Question: Do you know how to make God giggle?

Answer: Make plans.

I had a plan for today. I was even going to do a good deed, so I dunno if that counts, or what...but God had other plans for me today I guess.

I even went to bed early so that I'd wake up at a decent hour (and just what is decent anyway?).
Anyhow I was going to drive a friend here down to Asheville to visit her doctor. It's a 2 hour drive and while I've passed Asheville on my way to other places, I've never stopped and was looking forward to it. I'm still fighting the valiant battle against letting this cold get a foothold, and a little road trip just seemed like a good thing. My friend was looking forward to a visit to a bookstore and I was going to Hancock's for some sewing notions I can't find here in Boone. She wasn't up to doing all the driving so we made a plan.

I guess at some point during the night it rained, and immediately after that the temperature dropped quickly. My friend called me early to tell me that our trip was off and I went out on the porch to see for myself.

This is how the car looked.....it had about three-quarters of an inch of ice covering everything. It was a Subaru Ice Cube and stayed like that until about 2pm when stuff started to thaw out enough for it to start dripping.

This is down the road to the left of me and though this photo doesn't show it, the sun was out and everything was just glittery and very magical.

It's probably the first ice storm I've seen in 30 years or so, since the last time I was in Illinois visiting my mom during winter. She is gone now, but I thought of her this morning. The snow plow passed by to lay down some de-icer on the road and it reminded me of how she used to fill a thermos of coffee and brandy and take it out to the snow plow that came down her country road in front of the farm. Now she was not on a much traveled road, so she was kind of low on the totem pole when it came to getting the road cleared, but amazingly once word got out that she would have some special hot coffee ready for the snow plow drivers.....she didn't often get snowed in for long. Gotta love a woman who thinks like that! So I made a platter of lemon-poppyseed muffins and when the plow came back this afternoon....I was ready for them. No brandy, but coffee and muffins might cause them to remember me.

This is how it looked down the road to the right of me.
All of the trees on the hillside across the road from me are heavy laden with ice and some of them have bent nearly in half. As the day has gone on, I hear the snap, crackle, and pop of limbs breaking off and the sound of icicles falling to the pavement. I was a little nervous walking down the steps from the porch....it was no stretch to imagine an icicle breaking off and knocking me in the head.

As it was I tried to dodge all the drips as they melted and still got damp and chilly.

Since the weatherman contributed to my delinquency today...hehehe...I was able to spend part of the day sewing. I'm working on another Mexican quilt and I put together the center block....another Virgen de Guadalupe framed by fabric celebrating the variety of Talavera Tiles that you find all over Mexico. In Puerto Vallarta where I shopped weekly for household stuff, they have a tile factory in old town. I got most of my tiles there when I was building my house in Punta de Mita, and it was really fascinating to go upstairs and watch them paint the designs freehand on the tiles....no templates or streamlined automation...just artisans with their brushes and pots of glazes. In addition to tiles, they made sink basins, towel bars, soap holders, and all manner of dinnerware and other ceramic clay items. All the images in these 3 Mexican Quilts I'm working on, are memories of my time in Mexico and so I find myself thinking about it a lot lately. Be right back........

The UPS guy just was here....brave guy out in this weather. I love it when the big brown truck stops here. Maya loves it too, because she loves the UPS guy and he always has a minute to scratch her behind the ears and tell her how pretty she is....now if I could just get him to do that to me! LOL

Sylvia's quilt is back from the Long Arm Quilter over in Tennessee! I love it and Kathy did a great job on it. Now I just need to square it up, trim it, machine stitch the binding on and then hand stitch it. I'm so excited to get it back and see how it turned out.

Meanwhile I'm busy getting the next ones ready. I have one ready to send off now, so will take it into town and send it tomorrow if the weather permits.

See you next time.