recovering from the storm

 Trees and wires down on our road,

a common scene all over central Vermont.

 The hard working linemen from Green Mountain Power,

 worked their tails off for days on end.

In the midst of the storm that was still raging, these guys

ventured up into the woods and across meadows, 

with 12-16" of snow on the ground,

tracing the power lines to the multiple sources of trouble.

They worked outside our home in the pitch dark

and ongoing snowfall for an hour on Tuesday.

 Despite the inconvenience over the last few days,

I was moved to pull over to the side of the road,

get out of my car and lift my arms in worship.

Mother Nature is such a gorgeous goddess.

We melted snow on the Home Comfort and 

used the water to flush the toilet.

We shoveled and shoveled and 

took note of the trees and branches that will 

need to be cut down as soon as we can manage it,

(the stand of lovely birches in the side yard will have to go,

I am a bit broken hearted about that situation).

I drank a lot of hot tea

and wore more layers than usual.

I went down to town to check on email once a day.

I did hand sewing and read a lot and

 liked being disconnected a bit!

We sat in the evenings by candlelight and

 fell asleep earlier than usual.

Having no phone was a little disconcerting, 

but that's been resolved, too.

We were at a meeting in Barre last night that included

a hot dinner (much appreciated!)

Driving home, we noticed that 

lots of folks in our neighborhood had their 

lights on and as we came around the last gentle curve

in the road and I saw a light at our house 

twinkling through the trees 

and I let out a whoop of delight.

Nothing like a "snow event" to remind us 

of the many things we take for granted.

I thought about Laura and her Little House in the Big Woods 

more than once this week.

:-)

oh good grief

Hello friends! After I finished up my last post about our winter storm, the power went out again. We had enjoyed about five hours of power in the late afternoon/dinner time on Tuesday and then poof! Off it went. We finally had the power restored last night, after another 48 hours without. Will check in later today with all of you. And I look forward to catching up with my blog reading, too. :-)

tula tuesday::week 37

 block number 81

from tula pink's

city sampler

100 modern quilt blocks.

 11" of snow have fallen since yesterday afternoon.

 the power went out at 1 in the morning.

 we fired up the home comfort first thing and i hunkered in for the day.

batman went cautiously down the hill to work.

trees are down, wires are hanging.

we have lost a bunch of trees here,

including a birch in our side yard.

our amazing town road crew and the guys
from green mountain power
were busy on the hill all day.
chain saws.
plows running with chains on their wheels.
the neighbor's generator running down in the valley.
sounds of country living...

around 3 this afternoon our power came back on,

along with our phone and internet service.

the lights have flickered a few times,

but so far, so good.

this week's square was hand stitched because my

faithful bernina was quiet.

there's been a lot of white on white lately.
...and it's still just november...

xo 

reaping what we sow

We have a little room, tucked under a slanting roof, just off our kitchen. The gentleman we bought the original cabin from used this room when he tied his fly fishing lures. Truth be told, I think it was his "man cave". When we first started coming up here, it was Gretta's bedroom. Then it was Peter's office for a bit when he did some consulting work. After our big renovation it became the "room of requirement", a lá Harry Potter. 

One wall is filled with shelving and it serves as our pantry. Baking pans, assorted small appliances, dried beans, canned foods and cookbooks are stored here. My very own red toolbox is on the top shelf. Don't mess with it. :-)

A twin bed is tucked into the other side of the room, allowing overflow sleep space for when we have a very full house. Sometimes I sneak in here with a mug of tea, curl up and read cookbooks. The curtains are made from some of my Grammie Lowry's table cloths. The rug on the floor is made of old jeans. You can find my tutorial here. The quilt is made from an old and favorite chambray dress that I wore for years and a stack of flannel squares.

Under the rug, in the floor of the "room of requirement" is a trap door, with stairs leading down to the root cellar. How lucky are we to have a house with a root cellar? It tends to stay a pretty steady 45-50 degrees year round. There are no windows and the floor has a layer of pebbles, covered by thick plastic sheeting.

Right now, we have a whole collection of flower bulbs potted up, waiting to come upstairs. Bit by bit, we will perch them on our windowsills, forcing them into bloom all winter long. Hyacinths, paper whites, têt-à-têt daffodils and amaryllis will remind us that the winter shall pass, and the world will be green again come springtime.

We had a good onion harvest and many of them are stored in the mesh bottomed box, here. We bought some butternut squash from our friend "Farmer Chip" at Pebble Brook Farm, just up and over the ridge, and they are stashed down here too.

We did not grow potatoes this year, so we have fingerlings, reds and Yukon golds from Chip as well.

We store our carrots and beets in buckets of playground sand. Here are some of the beets...they have been sending up shoots in the pitch dark.

Remember the leeks I harvested before the first hard freeze? They are doing OK, planted in a bucket of potting soil. I'm thinking potato, celeriac, leek soup sometime next week...

(Our garlic, which don't store as well in a root cellar, are nestled in a covered basket, pushed under the bed, where it's not quite as cool.)

I do so love having some of our produce tucked under the floor of the "room of requirement". It's part of the dream we'd been dreaming for years. We know where the food came from and how it was grown and harvested. When the snow is blowing outside our windows in February, what's on our plates will be evidence of the fruits of our labor. We'll be reminded of the quiet evenings of weeding with a glass of wine in hand, listening to the breezes in the balsams and the birds as they settle down for the night. I think I've already forgotten the mosquitos!

xo

today

"Gratitude is heaven itself"

-William Blake

tula tuesday::week 37

 block number 81

from tula pink's

city sampler

100 modern quilt blocks.

 and the paperwhites,

sprouting on the windowsill

that inspired the block...

 and the ivy creeping along the curtain rod

in the bathroom. 

touches of green in a very white landscape.

 the white and grey has been so lovely,

with flurries nearly every day.

so peaceful and quiet and calm.

xo

sunday simplicity

Corazón and Wilma with a gentle reminder:

It's not what we have in our life,

but who we have in our life that

counts.

-J. M. Laurence