Spinning in the Snow

We've been pretty much snowed in for the last several days. We could go out, but why drive through near white-out conditions? We've got groceries so there is just no real reason. Actually, Tim has been going to sleep work each night, but that is about it. All work on our house has stopped. Neither the supplies, nor the workers can get there.

So, I've been spinning! Remember the picture I posted from Madrona, of the big red pile of combed wool top? Well, I've filled my first full bobbin (which looks quite pretty against the avocado carpet at our little cabin). I think I will make it 3-ply, so it should end up about a DK weight.. well, maybe sport. We'll see. I'm still a beginner, so I don't really know what it will end up like!
Once I finished that bobbin, I broke into my new shipment of Yak down! Chicken time: The package arrived on a day which brought us a couple feet of snow. Big kudos to UPS for getting it here on time! I have 3 colors, brown, gray and white (all natural), that I am randomly mixing. I learned to spin the Yak down at the Three Wild Downs class that I took at Madrona. It is super soft and a lot of fun to spin with. It is supposed to be very warm. I'm looking forward to knitting with it after plying.

Oops!

This is the tree stump that ambushed me today. It was hiding under the snow, totally invisible, totally sneaky. I made a turn, my ski hit the stump and stopped dead. I was ejected face first into all of that wonderful fresh snow. While digging in the snow, looking for my ski, I found the stump. And see the ski? The tip is just visible above and to the right of the stump. On the next run, Tim fell and there was another member of the sneaky community hiding nearby. This time it was a rock and his arm hit it hard when he went down. We decided that wasn't the most friendly stand of trees, and to stick to designated runs. Not much happened at our house today. About half of the guys on the job were out skiing today. We even saw our plumber out on the hill.

Weather Watch

We've had a very dry winter in the Lake Tahoe Area. That isn't very good for the local economy, but most of all, it isn't very good for my skiing! During the winter, the locals watch the weather quite seriously. The Weather Channel is one of the most popular TV channels around here. Wednesday, the wind started to pick up, heralding a coming storm. Everyone was talking about it at the construction site/our house and the predicted snow fall got pretty large. Basically we've all been watching and waiting for this storm that is expected to hit tonight for a couple of days. The gusty winds have been teasing us for 36+ hours but fortunately the storm has taken it's time (slow storm = more snow). The snow is scheduled to begin tonight at 1 am and continue through Friday. Here's the scoop:

URGENT - WINTER WEATHER MESSAGE
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE RENO NV
338 PM PST WED FEB 21 2007

COLD PACIFIC STORM TO BRING SNOWFALL AND WINDY CONDITIONS TO THE SIERRA TONIGHT AND THURSDAY.

A COLD LOW PRESSURE SYSTEM WILL CONTINUE TO MOVE SOUTH FROM THE GULF OF ALASKA AND INTO THE REGION. THE PERIOD OF HEAVIEST
PRECIPITATION IS EXPECTED FROM EARLY THURSDAY MORNING THROUGH
LATE THURSDAY NIGHT.

IF YOU PLAN TO TRAVEL IN THE SIERRA BETWEEN TONIGHT AND
FRIDAY MORNING...BE PREPARED FOR HAZARDOUS DRIVING CONDITIONS.
ALLOW EXTRA TIME TO REACH YOUR DESTINATIONS AND REMEMBER TO CARRY
TIRE CHAINS...FOOD...WATER AND CLOTHING.

I'll fill you in on the details once the powder is all tracked out.

technical difficulties

All I wanted to do was add a little weather script to my blog, and now the whole template is messed up. Because of the upgrades blogger has made, I had to upgrade my template to be able to use the modular template functionality. I got my weather script, but I lost all of the customization I had done to my template. OK, I admit I saw the warning, but didn't exactly process it. I should have just done it in html! Oh well, I picked a stock template for now and I will decide what to do later. It is still my blog and all of the content remains.

It is just beginning

The stonework has begun. We begin to get a glimpse of what our fireplace will look like.

Hey Val...Guess what?

We're still working on your stocking!

We might even be almost 1/4 done. But don't hold your breath :-)

Excitement and Romance

I've been slacking on the blog. There haven't been a lot of interesting changes at the house. That's not to say that there hasn't been excitement... of the depressing kind. All the plumbing was done and they went to test the system and... nothing. No water. It had been off for months, and several weeks ago, the temps were very low for quite a while. It took about a week to get it dealt with and finally thawed out. So now we have water. The house was waiting to be inspected before the insulation and then the drywall covered up the walls. That was delayed while we waited for water. So the only work being done, was on the fireplace. That went really slow, but they promised me more activity this week. They were building the firebox, and they had to go slowly, allowing each layer to set before the next. This is how it looked over the weekend, but it has already grown a lot from today's work.
This week they are starting the stonework. They have promised me much more activity with all the cutting of stone and fitting and stuff.

Oh some other excitement for you: for Valentine's Day, we had a romantic day at the DMV, lines and all. We both took (and passed) our CA driver's license tests, and registered all 3 vehicles. There were a few hitches. The truck needed to take a side trip to the CHP to get weighed, and we had to hold our breath about the forerunner passing smog, but it all worked out in the end. Now I'm really back home, with a proper license plate on my car. I was still in the system, so I got my old driver's licence # back. I still have it memorized, so that's useful. My car and Tim's forerunner have almost the same plate #s, just one number apart, which seems kind of romantic, right?

Now that the house has been inspected, and the stonework activity is beginning, I should have more news to report soon.

House Update

When I got back to Tahoe after being away for 1 1/2 weeks, there were some changes. There had been a lot of wiring done! By both the electrician and Tyler, the low voltage guy. Tyler especially had put in an impressive display of wires. We don't think we even need to sheetrock in some places, because the wall is already solid! The picture below shows the control panel for our "structured wiring". We have coaxial cable and cat5 (for data and/or voice) throughout the house and this panel is the hub for it all. Below are the new atrium doors in the great room:
Nice view, huh? Next is the wall against which the stove will live. There used to be a door here.
All the internal plumbing is done. We just need to get the plumbing and wiring inspected, and then they can start to close up the walls. There is just one problem. No water. And without it, they can't verify the plumbing. We think the pipes are frozen down near the street at the main water shutoff. Things have been complicated because the plumbers can't use their thawing equipment. They use electricity and send it along the pipe, but they cant seem to get it to conduct. Jonas figured it out when he had the same problem 6 houses down from us. Turns out, the county put plastic between the shutoff at the street and the main metal pipes of our supply. Plastic doesn't conduct so well.

Salty and his gang have begun work on the fireplace, but it is just cinder block so far. I'll get some pics when it gets interesting.

The Trip Home

I've been sick lately, so sorry for the lack of posting (for details, check out Jack's blog). I brought my cold with me from Seattle as I drove home to California, but still had a lovely drive. It was a beautiful day, so I stopped at the vista point just past the Oregon/California border to check out Mount Shasta.
The afternoon sun was perfect for this picture.
This drive felt like the real move from Seattle to Tahoe. Our house is all packed up and about to go on the market. I'll never sleep there again, so it felt really final. I really look forward to living in our new house, but I feel a bit sentimental about leaving our Seattle Bungalow. After all, we spent the first 6 years of our marriage there!