Wednesday, December 20, 2017

The Weather Outside is Frightful.....

We are developing webbed feet here.  Sunday was a miserable day, it rained steadily all day.  We went to a family Christmas brunch held at one of our nieces on Larry's side.  There were twelve kiddos between the age of 'almost three', to thirteen.  Eight girls and four boys.  Noisy and hectic and a lot of fun, and so good to see everyone again.  Their grandparents buy them matching pyjamas which they all have to put on before doing their gift exchange.

Grand nieces and nephews

Once we got home just after dark, our four legged kids were expecting some attention,  so on with the boots and rain gear and reflective stuff and I had a white umbrella, and we slogged around the block in the dark.  
Yesterday was a decent day, but the rain started up again just after 6pm and was still coming down this morning.  Except this morning there was sleet in it and we had a snowfall warning in our weather forecast.  We had been working on getting the moss off our roof.  We had resorted to pressure washing it off.  Sounds wrong I know, but that was our last resort.  We have some trees on the south side of the house, but none overhang the roof.  In the summer the roof is in full sunlight all day.  By the amount and thickness of the moss you would think that we lived in a cabin buried in the trees.  Anyway, with the snow in the forecast, we wanted to get the worst part of it done before the white stuff started.  I had worked on it yesterday, so Larry said he was going up there today.  We have a long line tied around the chimney and the person up there is supposed to tie the other end around their waist.  I was mighty ticked off when I arrived home the other day and Larry was up there unleashed.  
It was really miserable out so we donned the heavy duty rain gear and slogged the dogs through the bush.  There was standing and running water every where.  The upper veggie garden was covered in pools of water.  
When we got back, Larry went up on the roof and I went to clean a chicken coop out.  They get dirty fast at this time of the year.  So little daylight, such long nights makes for a lot of hours spent in the coop.  I got that cleaned out and rebedded in nice new hay, and pushed the wheel barrow up to the garden where the dirty stuff was spread and then will be covered with some mostly composted horse manure to help it rot down faster.  Then I worked on making the over hangs around the coop more protected from the snow so that the hens had a decent outside spot to hang out, out of the weather. You would be surprised though at how many of them wander around in the rain, picking at this and that.  After a couple hours outside in the cold sleet, we had had enough.  Digits were starting to freeze.  I'd been proactive ( usually I tend to be reactive, well proactive in my head, but not usually physically taking the action).  So I laid down some long pieces of corrugated fibreglass roofing.  The plan was that if it snowed, it would be easy to shovel the snow off them and then flip them out of the way and expose some grass to the hens once the snow stopped. Brilliant eh?
Then I went around the garden and picked the last of the broccoli and took all the decent beets and carrots out of the ground.  We have some cold weather coming too, and the broccoli definitely won't survive it, and if we don't get enough snow, the root crops won't either.

We spent the rest of the day inside.  I amused myself trying to take a decent picture of 'Anna', the Anna's hummingbird that is regular visitor. I didn't succeed in getting Anna in focus.  I like the shot of red in this photo though!  Maybe on a sunny day I can tell if Anna is actually not Anna, but Andy. Thanks to Granny Marigold for educating me about the hummingbirds that over winter here.



Most of the Christmas decorating is done, and I'll have to give Larry credit for doing the majority of it.

We even have a Minnesota section on our tree!  Thank you to Connie from Farside of Fifty for those two.  Both handmade, the Santa from a milkweed pod, and the fish, with our names and the year painted on it's belly, hand carved from basswood.




This is Bella, getting into the Christmas spirit.  I was going to tell you about Bella. I will, I promise.



More projects underway.


The bar table and stools are getting a makeover.  They are a Christmas present.  I was doing so well, and now seem to have stalled out a bit.  I really need to  get myself back in gear.



And then this afternoon I took the top off the coffee table footstool thing in front of the couch (in the bottom right corner of the photo in front of Luna).  The webbing was old and sagging and there were two sagging holes at the ends. I did a makeover on it a few years ago, but the webbing seemed okay then.  Now webbing is off, a piece of plywood has been cut to replace it, and a support piece needs to be added.  



Looking very pretty after the sleet turned to wet snow.  It continued on and we got a good two inches of very wet stuff.  The lights flickered a few times this evening, and some people lost their power.



David and Melissa and their two dogs are arriving from Edmonton on Friday night.  
Things are going to get a bit frantic in the next few days I think. 







10 comments:

  1. The children all in matching pajamas are so cute! It has started to rain here too. I shopped all day in the rain and now they are saying rain for Christmas. Our chicken lot turns to mud when it rains. I may rake up leaves and pine straw tomorrow and dump them in the lot. That was smart of you to lay down the fiberglass roofing.

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    1. In our chicken fields, the areas around the coops gets pretty yucky with the rain too. The fibreglass roofing worked like a charm!. We got about 2.5" of snow. I spent a couple of minutes shovelling most of the snow off the fibreglass and then flipped them over, and voila, a nice greenish path down to the fir trees that had bare ground underneath them.

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  2. diane in northern wisDecember 20, 2017 at 6:35 PM

    What a great post! I love it. Love the children in the matching PJ's....so cute! Also love your tree and ornaments and oh Bella is so beautiful. She looks just like our Tom-boy....who was a gorgeous Maine Coon that we were honored to own for many years. May you and yours have a wonderful Christmas celebration! Hugs to your dogs too!

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    1. Thank you very much Diane. A very Merry Christmas to you and yours too! We wondered if Bella might have some Maine Coon in her.

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  3. Your "new" Bella is so pretty! Hope she likes dogs! Two dogs coming with your son...did they get another?
    Good to see you opened the ornament! I smiled at your Minnesota section!
    I guess matching PJs is all the rage...and that must have been one busy fun household!
    Merry Christmas!

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  4. I love the fish! Thank you! I'm not sure what I did to deserve it though ;-) Bella and our dogs co-exist well. The fourth dog is Melissa's (David's GF). Chy(ene) the husky lived with us in the first part of the year also. They were fine with Nelson then.

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  5. You keep so busy! Love the bird feeder and the winter hummingbirds!
    Hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year!

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    1. Good to hear from you! Hope all is going well with you and your family, human and otherwise. Merry Christmas to you all!

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  6. Merry Christmas Karen, to you and your family!! Not sure how I missed this post but I'll blame it on the season.... or something. Love the kids in their matching PJs. My mom used to sew my kids new jammies every Christmas.
    Are you tired of the snow yet? I wished for snow but I'm always ready for it to go after a few days!!

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  7. Thank you GM! Merry Christmas to you and your family as well. I'm okay with this snow so far, it isn't deep enough to be much of a bother. Our driveway is getting slick though with packed down snow that is now ice, and since it is on a slope we have to start at the road and get a good run at it to make it all the way up. Kind of waiting for it to snow this evening, that would be sort of special!

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