvedges are quite different than anything I have ever woven with before.

And just to prove we have had some nice days, here are Grover and the chickens enjoying the sunshine, just the day before the snow in the earlier photo.