Quilting and other Things

When I was a very little girl, my parents got me skates and took me out skating. Apparently I told Dad that we needed to take those skates back because they didn't know how to stand up. Eventually the skates did learn to stand up -- more or less and so did I. Tonight I went over to the community centre behind the house for the fun skate. It's the first time I've skated in 15ish years I think, The last time I remember skating is when we would go over to city hall at lunch time on Fridays. Tonight I only skated for 20 minutes. My legs were getting very tired and I decided to make it short and not take any chances. The little ones around me were bouncing back up almost as fast as they fell but I'm not short enough to do that any more. Next Friday's fun skate is cancelled at that arena so I'll have to look for an alternative.  I also need to find somewhere to get the skates sharpened. 

Last December I joined the same workshop It was fun so I signed up to join Mike Guilbault of Photography Workshops again this year.  We got snow and ice this time. Mike took this picture of me admiring the view and this photo of the group I'm having problems picking favorites this year. The milkweed at the last stop was very interesting but I really like the icy ones too. The photos from both years are here

This is one of the photos I took on the first day of spring down at the Mississauga waterfront. The temperatures during the week had been up around 17 - 19 C. Saturday, the temperature only made it to 7 and the sun forgot to come shine. Had fun taking photos anyway. Others photos from the last couple of months are here

So this morning I played a little with the camera settings. It was cold since it was so sunny. Last night I finally made a decision of sorts and come home with this. I still might take Karen's suggestion and when it stops blooming go get another colour. The selection criteria leaned heavily on which one has lots of buds and not too many flowers as I want to enjoy the flowers which helped me to avoid the big decision of which colour did I like best....

This is the Amaryllis blossom as of this morning. The outside petals look like they are going to twist open. I did go for a walk today. I think the windstorms we had over the last week were too much for this poor pine tree. It doesn't appear to have damaged the fence (atleast from the street side). I saw two bus shelters with broken windows today. This one intrigued me because of the angled line in the top -- almost like part of a letter This tree also had a plastic bag in the tree -- that's what caught my eye and made me look up -- then I saw the remnants of the beehive. It must have been fairly large. The creek still isn't completely frozen. Its part of the same one from the walk on the cold day with Karen the other day.

Karen did get her white Christmas (along with the rest of Canada). But Christmas eve it start to rain a bit. Then on Saturday it rained a lot. By Monday and Tuesday, the front yard looked like this (just a little different from Karen's photo last week. Tuesday night it snowed again. The yard is back to this. The lump by the fence is the pretty mums I bought this in the fall. When I planted the bulbs, I planted the mums as well to see what would happen.

The general consensus was that it should be longer. But it was made to be a seasonal wallhanging for the top of my stairs. If it was longer, it would be too long. Mom Testing out new quilt Dad approving the new quilt Winter Sunset Karen's walk after a snow storm The pigeons look very cold Front of my unit -- just a bit of drifting A garbage can is under here -- do you see a teddy bear face in this mound of snow. Karen showing off the snow bank in the parking lot Walking on a cold afternoon The creek near home Still a bit of open water Christmas Day Dinner

We had some snow the other night but not much. This is what the bush outside the living room window looked like last night. It started snowing about 7:30 am this morning and snowed all day. By 4:30 this afternoon, we had to give the storm door a little push to open it We kept the door open long enough to get a couple of pictures After dinner, Dad and Karen cleared the walkway My shovel was waiting outside for someone to come get it The bush now looks like this Lots more snow is due on Sunday.