Why, what did YOU do on your day off?

Ah, life in the country. Sort of. What did we do on our day off? Replaced the dog run, which she snapped last night while attempting to chase god-knows-what off into the woods. Changed the water filters in our house and Sparky's. Cleaned out the woodstove and the chimney. Printed out the forms I need to file Sparky's taxes....ran out of ink. Again. Looked at the new struts for my poor broken car (the first step was ordering them, now we've looked at them. Eventually I guess we'll have to install them, as we've had them for several days and they don't seem inclined to install themselves. But not today.) Cleaned the kitchen. Did laundry, which turned out to be a bad idea because now the washing machine seems to have some sort of ISSUE that will also have to wait till another time because there's only just so much excitement I can take in one day. Why does everything break at once?

On the plus side, the Raggedy Anns came out really well, considering that I should have looked at pics of them first instead of going from memory...I forgot that Ann has red-and-white striped legs. I have red and white striped fabric, but I didn't realize my mistake until they were done. On another day I might have removed the legs and made new ones. Another day, not that one. So I painted the stripes on, and that worked just fine.

I have been eyeing the maple butcher block table I bought at a yard sale last summer and finally got around to sanding/stripping in the late fall. I have no plan beyond the staining of it, except that there will be a vine (well of course!) going up one leg and winding its way onto the surface. So I guess I will start with the vine and see where it progresses from there.

They may not look like it yet....

But these are Raggedy Ann christmas ornaments. WHY, you ask, am I making Christmas ornaments in February?? I do what i'm told. (stop laughing). Well I was told to make one, but I don't remember the last time I made one Christmas ornament. So there are four. I've never made a Raggedy Ann, but Sue used to bang them out practically in her sleep so I know pretty well what they're supposed to look like. Not sure how putting that red hair on these tiny little heads is going to work out, but I guess we'll see.

So we're getting through the winter as best we can; Sparky keeps buying seeds in anticipation of the herb garden she's going to plant on the deck as soon as the weather breaks. If she doesn't stop buying seeds, she's going to need another deck. And we're still sorting through Crash's treasures in anticipation of the yard sale we'll be having...again, as soon as the weather breaks. Today was in the 50s! Unbelievable how much snow disappeared in one day. But that's one day and it's still February, so I guess that doesn't constitute a break. What DID break was the nylon carport/tent thingie that Crash put up in the back yard for the purpose of parking cars while they were being fixed and that subsequently got filled with stuff...we don't know what yet. We're kind of afraid to venture in there, and now that the "roof" has collapsed under the weight of all the ice, we won't be going in there until spring and I suspect that most of what's there will go into the dumpster we'll be renting. And that's ok too.