Snow Day

The most amazing morning today. the whole country is in the grip of the weather and this is what has happened overnight in Stratford. I can only remember about half this amount when I was about 14 years old. Marilyn (2kms away) has no power and about half as much snow as this. Alice in Dunedin evidently has had quite a lot and it was -6 degrees Celsius today in Dunedin. Our temperature is about 6 - 7 deg Celsius.
Oh what fun and I am pleased no school today.
Diane
No longer the "land of the long white cloud" - now "the land of the long white snow" - New Zealand.

The front garden - note my cute sculpture that I have.

Down the street. Most amazing

The view when I opened the curtains this morning.

Towards the mountain which is only 10 Km away

Across the road from my house.

Embroidery / Holiday plan notes:
Lots of inspiration in the winter snow for July BJP.
Colourific is being assembled with the face applied now and only a bit of painting to be done.
Cornpad notebook cover is being snail trail stitched all over and it certainly makes it come together.
Tarte Tartin was made yesterday and I was mildly pleased. Will have to try again to make it better. The caramelizing did not happen well.
Diane

Holiday catch ups

Adding the beaded face.

It is time for the end of the school term and holiday time. I have six days off this time and busy completing my entry into the national exhibition. I am busy getting all the elements stitched and added onto the base goddess. Hopefully I will be completed by next thursday when I go back to work. Soduku has been getting a couple of squares stitched each day so I have finished 5 sets and onto the 6th set of nine stitches.

Also I have been completing a few other jobs over the past weeks. I made 4 baby bibs (with one to complete) so that is a job of the list. I have my notebook to make for our trip away - we have tickets to the ice hockey in New York but no trip up to the crown of the Statue of Liberty.
I have my cake mixer fixed (not doing to badly for something that is 30 years old) and purchased a pizza stone so that is the next cooking element. This afternoon I am going to try out the Tarte Tartin recipe from Masterchef as I have a suitable dish now.

On the book front I have been listening to the new audio books from the public library. They come on a little MP3 player and really great to use. Have another which is on CD's so that will take a couple of days to listen to but makes the beading and hand stitching go faster.

The bike riding has started and I am off this afternoon for a 20 minute ride around town while I get my confidence back. Hopefully I will be able to keep it up. Certainly I am more confident in changing gears and using the hand brakes. The weather is not very conducive to riding bikes but it will improve as we move nearer to spring and summer.