Last night we heard a sound in the driveway that wasn’t wind.  Alex!   We wondered how he would manage with his plow.  Well, he didn’t.  He called in his big guns:

Alex to the rescue—with the frontloader. So nice to have a neighbor-plow guy-town road commissioner with BIG stuff in addition to the big plow on his big pickup truck! Love this photo because it shows how hard the wind is still blowing, lifting snow out of the bucket. And notice that vast mound between the edge of the porch and the driveway….

I just stood in the kitchen looking out the window and laughed!    The “plow” pile grew so huge the big bucket on the frontloader (or is that a backhoe?  or two-in-one?) couldn’t reach over the top!

He’s actually driving UP the plow pile to try to dump over to the back side.

And bless that man.  Remember that DEEP drift (about 3 1/2 feet deep) between the front door and the driveway in the first photo?):  Lookit what that nice man did….

Alex came in with the wide bucket empty, set it down gently about 4 feet from the edge of the deck, and then dragged all that snow back out to the center, then scooped it up to dump on the ginormous pile. That meant LOTS less shoveling for us! When the snow melts its gonna be a serious mudfest getting over to the garage!

Made us a wide clearing so we wouldn’t have to shovel as much.  DEFINITELY buying a snow blower before next winter!

This was the view out our bathroom window this morning.  Notice how high the drift is by the entry windows on the left.

And looking back at the house. The photo above was taken from the window on the far left. I was standing just uphill of the ginormous snow pile for this photo.

It was a glorious crisp morning! I love the strong shadows and the blueness of the snow and the wind-carved ridges in the snow.

Love those wind carvings so much I kept taking pictures. As I tell my students, there is quilt inspiration everywhere!

Eli spotted this cool overhang: yes, that is a “corner” of snow hanging on the uphill side from the wind!

Eli scraped the snow away under his feet to stand on the ground next to the drift from what blew over the roof. He’s almost 5’10” tall. Love how the wind whips a channel next to the house. We saw little tiny critter tracks in the snow near there.

Eli, Me with Widgeon, and Paul. We got the gas grill back up on the porch, then set the camera on timer. For once I was going to get into the picture, too, as we aren’t likely to see anything like this again for eons. I mean…snow as tall as the eaves?  It may be routine in the mid-west, but not in Maine!

Eli hoists the King of the Mountain, as said king’s leggies are too short to get him up to the top of the hill!  Eli also needs to go back up there and retrieve the shovel he left up top!

And the storm clouds have cleared and we have that GLORIOUS view back. Yes, the towns of Freedom and Liberty are off in the distance as we stand in Hope! I LOVE MAINE!

And yes, I really DO have art and quilting to share…stay tuned!  First post is tomorrow.

And a PS:  our neighbor is wonderful, but plowing is part of his business!  He gets paid for plowing, but he does it well and responsibly and promptly every snowfall.  It can snow overnight, and when we get up at 6 am the driveway is already plowed most often!  Lots of folks here in Maine have 2 and 3 jobs, including seasonal ones.  The landscaping folks work the earth when it is visible, and plow in winter, for example.  And MANY people buy a plow for their truck and then earn extra money plowing in their neighborhood.   It’s the way life is here in Maine, and I expect in most of the northern tier of the US where snow is prevalent.

Hi everyone! I thought I’d give you all a vicarious blizzard experience since luckily we still have power, and a snug house, food and entertainment.  There’s a YouTube video as well as still photos.  If you live in New England, never mind…just go outside!  It’s still blowing with sustained winds about 25 mph here, with gusts to over 50! This first bit is some video I shot this morning. This is the first time I’ve ever tried to narrate, so apologies for any (all) mess-ups with the audio!

I have NO idea how neighbor-and-plow-guy Alex is going to plow the mountain of snow, and it is simply too windy for him to come out, as he usually does, and make multiple passes every time another six inches falls.  Besides which the wind would just blow the snow all over anyway!

The weather stations tells us what we already knew: it is cold and blowing lots of snow!  That is air temp of 8 Fahrenheit, -14 wind chill, and a momentary lull in the wind…only 17  mph!

Eli decided to take the dog out as I got ready to take pictures and video.  The dog was NOT amused.  He got 2 1/2 of his feetsies outside the door and promptly turned around to come back in.  Eli got him out:

Eli is excited. Widgeon is NOT.

Eli “encouraged” Widgeon to check it out (ie. dropped him into the snow). Widgeon is NOT amused.

As you can see, coaxing the dog to go pee by the pine tree (protected from the wind by the tree) wasn’t successful either, as the snow is much deeper than Widgeon is tall.  I think he’s saying “MAMA!  Come rescue me! HOW could you make me go OUT in this????”

And the before and after pics, first looking at the view (or what is left of it):

The view in mid-December 2012

In the beginning, there was an inch of snow over the previously bare ground. This was taken on Friday morning.

Twenty four hours later…

Saturday morning, couldn’t hardly see the trees at the bend in the driveway, let alone the hills beyond. It is maybe 1/10th of a mile to the trees. I promise, they are still there. In the blowing snow.

Then the garage, before:

Light fluffy stuff came down on Friday during the day, coating the roof and logs for next year’s wood burning.

and after:

Saturday morning, Feb. 9, 2013. All that coating on the roof and logs is now blown uphill and the snow is coming down heavy and blowing sideways.

The woods to the west of the house when the snow began.

And this morning. When I looked out the bedroom window in this direction when I woke up all I saw was white stuff going sideways.  In the lower left you can see where the wind has blown down to grass, yet other spots have 4 foot deep drifts.

And now I’m going to clean up the dishes and shower while we have electricity; if power goes out, so does the water pump! Then a cozy day at home reading and working on my watercolor class!  Hope you’ve enjoyed the blizzard…we are!  Joshua and Ashley are also home–most businesses (almost all?) are closed down, and texting works!  So we are snug in our home, together.

Just checking in! Have been really busy working on that quilt I can’t share until April and new handouts for my Quilting Design class which I’m teaching in a few weeks in Venice, Florida, hence the lack of posts! But thought I’d share the storm for those of you who prefer your snow vicariously!

The view from the kitchen sink window this morning

The snow has begun.  Camden and Hope are predicted to get 15-24 inches.  They cancelled / postponed the statewide wrestling meets (will happen next weekend, but at 3 high school venues instead of the Civic Center in Augusta which is booked).  We have buckets with water in the bathrooms for flushing (if the power goes out, so does the pump for the water) and will have in the kitchen for food/tea/etc.  The heavy stuff isn’t supposed to hit until tonight, but it is already coming down light and fluffy and thick.  School is cancelled (YEAH!) and we’re looking forward to a nice day at home.  I’m thinking scones for lunch and a movie with Eli; if we lose power, at least we’ll save the reading for tomorrow.

Last night about 5 pm. I meant to take the photo earlier in the day, but you can see the (how weird!) meadow/lawn area with NO SNOW. In late January/early February. In MAINE???? Wha’ happened to winter? I guess Mother Nature decided to deliver it in one whopper of a storm this weekend.

This morning, after the “school is cancelled” robo-call, we looked out the window to the west to see the snow coming down lightly, thickly.

And the view from the living room deck…the most beautiful view ever (well, maybe our view on San Juan Island was equally beautiful!).

Rather than the usual Winter Storm Warning, there is a Blizzard Warning in effect.  For the latter you need not just lotsa snow, but lotsa wind, and we’re gonna have it.  They are predicting some coastal flooding due to the winds–here in Hope winds are predicted at 23-31 with gusts to 55.  It’s odd because usually it doesn’t snow a lot when it is this cold–currently it is 5 with a wind chill of -2 or thereabouts.

The weather station shows that it is currently 5, which is cold for getting snow, usually it is in the teens or 20s to get snow. Just a slight breeze brings it down to -2 wind chill. By tomorrow morning it will be as cold but winds will be high!

Paul says the NOAA (National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration) reports 1-3 inches today during the day, 7-11 more inches overnight, the wind kicks up, and then another 6-10 on Saturday before it peters out.  Old timers are saying this sounds like the storm of ’78, so if it actually is, you know it’s gonna be a big one.  LOVE our snug, warm, wood-stove-heated house (we also have thermostats and baseboards, but love the wood which also costs less than fuel oil) and gas range (the oven doesn’t work during a power outage, but the burners do).  So we will be warm and well fed.  <Beam>

Here’s the garage. I’ll use this view and the one from the living room to show the progress of the storm. Now there is just a dusting of snow, maybe an inch or less in this photo.  Note the huge logs on the right:  that’ll be our heating for the winter after next.  In spring our wood guy will come and chop and split the wood, then we’ll stack it in the wood storage area on the right end of the garage.  The third garage bay is for the lawn tractor and (to be bought) snow blower.  After building the garage, we decided we’d shovel one more year before spending more money on the snow blower this year.  Next year:  fix the drainage on the driveway and the snow blower.

Stay tuned.  I’ll take photos and, if we have power, post the course of the storm.

Have been busy with Eli’s wrestling meets and working on a quilt (which I can’t share until about mid-April), but wanted to check in, and to share the best moment from the Super Bowl:  The Dodge Ram commercial.  Eloquent.  True.  The spirit of America.  Will be back soon with more. In the meantime, enjoy:

PS: My Uncle Eddie was a true cowboy, a ranch hand, in a small town up in the mountains of Wyoming north of Yellowstone; this commercial makes me think of him. He literally rode the fence rails on horseback in driving snow to tend the herds. He died last year at the age of 98, and I shall miss him. I loved that he would call me around Christmas every year after receiving our annual newsletter–it was such a joy to hear his voice strong and true even up in his 90s and know that someone old could still have all their marbles and keep in touch. RIP Uncle Eddie. And thanks to all the farmers and ranchers and every day folk like Uncle Eddie who make our country great.

I blogged earlier about a wonderful lettering class I’m taking with Val Webb online; it was SO outstanding that I’ve also enrolled in an Herbs Drawing and Painting class.  I thought I’d share a few of my lessons, some good, some not so much.  All I need is a 37-hour day, with the extra hours for art!

P is for Pigwidgeon the Pug

One lesson was to create whimsical letters.  Val offered a pdf of a cat alphabet, but of course I had to attempt my dear (well, Eli’s dear dog) Pigwidgeon.  I didn’t spend a ton of time on the sketch so it isn’t quite spot on, but I love his little peeping face anyway!  This one is 3×3 inches.  And while not expert by a long shot, my control of the paint is improving!

Another lesson was Art Deco style.  Didn’t know what word, didn’t want something too long, and finally decided on Zelda, as in wife of F. Scott Fitzgerald (had to add that bit… Eli asked why Zelda, as the only one he knew was from the videogame Prisoners of Zelda!).  I was elated at how well this turned out.  The width of each section of letter is about 1/2 inch, they are about 3 1/2 or 4 inches tall:

Art Deco style lettering to simulate chrome–inked outline, watercolor,  used a teeny tiny size 1 brush for the shadows on the outer edges that are maybe 1/32″ wide!

Another WOOT was the “Decorated Versal” lesson.  Val had us try white ink with a crow quill dip pen.  Since I’m comfortable with nibs and dip pens, this wasn’t terrifying to me, unlike getting large smooth washes of watercolor (without blotches, which are HARD). Here are some practice bits using the white ink over a wash of blue watercolor:

White ink from a dip-pen on blue.

A Versal is a fancy initial capital letter at the beginning of a verse (had to learn that one ).  I wanted to do something William Morris-ish, so I created the vines behind the letters. I wasn’t sure what I would do to decorate the letter until I was actually muddling around, and decided to have the green vines turn to white on the letter to break up the space:

A decorated versal “S”. I like this, but thinks it needs something more to “weight” the S on the bottom. Awaiting feedback from Val!

Another lesson was to do letters that recede into the background.  You begin with a wash of a lighter color over a large space, wait for it to dry, then go back in with a darker color to create the negative space.  Instead of working within the box or rectangle in the class sample, I wondered what it would look like to offset the text and have illustrations on the edges.  Not so great is the answer!  You kinda loose the idea of perspective–of the darks going back to a vanishing point.  But it was fun anyway:

A less than brilliant effort.

But it is all about learning, and I am learning SO MUCH!  Now… I need those extra dozen hours a day to do more classwork, work on that quilt, exercise, sleep….. EEEK!  So with that I’m getting OFF the laptop and down to the studio!  Be back soon!