Finally, A big Snow and Lots More !!

First, I must thank all of you who left such helpful suggestions for working through my Blogger problems. I have made some adjustments and we will see how things turn out in this post. If you do leave me a comment and you to try to enlarge the photos, let me know if it works for you!!
Now on to today's excitement. We FINALLY had a real snowstorm!! Iam not sure who was more excited about a potential snow day, The Daddy or the kids!! each ahd their noses firmly pressed against the windows at various times throughout the afternoon and evening. They actually called for the day off at about 9pm last night. Virginians don't really know how to deal with real snow, nor do they have the equipment to handle clearing of all of the country roads.
Becca was out the door ready to paly at 8:30 am, eventhought he temperature was 20 degrees. Pepper was overjoyed to ahve a playmate, Buddy took one look at the cold white stuff and decided that he was not a fool. He stayed inside curled up on the couch!
We actually got about 9 inches of very dry snow, but after a bit of packing Beccca and buddies managed to get in about three hours of sledding. I now have three pairs of soggy wool mittens to dry out!!
My wonderful garden dragon looks as if he is wearing a Russian Fur hat and the birds were not impressed with the white coating that adorned their birdfeeders!
The only negative about this storm was the fact that I had to leave my long anticipated weaving class about three hours early to beat the storm home.The Fredericksburg Spinners and Weavers Guild sponsored a wonderful weekend of Gourd Workshops taught by Gourd Artist Marla Helton of Newcastle Indiana. Marla came equipped with all sorts of wonderful pieces for sale and tons of wonderful supplies to create fabulous gourd creations of our own.


The class that I participated in was a combination basket weave, tapestry weave and ceramic vase class. I ahve never seen anything like this and it particularly appealed to me because it was so colorful and full of fabulous texture.

This picture shows you a sample of the finished produc, to the left of the shot in front of my friend April. On the right Ann is working on weaving in the spokes of her vase. We had the pleasure of being able to work in the Liberty Town studio of Lynette Reed. All the glorious paintings behind April and Ann were done by Lynette!!

This picture shows you what my vase structure is. It all begins wiht a very cool ceramic cylinder that marla has designed specifically for her project. The vase has a closed bottom which you see here, and a rim on each end that has holes through it. Into these holes we placed spokes of reed, and then did a triple weave to hold them in place and to create pockets for a second set of reed spokes. (You are looking at the bottom of my vase)

Here are our vases in various stages of done-ness. This was the point at which all of our cell phones ang, practically in unison, from worried spouses asking if we knew that it was snowing. You ahve to get aon the road immediately- yikes!! They don't seem to get it yet, art comes first every once in awhile.( Ok, not really , but it seems that it is alwyas ok to interupt the art classes!)


My piece was very naked at this point, but I have been working on it today, so I will ahve more pictures for you tomorrow!!
We have just gotten word that the kids will not have school again tomorrow- more soggy mittens, but happy kids!! the biggest kid has to go to work however!
I will get out to clear off the bird feeders if the wind does not take care of it tonight!!



















It is 15 degrees and the wind is blowing- it is March 2nd!! I am more than ready for spring!!!!!