Three year old, Emerson, getting ready for her dance recital last weekend.

April 12, 2017 - Wednesday

23 degrees/clear/calm winds

Pentoga Road

Brutus awakened around 2:30 this morning, shook his head back and forth, waking both Sargie and me, then headed for the first floor, something that is very unBrutus-like. 

I followed my four-legged companion down the stairs and out the back door where, clad only in my Fruit of the Loom's, I shivered while he did what needed to be done. 

Big, tough, Brutus, is afraid of the dark, especially at 2:30 AM when the biggest and worst of the boogie dogs come out to haunt all the little puppies the world over.

It's currently 3:00 AM. Brutus has gone back upstairs and is making his usual sleeping sounds, snoring, groaning, and tooting, and here I am, sitting by the wood stove, wide awake and most likely, up for the day. Sometime's life's not fair.

I was out the door first thing Tuesday morning attempting to clean the drive before the temperature warmed too much. Once the snow becomes too slushy, it's almost impossible to move, either by plow or snowblower.

I opted to blow the snow. Pushing it would be like trying to move a ton of cement blocks from the drive.

All went well and the drive was rid of the sloppy stuff in well under an hour.

Since Pentoga Road is the one of the last to be plowed in our area, Sargie drove the Blazer to work. The Kia would never have made it through the foot of snow that lay on the road in front of our house.

 

I opted to ride with her for a few miles and walk back.

We found the main roads wet, but bare, once we were off Pentoga Road.

Sargie and I, both, saw our first UP robins of the year yesterday.

In fact, we didn't see one, but hundreds.

Does anyone ever notice that the first robins of the season seem to magically appear? I've never observed a flock of robins winging their way north overhead in a beautiful V formation. It's like a person wakes up one morning and there they are.

I wonder if they braved the snow storm in order to arrive yesterday morning. One thing for certain, their timing wasn't the greatest.

Once home, I finished cleaning the drive. The foot of snow had already been reduced to several inches of slush and what little remained on the drive was rapidly melting.

With well over an inch of melted precipitation having fallen during the night on already saturated ground, Lake Pentoga is rapidly filling.

I wouldn't be surprised to see the entire meadow flooded once the rest of the snow melts. I noticed late yesterday afternoon that a pair of mallards had already found the growing puddle.

The remainder of Tuesday was spent in the shop where I fashioned a fitted lid for the vessel that was turned on Monday.

In keeping with the hallowed Easter season, I wanted to make the lid secular in fashion and give the entire piece some religious significance.

Sargie said she really liked it and placed it inside the glass China cabinet in the dining room for the whole world to see. 

It was time to begin turning bowls for Sheri's 4H fund raiser. I mounted a piece of gray birch, something really special, and began shaping it. 

I knew the wood was spalted and on the edge of either being beautiful or simply too soft to turn.

Well, we see how that turned out. I have some beautiful birch and cherry set aside for Sheri's projects that I'll work with today.

One of the busy work benches in the shop 

I left late in the afternoon for Iron Mountain so I could meet Sargie after work and ride home with her. Since I needed to be in town well before dark and was running early, I stopped by Holly and Ross's for a wonderful gabfest. It was good to get caught up on family and friends and what's happening in each other's worlds.

Sargie and I arrived home around 9:15 last night, grabbed a quick bite to eat, and were soon in bed. It was a short evening for both of us.

Sargie opens today, but somehow, has the next four days off from work beginning on Thursday. I'm not sure how that happened, but I learned long ago to never look a gift weekend in the mouth. We have some busy days ahead, so the timing was perfect.

I'll ride back to Iron Mountain this morning, run a few errands, then come back home and plan to spend most of the day in the shop. A high of 57 degrees with plentiful sunshine is forecast and it will be too wet to venture very far off the pavement.

Hmm, it's now 4 AM. Should I try going back to bed or simply stay up for the day? I think I'll pour another cup of coffee and proof read all the above while deciding.

After all, a man's work is never done.

So are the tales from Pentoga Road...

Ivy was playing peek a boo with her daddy