Snow!

Last night I heard that we were to be under a winter storm advisory, up to 7 inches of the white, fluffy stuff.  I hoped they were wrong but. . .

The view here last night was of a valley with homes across the way!  Today's visibility is nil.

Good thing I brought a snow broom and scraper with me!

I have decided to remain here another day.  I am not truly prepared for this weather despite the snow broom, as I did not bring my heaviest coat or snow boots!  (I did bring gloves.)   My truck has rear wheel drive and is horrid in deep snow (Rob, Tanya and I have vivid memories of driving sideways up the hill this past winter!)  I came this route because I had never been this way, so I would like to see what's here not a curtain of white (beautiful but...) and finally my life is worth more than the cost of this hotel room.  Tomorrow should be sunny and warmer and I can continue on.  

Luckily, I packed several projects, books and have free WI-FI!  I have everything in here (remember I had to bring all the food because of the bear-who is probably holed up somewhere sleeping) except the shoes that would be best for the snow, perhaps I'll dig out after it stops snowing but until then I'm making a pot of coffee and settling in!  There will surely be college football and major league baseball on the telly if I can't find a movie-it is after all Saturday.

I'm in the Mountains Now!

Yesterday packed a real punch weather-wise!  After I finished my post on the wind I was watching the telly (after Big Bang before Person of Interest) when I noticed a severe thunderstorm warning on the bottom of the screen.  Not knowing the counties of western Kansas (or even the one I was located in) I hauled out the atlas and looked.  Not my county but counties to the south and west, since most of the weather on the plains comes from the southwest in the summer/fall, I continue checking updates.  Next up is a tornado warning for several counties including the one I am in!  Tornados are serious business and I have all my stuff in a motel room!  Where would I go if it was coming to me?  Solution:  the bathroom-lots of walls close together.  I moved all my stuff in there and continued to watch the weather.  Turned out the possible tornado storm passed just to the west of me, whew!  All this time the wind continues to blow against the window and door of my room (dirt blows in around the door until I stuff a towel under it) and about 10:30pm it began to rain.  As my Granna would have said "It came a gully-washer!"

This morning, on the other hand, dawned clear and nearly windless!

First up today I went here!

The Prairie Museum of Art and History

I've driven past this place so often and wanted to stop but there was always something (it was freezing cold out-frying hot out etc).  They have several buildings on the grounds that date from earlier times and I enjoyed walking through them.

First up was the 1930's farmstead.  Depression years so they talked about dust storms and this:

I thought of you, Ann, and Australia's "rabbit problem".  Behind the house was a small barn where some 4-H kids had their black-faced sheep (black-face sheep always make me think of Jenna).  The sheep were pretty curious about the lady with the camera!

There was a herb garden complete with an unusual windmill-called an umbrella.

Weird, huh?

A lovely white Church or Sunday School as they were originally called, built in 1915.  Love the "fish scale" shakes, although "clam shell" would be a better name as any quilter would tell you!

There was a sod house, very common on the plains as there were very few trees (there are more now because folks planted them-we primates like our trees!)  I have seen lots of photos of them but I've never been near or inside one.  I was especially  taken by the thickness of the walls.  This one had a wooden floor, windows and wood covering the sod by the windows-I think I've read that those thing were later additions.

Cactus growing on the roof!  In many photos the roof is covered with sod and sometimes there are wild flowers blooming!

These walls must be two feet thick!

There is a one-room school house and what is billed as the "largest barn in Kansas".

Isn't that sky a wonder?

The main building houses 21,500 square feet of art and artifacts! Wonderful collections of glass, buttons, coins, military uniforms from WWI to the present, bridal gowns, china, toys and dolls (my favorite).

I enjoyed this stop tremendously, and I bought stuff in their gift shop!  See!

Another glass ball to hang in the Kitchen-only 6 empty hooks now! Where am I going to put that cookbook? And another history book  (I am most intrigued by 19th century women and children-in spite of my current research into the Town of Kansas this is what I love.) I really hope I don't own this book-I might!

So, after that I was off on Interstate 70 again, soon leaving Kansas behind for Colorado.  It seems greener in Colorado-the trees are only hinting at fall color, strange.  I leave the Interstate at Limon for Colorado Springs via US 24.  I have never driven this road and it is odd to always have Pike's Peak in view, as it usually disappears as the northern peaks come into view.  I arrive in Colorado Springs at 1:30 pm MDST and decide to just keep on.  Ended up at Mountain View.  There is new snow on Pike's Peak and the aspen are turning!  I was told at the hotel to take all food in out of the truck as there is a bear about!

Wind, Wind, Wind

The day began well, a clean truck, donuts for breakfast and off down the road I went.  I picked up a 20 mile and hour wind out of the southwest just west of Topeka (about 60 miles from home).  The wind just got stronger as I went.  My lunch, usually eaten at a rest area picnic table, was moved to inside the truck at the rest area.  At Hays I don't know how high the wind was but it nearly blew my bluetooth headset out of my ear!  Just before I reached Oakley I heard that the interstate was CLOSED at Goodland due to sustained winds of 40 miles an hour and gusts of up to 60 miles per hour.  By the time I reached Colby, my destination of the day, the interstate was closed here.  Kansas is always windy and the highway is often closed for high winds out here where there is nothing to stop it.  I've never driven in any winds this high and I guess my pick up is a rather "high-profile" vehicle because it took two hands on the wheel to stay on the road at times.  Visibility was low in places from all the dust being blown about as well.  Between the dust and fighting to stay on the highway I didn't get to observe all the small details I like to report.  You can see my report of geography etc here.  It is fall this time so things are shades of yellow, rust and brown.  I had hoped to see fields of sunflowers, I did put unfortunately I'm too late to see the blooms just the seed heads drying on the stalk.

I did make a couple of stops, here:

Where I bought some yummy apple butter!  I also stopped at a quilt shop for a driving break but I didn't buy anything :(

After unloading at the hotel (my small suitcase blew off the cart twice! Thank goodness for the lovely housekeeping ladies who helped me with the door) I went to Montana Mike's steakhouse for dinner-my waiter's name was Colby.  Colby in Colby, pour guy!

As I'm sitting here in the Motel 6 the wind continues to blow, it whistles around the door and rattles the exhaust fan in the bath.  The forecast says it will stop later and that tomorrow it will be windy but not nearly as bad we shall see.  If I can't go any further tomorrow I'll enjoy Colby and think of another trip when a car broke down outside Russell and we discovered Hays!

The bags are packed and so is the truck!

In the morning I'm headed west again!  Destination is still San Diego, where Steve and his family live.  I'm going out for Nora's birthday-I can't believe she will be two!  Time is just evaporating!  I am taking some large things to him and bringing home some larger things for me, more later.  I am taking a slower path than I have in the past and will try to see some more of our national parks and monuments.  In all I'll be on the road for a bit over two weeks.  It is a very long drive out and back so this may be the last trip in the truck-I think I'll just start flying out now and again.  If it weren't for those big things going and coming I would likely have done that this time.

I'll try to keep a travel log as I did last year but internet may be spotty!

It's been a lovely fall, cool nights and warm days, still dry (we could use a good rain but it's just so pleasant!)  I'm hoping the weather is pleasant all the way!

Fall!

We've had a very cool September, which I quite enjoy!  Have considered turning on the heat a couple of mornings already but managed to control myself.  Does my pocketbook good to have neither heat nor air conditioning running!  I noticed while driving to Columbia on Sunday, and more and more since then, that the trees are changing color, the soy beans have gone gold and some farmers have already picked their corn.  The great bowl of a sky has turned the hard and wonderful blue that I love so much-no humidity to soften that blue! I planted mums and asters in the front garden. Fall is my favorite time of the year.  Not yet cold but chilly in the morning and after dark-it so reminds me of my years in the Rocky Mountains.  Rob built a fire in the fire pit on Sunday and it was so lovely to sit around it, chat and watch the flames dance!

I hope to get to stitch again this week as I am cleaning out the extra room today.  I've finished all the painting (for now) and can sit in there at night and stitch.  Just can't seem to do it in my bed room.

My office is getting cleaned out today.  I took the quilt out of the frame and took it down a week or two ago.  The quilt isn't finished but I simply don't have room in there for the frame and I don't like using it so quoting Ann "I make up excuses" not to work on it.  My Mother's cousin, Betty, who was a wonderful quilter always just quilted without any frame so I'll do the same and use a table.  Planning to take it along on the trip to San Diego and work at night.  I always stop early, so the evenings can be long.  I have so many things to do before I go, re-up the plates on the truck, get an oil change, clean the house stem to stern etc, etc, etc!  Guess I'd best get to it.  When Rob gets up we are trimming the kitchen, and working in the yard.  It will be a good day!

OOPS!!

Apparently my Math skills are not what they should be!  I can't measure and divide by two and correctly fit the cabinet!  Also my idea to cut off the fronts of the drawers using the jigsaw and then screw on the new front didn't work, sigh.  So, tomorrow I am ordering drawer boxes and new doors for this cabinet.  I am tired of working on it, although I will still be doing work in there each day with this little set back I won't be finished until well after I return from San Diego.  I feel like the most boring person on earth!  All I've talked about for weeks and weeks is the kitchen-so no more.  When it its all finished I will post before and after photos and I may mention in passing that I've done something (like put my cookbooks on the new bookshelf or trim or something) but no posts just about the remodel.

On that note, this morning I took a look at Lee's Summit's Oktober Fest.  Not very big, although they did have locally made crafts in the craft tents.  I was totally disappointed by the lack of funnel cakes!  I could really have used a funnel cake this morning!

I have done a little quilting in the past couple of weeks.  I have all the bag pieces together and have machine quilted two of them (two I've done by hand with big stitches).  I've never really had any luck with machine quilting but I used my quilting foot (well, duh!) and they went quite quickly and nicely.  I expect I'll be doing the rest this way as I'd like to finish them and use them this Christmas!

I spent the afternoon cleaning the house as Rob and Tanya are having guests tomorrow.  It looks better than it has in a really long time but there is still much cleaning to be done before the holidays.  My office/sewing room looks like a hurricane hit and the extra room (where I do hand work and watch tv) is full of trim, tools, and all the stuff I couldn't figure out where to put!

Tomorrow, I'm off to Columbia to deliver a bed to Scott and Bri.  My Dad no longer needed it but Scott and Bri have empty bedrooms.  Next time I go down for an over night I will have a real bed!

The State of the Kitchen Address.

So, I have eight doors left to hang and eight drawer fronts to put on-then tweek the fit of several-then the cabinets will be officially finished!  Rob, Tanya and I installed the new counter/bench top today and Rob the new sink.  My plumber, Jamie, is coming in the morning to hook up the sink drains etc.

My plan for the next two days:  finish door and drawer fronts, put up the backsplash, and paint (of course).

By the weekend I should have the bookcase installed (and filled-I have four file storage boxes of cookbooks!) and the windows turned into photo frames painted although the photos won't be back.  Then all that will be left will be painting and installing trim.  And cleaning house and cleaning house and cleaning garage!

I do believe there is a light at the end of the tunnel!  I also believe it would be easier to move than remodel a kitchen!  I am going to love it though, I can already tell.