ready to move on now....

But there's no relief yet.  Just as everyone was talking about getting back to work, slight thaw,  ever-so-slightly positive temperatures, we get another couple of inches of snow overnight.

 

That scruffy plant I photographed yesterday is covered in snow again and the hellebore is doing its best against all odds.

My favourite has to be the "fur edge" to our big pot.  Gorgeous!

But seriously, we've had enough now.  OK?

weather update

We are still sitting under a deep layer of snow, though we ventured out on foot to get our papers this morning from the shop in the next village.  The roads aren't too bad, though our lane remains tricky.

 

Though it hasn't melted at all, the occasional gust of wind and the weight of the snow itself causes the occasional small "avalanche" and we sat yesterday lunchtime, watching it falling through the branches of the apple tree.  The end result is all rather messy.

Yet, here and there, nature is proving stronger than imagined.  This hellebore in the kitchen border has pushed its way through the snowy crust and stands tall, defiant.  Its mates alongside remain tucked up for now.

As do we.

fiddling about

Together with a bunch of friends, I signed up for an online class about manipulating photographs.  As a result I'm spending more time than normal sitting here at my computer, fiddling about with Photoshop with mixed success.

The first exercise was about cleaning up "noise" on a photo and the sample photograph provided was of a bird.  As those who know me well, that was not a good image for me, who has a real "thing" about (your, not mine) feathered friends.  So, I trawled through my images and, with difficulty, found a noisy photograph taken in poor light which I thought could do with cleaning up.

Having followed the steps through using the bird image, I applied the same process to the poinsettia image above.  I resampled the image, worked on the channels using the smart blur too, merged layers which had been blurred using the Gaussian Blur tool and used the healing tool to get rid of the little white dots in there.  Along the way, I found myself struggling to use the recommended methods rather than those I normally use (eg making use of the healing tool rather than the clone stamp) but with a final sweep of the High Pass filter I was done.

The funny thing is, with the exception of the little white dots, I'm not sure that the process has been altogether successful.  Here's the "before and after" for a closer comparison

Your verdict?

No spots

Armed with the advice of clever friends (thank you Marianne and  Helen, who has altogether far more important things to worry about right now....) I repaired the broken warp thread.  Actually, I took the weaving right out, went right back to the start and tied in a new thread, because I hadn't got very far.  I started again, more loosely this time, and established more of a rhythm though I really need to sort out my posture before my back breaks!

Clearly things are meant to be looser.  I've relaxed and allowed it to take its own shape, which sadly means there are no longer spots forming in the pattern.  But the resultant weave is more regular (except for the odd blip like in the photo) and in working like this, I now realise how far I was forcing this when I began.

I also notice that the edges are straighter than they were - and remembered Miss Lin's stern face because I had a tendency to pull it too tight when I was there, too.

Yet another lesson learned - my goodness, this will look good on the CPD* record?!

* Continuing Professional Development, of which I am obliged to do ten hours per year.  Half of it must be professional training and the other half can be subject-specific, like this.  I've counted three hours of crochet classes so far and will count two hours of learning to weave.  Add that to the fifteen hours of professional training done so far this academic year and I think I'm out of the woods, don't you?

hanging around

With temperatures below freezing still, there are small clumps of snow hanging in the trees.  Waiting for more, my Mum would have said.

 

Still, there are comfortable (if cold) cushions on the garden furniture if you fancy waiting till tomorrow, when another fall of snow is forecast.

We've just had lunch and commented on the positives of being at home for a prolonged time. Space is appearing in the freezer (which was full to bursting), we have emptied the fridge of all kinds of small bits leftover from Christmas (but still have enough cheese to keep us going for some time yet) and the odd bit of housework from time to time keeps us warm.  Janice, of Project Forty has put this so much better, however.

Bored yet?  Not likely.  More weaving later!