snow

My Sunday Photo – 18th March 2018

March 18, 2018 by Anne Sweet 12 Comments

Sunday Snowday

It’s Sunday, SUNday, not Snowday! I’m so fed up of snow days, enough already. Let’s have Spring now.

Yesterday the weather just couldn’t decided what to do. One minute it was snowing, the next, the sun was shining. But overnight, the snow won out…well, the sun wasn’t there to compete and I guess the moon just doesn’t have the same snow melting power.

This morning we woke up to….snow. Lots of snow. The garden is covered, the car is covered, the roads are impassible. My daughter has a hospital appointment that was re-arranged because of the snow and now we will have to re-arrange it again because of the snow.

Someone is not minding it too much though. My one remaining cat went out for a leap.

You are much braver than me Sabrina!

How is the weather bearing up for you today?

Fifty Words for Snow

March 6, 2018 by Anne Sweet 7 Comments

Did you know that Kate Bush had a single (and an album) called Fifty Words for Snow? The single features Stephen Fry and he names fifty words for snow (bet that surprised you!)

I tend to think of Kate Bush a lot when it snows, one of my favourite songs of hers was ‘December Will Be Magic Again’ where the snow falls to cover the muck up…and it certainly does. But it causes so much disruption and it certainly doesn’t take the muck away. Our garden is currently a mud bath after the melted snow. We have had water disruptions due to burst water pipes and we lost our heating and hot water for a while.

Santanyeroofdikov

Okay, the song contains a lot of words that are made up and ‘santanyeroofdikov’ is one of them. I think it means that Santa is on your roof with a bit of a Russian twist?

The snow we had last week seemed to drift off the roofs, it didn’t want to settle. Well, not until Friday when it settled in force and we first became snowed in. The earlier snow was sort of powdery, you definitely couldn’t make a snowman from it. It was blown around by the gale force winds of storm Emma and it was so, so cold. Because the roads and pavements were not affected I didn’t think the kids were going to get a day off school, but they did. On Thursday evening the school sent a text to say they would be closed on Friday. They called it right, on Friday morning it was still blustery and cold, but by the afternoon the snow was coming down fast and sticking. It was soon forming drifts half way up the doors and fences. It was a proper ‘vanilla swarm.’

Terrablizza

By Friday evening we were snowed in, good and proper. My daughter had a hospital appointment but my husband barely got a quarter of the way there and had to turn back. The traffic was just not moving.

Saturday, we were happy to stay indoors. The kids had lost interest in the snow and didn’t want to go out and play, in fact there were very few kids out in the neighbourhood too. This snowstorm really wasn’t welcome. I was proud of our cat who braved the snow to go outside even though she was practically buried in it. Good job she’s black and not white, we may have lost her!

I didn’t take any photos of the snow. I guess even I was bored of it. Here’s one I took of the last snow fall just before Christmas.

In a totally unimaginative way, I called it ‘snow.’ Kate Bush would not be proud.

Slipperella

By Sunday the rain had started but it was like little drops of ice, ‘psychohail.’ The snow started to clear a little leaving a deluge of slippery slush. Still not good to go out. Which is a shame because we had been invited out to an event at Pizza Express which had to be cancelled. I guess I expected it would be, and the kids did too. Maybe they will do it again another day.

I don’t know if it was the snow, or cabin fever or whatever, but things started to get tense in the house by Sunday. I was hoping so much that the snow would clear and the kids would be going back to school on Monday. They seemed to bicker with each other all day, I lost count of the tantrums.

Stellatundra

Don’t you know it’s not just the Eskimo.
Let me hear your 50 words for snow.

Just so you know I’m telling the truth, here is Kate Bush and Stephen Fry with 50 Words for Snow and someone’s home video of an awful lot of snow.

The Snow has gone now!

Thank goodness for that.

Word of the Week – Cold

March 2, 2018 by Anne Sweet 12 Comments

Cold

Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash

So a lot of things have happened this week but how could my word be anything other than cold! I know most of the country will be feeling the same.

I think we may have got off lightly with a lot of the weather, I may be eating my words by the time this is posted, but we haven’t had a huge amount of snow, just an relentless flurry of the white stuff. It has been so, so cold though.

On Monday I had to go and pick up the kids from school in my wheelchair. There was a slight flutter of snow but it wasn’t sticking around. It was, however, incredibly cold and chilly and it didn’t matter how wrapped up I was I still felt the bite.

I vowed not to go out again this week, but on Wednesday I had to pop to the end of the street to the GP surgery, again in my wheelchair, again in the flutter of snow that didn’t settle.

I’m so lucky that my house is warm, we have only a slight draft in the living room but if we draw the curtains we don’t feel it, and we haven’t had the heating on that much during the daytime. All the bedrooms are cosy except for the Little Man’s room and he has a big duvet to keep him warm. If he gets too cold he can always come and cuddle with me, I won’t mind.

I look at the news and see how awful it’s been almost everywhere else and feel quite lucky. Yes, it’s freezing cold but we’ve had little in the way of transport disruption and the school has been open all week. The kids finally have a snow day today, I’m just glad they don’t have to go out in the cold.

My fingers are tightly crossed that the Beast from the East and Storm Emma are soon packing there bags and leaving our country alone.

Keep warm everyone, and don’t go out unless you really have to x

p.s. Don’t you think the photo I’ve used is beautiful. I love Unsplash for free images, there are so many gorgeous photos to choose from.

School, Snow, Crochet and Reading

February 27, 2018 by Anne Sweet 5 Comments

Back to School

Half term seemed to fly by so quickly, how long until Easter? The kids went back to school today and I went to pick them up. Hubby had to take eldest daughter to a very important meeting on the other side of town so it was down to me to fetch the kids. I had to get eldest son to come with me as I’ve still not been out alone. It feels strange, that I’ve not been out alone in more than two years, what happened to my independence? I guess that’s something I need to work on, starting with the blogger’s retreat that I’m going to in April.

Anyway, back to the kids. It was so, so, cold, even snowing, when I ventured out in my wheelchair. I had my biggest warmest coat on, gloves, hat and scarf. I took my handbag to sit on my lap and provide an extra layer of protective warmth and of course I had my boots on. I still nearly froze to death! Jeez, how cold it was! The school is one and half miles away. I know this because I measured it when I was trying to keep fit and measuring the amount of walking I did each day..ironic, I know! At that time I was having to pick the Little Man up from nursery so walked the journey there and back three times a day, that’s 9 miles!

The kids were excited that I came to pick them up and didn’t seem to mind walking home, even though the snow had stopped.

Shopping

I do my shopping online, for two reasons. One, I find it extremely tiring going around the supermarket, even in one of their powered trollies. And two, I find I can budget better online, it’s easier to put things back than it is at the checkout in the store!

I find shopping online incredibly tedious though and I’m often tempted just to fill the virtual shopping trolly with last weeks shop. Still, as I work through it all I’m very prone to make mistakes, so I do it on Saturday and then spend the next day or so editing it until I’m sure I’ve got it right. I remember the time I ordered 4 kg of frozen chips! Or 3 whole chickens.

This week I didn’t do the shop until Sunday and with the going back to school preparations I didn’t go back to edit it. It wasn’t too bad though, I didn’t forget anything (apart from ANY toiletries whatsoever!) I did order an extra loaf of bread, 2 boxes of choc ices instead of 1, and the wrong sausages for the Little Mans lunchbox. I’m thinking there may have been more errors but hubby was shoving it all away at the speed of light because he had a new PS4 game to play.

Reading

Can you call it reading when you’ve listened to a book on audio? Well, I have been listening to books for a while but I steered away from fiction thinking I wouldn’t enjoy it as much as a book. The truth is, I LOVE IT, you can listen while doing other things, like cleaning or, my favourite, crocheting. Anyway, the book I listened to was The Girl on The Train, Paula Hawkins. I’ve not read it before or seen the film and I have to say, I loved it. The narrators where amazingly good, I couldn’t stop listening.

Just one thing though. I never, ever skip to the ending of a book, I really don’t see the point of spoiling it. However, while listening I was interrupted by the Little Man and had to pause it. Then when I switched it back on I had somehow managed to skip ten chapters and was near the end. I KNEW, I’d missed part of the story, I KNEW I was near the end, but I was so gripped I carried on listening anyway. Then I had to go back and listen to fill in all the gaps. Why did I carry on when I would never do this while reading? I just don’t know, but I still enjoyed the book anyway. I really want to see the film now.

Crochet

I’ve joined my first ever CAL or Crochet Along. I’m making a blanket, one square at a time, along with a group of other people on a Facebook group. The pattern is printed monthly in Simply Crochet magazine. I’m hoping it’s not going to be too difficult but I guess I’ll have lots of help if I run into problems.

I’ve also bought a book of cuddly toy patterns that I’m keen to try. You can get these sort of patterns on the internet but I think it’s nice to have them all in one place in a book. These are bigger than the amigurami toys I’m used to making so I’m hoping I don’t lose patience with them. They all have cute little outfits too which you can interchange for different looks.

Rare Disease Day 2018

February 28th is Rare Disease Day. As you may, or may not know, I suffer from an extremely rare condition, Stiff Person Syndrome. I’ve written a post about my story, which began only two years ago, and if you have five minutes you can read it here.

My Sunday Snow Photo 17th December 2017

December 17, 2017 by Anne Sweet 13 Comments

Here are a selection of snow photo from my garden. I love how white and wonderful they are. I know not everyone likes snow, but I do. (so long as I don’t have to go out in it.)

My trees heavy with snow with more snow falling and the sky a white blur!

I think they look stunning. and the photo isn’t black and white even though it seems like there are no other colours.

This is my garden on Sunday Morning last week. It’s so blurry because the snow was still falling. It’s hard to capture snow fall on camera. Just look at how deep it looks on the table and the slide. If I was younger I’d probably enjoy sliding down the slide covered in snow.

And our car on Sunday Evening. It stayed like this for three days then hubby had to sweep off the snow so he could go out. I’m just glad I didn’t have to go anywhere. Sometimes staying at home is the only option.

I know that snow can be disruptive, and I especially hate driving in it. I do love how wonderful it makes everything look, until it starts to melt. Like Kate Bush said in her song ‘December Will Be Magic Again’ it covers the muck up! It’s a pity the muck is still there once the snow has gone away though.

Have you had any snow?

I hope you like my snow photo.

Do you have a snow photo to share?

Here are 50 Words for Snow