Sunday

Tropical plants that I got Monday (Picture from Tuesday or Wednesday?). One of them wasn't looking so good anymore yesterday and today.

The rest of the pictures are from today.

Ruffy's King of the (a) snow mound.

See the fence? Yeah, I mean that lump of snow in the middle. There should still be a fence underneath it, though it is covered in snow. The fence is fairly straight and it's snow image shows up nicely, I think. Also note the sunlight on patches of snow. Pretty sunshiney moment.

See? Blue sky! And snow :)

Bella laying on a path. Again, note the sunlight and blue sky. It was wonderful!

And this is after/during the warm time when things seemed to be melting, but it looks like we still have enough snow!

Today was a lovely Sunday, to a large extent. Having missed work the day before because I decided against driving through about a foot of snow that was a bit heavier than the fluffy powder we had earlier, I really wanted to get to church today. I thought it was important. It was.

Sunday school... Ephesians 3 and 4. I had looked over the chapters earlier, which was good because I was really late for class. They are good chapters. I am inspired. Read them and be inspired, too. Be new in Christ! This is how I plan to get through the week. Learning to be new in Christ. The internet is being trouble right now, and my goal was to get to bed by 7:00... hmmm.

And the main service at church, and talking to people, and I was encouraged.

And the sun shone! And I saw blue sky! And I drove about 50 miles per hour! (i.e. I was somewhat confident - though still a little concerned - that I wouldn't spin of the road because of ice or snow!)

[more] snow

Here are some pictures - I think my mom took them all. After the ~3 foot snow last week, it has snowed off and on, typically with some kind of weather warning, antisipated or currently occuring, reported via the internet. This last night and morning, we got another foot or so. But it is warmer now, and this snow is heavier than the multi-foot powder snowfall.

The second big snow of the year (first of such depth in a long time - check the news for more detail)

Wednesday, my last day of normal student-hood at my community college... it snowed. Shortly after my last final, I walked through the snow to my car. I slipped and fell on my way from the science building to my car. But I survived. When I opened my car, it was like a cave inside because snow covered the windows. When I knocked the snow off the car, snow came up around midway up one tire. The wind-shield wipers were frozen to the car. And the temperature... was probably in the teens. I warmed the car up for over twenty minutes and still the windshield wipers were iced in place. Finally, I talked to my dad (thank God for cell phones) and he said to try to pull them off by hand. This worked. Then, with the car stopped when they were up, as he instructed, I could slap one against the windshield to remove the remaining hindering ice so that they could do their job. Finally, perhaps 45 minutes or more after I had first reached my car, (and after watching a car play in the deep powder snow, at one time driving fast enough that some snow flew over top of it, and after seeing a truck play in the powder snow by spinning) finally I left. The point is, I was more concerned about the hazard of the cold and the deep snow, so I didn't have as sentimental a farewell to my college as I could have. Actually, I think I forgot about the community college ending part (had the snow not been like it turned out to be, I had been considering coming back Thursday to sell back some text books).

It snowed Wednesday and through to Thursday. The snow stopped Thursday afternoon.

See the snow on the back porch?

Here is the back porch again in the light Thursday morning.

I thought it was interesting how the snow on the railing was leaning out.

Supposedly, by brothers and Dad shoveled around 9 inches Wednesday. It kept snowing. I helped them shovel about 22 inches more on Thursday morning. We started around 6:30 a.M. It kept snowing. By the time one brother and my mom shoveled the back porch there was 30 to 31 inches on it. It snowed some more. About 5 more inches were measured on the back porch. So it seems we got around 35 or 36 inches (around 3 feet). One very thorough snow storm. And it was cold, too. At this time, we are plowed out. Thank God for neighbors with equipment.

Only two big snows into the winter (only counting what I qualify as a big snow and remember), and I think there was only an inch or two of fence left above the snow in one place in front of the house (maybe the snow has compressed down some now, though?).

First big snow of the year.

Yesterday, the day after the last "normal" day of school (as if any last day of school is normal! this was perhaps a normal "last" day), it really snowed. When I measured it, it measured fairly precisely 8 inches.

When I went to work, it was snowing. So as I worked, I hoped I would get home soon enough that I would not get stuck.

When I finally reached the neighborhood, someone had plowed! Praise God! So I didn't get stopped by snow until I was just a foot or two from having my front tires in the garage. Imagine my relief! (No cold walk home in the dark; no trying to shovel the car out and hoping I wasn't blocking the neighbors; you get the idea, right?) I am so thankful to God.

So, stopped a few feet from my goal, I backed up to try again. Somewhere in this try, I slid to the side. See the tracks where the front tires slid to the side?

Third try, the cat was in the way. I was afraid he'd risk getting run over instead of moving into the deep snow or getting to the garage in time... :(

So I backed up and tried again. Success! I got all the way into the garage. But when I tried to close the garage door, the sensor stopped it because...

the car had pushed snow into the way. See the dirty snow where it was cleaning my car? This is an indication that the snow was too deep for the car (ideally) and if the road hadn't been plowed, I probably would have gotten stuck much earlier.

Now for some pictures from today.

Isn't Ruffy so cute?

See how big he is next to Belle? (Or how small.)

Isn't the snow so pretty?

(Trying to honestly appreciate the snow. For now, God has put me here in this snowy place.)

My hands are cold
I'm getting old
(er)
It sounds so good to sleep
I'm rather hungry
Missed most of lunch, see
But not ready to eat
(yet).

Four of my classes are complete
(enough)
Two finals are left to greet
A little study might be neat
'Cause 98.9999% percent right would be sweet

But finals are nearly a week away
I've lots of time to sleep and play
(or work).

(Now my hands are a mixture of warm like when you come in from a winterish cold day - which I did.)

change

what if I didn't capitalize letters? see, I can't (meaning "I choose not to") do that. I still capitalize 'I.' Oh, well.

Imagine! I have 5 days of classes at my community college left. Period. And then finals.

Its scarey. Change.

Lunch with people that I've eaten with many times. In the lunch area that used to be foreign and intimidating when it was full of the noon crowd but now is part of my normal life. With friends I may never have met without coming here.

Moving on, I wonder and guess, as I have wondered and guessed before when about to make a big change, what friendships will continue, and for how long?

Of course, all this thought could be un-necessary. The possibility still remains that I will take a class or more here next semester. Or tutor. (Or both.) (Or neither.)

I have appreciated... what?

1. Learning more about Spanish grammar!
2. The Early Childhood Curriculum class last semester.
3. Learning about Access in the Intro to Computers class.
4. Disecting in Biology lab.
5. Chem. lab. (What? I'm really saying that?)
6. The music we were supposed to learn to identify in Music Survey.
7. Watching La Historia Oficial in Spanish class.
8. Good teachers.
9. Funny teachers.
10. Making friends and meeting people.
11. Finding my church because of somebody and some people that I met through classes and Campus Crusade meetings.
12. The thought that soon I should have an official piece of paper that says I'm educated (at the A.A. level).

So did you know you could easily make a numbered list if you had a blog like mine?

So, I'm happy and sad and...

Have a great day! I should get to working on my last paper for my Engish class!! (Excluding the exit essay, I mean.) Well, I intend to work on it before toooooo long, but still not yet.