Frugal finds and fixes: Yard sales, wind storms, and earthquakes

Fixes: People in southern Ontario are starting off this weekend with lots of unexpected fixing ahead, after strong winds crashed through yesterday (up to 122 km/hr where we live). Trees blew down behind our apartment building, and we could see shingles flying off roofs in the neighbourhood. In Toronto, balcony furniture was seen flying through the air, and the roof blew off a school (there were also fatalities because of downed power lines). We had similar tree damage a couple of times at our old house, and it's not easy or cheap to deal with.

The only thing we had damaged here was one of the car ramps we had stored on our balcony (used for oil changes, not on the balcony). It fell over when the winds started up, and a piece broke off, but Mr. Fixit was able to re-glue it. That's pretty minor compared to what others are dealing with after the storm (and in other situations like flooding in New Brunswick and volcanoes in Hawaii). 

Finds: Street sales are starting, and in spite of the mess left everywhere this morning, there were lots of people out enjoying the warm weather. I found a Daytimer the same size as my planner (so the Bible cover can go back on my Bible), and a pair of earrings. The Daytimer was two dollars, and I actually bought it just for the paper and dividers inside it. Half-size filler paper is hard to find here, unless you go to the expensive office-supply store. Walmart used to carry it, but I haven't seen any there for awhile. Anyway, I cleaned up the cover and then decided that I like it as is; so I got more than I expected for my two dollars.

Finds: The one thing I'm not interested in right now at yard sales is books. I see enough of those at the thrift store. Here's one that came home recently: The Invention of Clouds, by Richard Hamblyn. It's about Luke Howard, the amateur meteorologist who gave the clouds all their Latin names.

E-book reading: I had to wait awhile to be next in line for Goodbye, Things: The New Japanese Minimalism, by Fumio Sasaki. I wasn't sure how much relevance to expect from a lifestyle book written by a single male thirtysomething, and translated from Japanese.  However, it was one of the better short books I've read recently on what we expect our stuff to do for us, and why we keep chasing down more of it. The author referred several times to the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011, and how that affected his own and others' attitude toward possessions. (He points out that his previously large book and camera collections could have been dangerous in such an earthquake.) In comparison, I recently read a twenty-year-old (thrifted) book about the simplicity journey, and I could barely get through it--too preachy. (So you know I don't recommend every minimalism book that comes along.)

Finds, again: I have been very lucky lately, finding summer clothes at the thrift store. I am putting a Project 333 list together, to be posted near Victoria Day. (In a couple of weeks.)

In the meantime, this is my happy find for this week: a chambray shirtdress, that was even more of a bargain than it might have been, because it was tagged as a shirt instead of a dress, and priced accordingly. It's a short shirtdress, okay? Anyway, this one also has sort of a patience-pays-off moral attached. I had been wanting a dress like this for awhile, because they're so useful: you can wear them closed, open, layered, whatever. The discount store next to our building has shirtdresses for about twenty dollars, and I looked at them a couple of times when I was over there getting milk, but I never got around to trying one on. They looked sort of flimsy, and I kept thinking about people sewing those dresses overseas. Please note that I have bought shoes, hats, and other things there, and even the occasional t-shirt or sweater over the years, so I'm not trying to get all sustainable-purist about it; but something about those particular dresses just didn't seem right, and I didn't feel right about buying one. 

And then this one, a better brand, turned up at the thrift store for a quarter of even the discount-store price. Plus it has a pretty floral pattern (hard to see in the photo, you have to look close). 

So, worth the wait.

Shiny happy rainbow

Seen from our balcony. The funny part was, we could hear people on other balconies also oohing and aahing and calling each other to come out and look. Rainbows make people neighbourly?

Twenty-four hours

Yesterday's weather.

Today's weather.

Enough said?

"All I want for Christmas is some snow..."

Another kind of fall

Greener, greener, greener

Also sunnier.

Green, green, green

Drip drip drip

(Finally.)

What a whole day of snow in April looks like

What 10 cm of March snow looks like

The sun is shining, the grass is green

Something whispered snow

 

The Sun is Out

Spring is on the way; it's up to 3 degrees (Celsius), sunny, and it's supposed to be warmer tomorrow.

Maybe I will even have a snow-half-gone photo to put at the top of the blog.

Snow day on Groundhog's Day...but not if you're homeschooling

See the photo at the top of the blog today? Taken out the window early this morning (the orange blobs are street lights). All the schools are closed here...except for Lydia's Homeschool Academy.

Summer or fall? Last days of warm

 Maple in front of our house--always one of the first to turn red

 Beside our house--still blooming

 Why you need to look very, very closely at these flowers: they're covered with bees today!

Winds, weather and water--lots of water

The temperature has gone up, and the thawing and the rain have brought all kinds of water in places where it's not welcome.  Including our basement, which is on the same level as the garage.  In the forty-some years that Mr. Fixit has known this house (it was his grandparents' before we bought it), the drains in the basement have never failed, even in wet weather.  Until last night.  Mr. Fixit is slightly insomniac anyway, and something around 2:30 in the morning told him to go and check on the status of things.

The status was several inches of water in our laundry area and basement entrance, some trying to get into the storage room, and more coming into the garage under the doors.  Mr. Fixit and Mama Squirrel spent about two hours, in boots and pajamas, bailing, sopping, wringing, pouring, and mopping.

The damage so far is not too significant.  All the floor mats in that area will have to be replaced, but some of them were old anyway.  The water that got into the storage room stayed in the middle, so it missed the shelves. The laundry appliances and vacuum cleaner (stored on the floor there) seem all right.  We had to toss part of a box of stuff being packed for the thrift store, and re-wash a few towels and things that got damp (besides all the old towels that we used to mop things up).  There is some concern about the places we couldn't reach to get clean or dry, but we are running heaters and trying to get everything dried out quickly.  It could have been a lot worse.

But we went out this morning and bought a new Shop-Vac.  Just because.

Snow Day Books Quiz (Reposted from 2007)

If you're looking for something to do, I've re-posted a snowed-in books quiz that we posted several years ago as part of a Carnival of Homeschooling.   (The photos are also from that post.)  Here are eleven cold and snowy excerpts from children's books--without authors or titles. Can you name the books? Answers are posted here.

Here we go:

"O ye Frost and Cold, bless ye the Lord, praise Him, and magnify Him for ever," sang Will, reflecting that Mr Beaumont had shown a certain wry humour in choosing the canticle. "O ye Ice and Snow, bless ye the Lord, praise Him, and magnify Him for ever." (1)

“Hush now, lad,” said Aunt Nan.
“You will have to wait until spring.
Nothing can get over
the mountains now, not even the mail.”
“No mail all winter?”
John asked.
“That’s right,”
Old Joe said. (2)

It was growing darker every minute and what with that and the snowflakes swirling all round him he could hardly see three feet ahead. And then too there was no road. He kept slipping into deep drifts of snow, and skidding on frozen puddles, and tripping over fallen tree-trunks, and sliding down steep banks, and barking his shins against rocks, till he was wet and cold and bruised all over. The silence and the loneliness were dreadful…..[He said] to himself, “When I’m the King of XX the first thing I shall do will be to make some decent roads.” (3)

By the middle of the pasture, the flakes were falling thicker. Now the wind drove Irene along so rudely she had to hop, skip, and go helter-skeltering over the knobby ground. Cold snow sifted into her boots and chilled her feet. She pushed out her lip and hurried on. This was an important errand….[The wind] swept up and scattered the fallen snow, got in front of Irene to keep her from moving ahead. Irene turned around and pressed on backwards. (4)

“On the little that could be seen of his face behind some unusually white-looking whiskers there was a mixture of surprise and excitement as he took in the sight which met his eyes. Overnight a great change had come over the weather. Whereas the day before had been mild, almost spring-like for early January, now everything was covered by a thick white blanket of snow which reached almost to the top of his Wellington boots.” (5)

[She] stood at the little window looking out in wonderment, for the snow was beginning again, and the thick flakes kept falling till the snow was up to the window; and still they continued to fall, and the snow grew higher, so that at last the window could not be opened, and [they] were shut up fast within the hut. (6)

In most places the snow was still hardly lying at all, for the wind kept catching it up off the ground in sheets and clouds, and hurling it in their faces. And round their feet little eddies of snow ran about as you sometimes see them doing over ice. And, indeed, in many places, the surface was almost as smooth as ice….Fighting her way forward with hood up and head down and numb hands inside her cloak....the only things she thought about were her cold hands (and nose and chin and ears) and hot baths and beds at Harfang. (7)

The ladder was his only hope, and yet there was so much more work to do….It was not much later when the wind began howling through the dark woods and fine flakes of snow whipped through the branches of the oak. Indoors it was warm and cozy, and to take his mind off his misery Warton decided to play a game of solitaire. (8)

The rest of the fieldmice, perched in a row on the settle, their small legs swinging, gave themselves up to enjoyment of the fire, and toasted their chilblains till they tingled; while [their host], failing to draw them into easy conversation, plunged into family history and made each of them recite the names of his numerous brothers, who were too young, it appeared, to be allowed to go out a-carolling this year, but looked forward very shortly to winning the parental consent. (9)

"We'll be lucky if we each get one present," said Susan. "Maybe we won't get any present at all," said Neddie. "Maybe Santa Claus won't be able to come, because it's snowing so hard...." "That doesn't make any difference to Santa Claus," said Betsy. "He always comes. Come on, let's help Santa Claus. Let's make presents." (10)

“You can fly in storms,” said Aunt Lily. “You’ve flown in storms before.” “That’s different—I was alone.” “I don’t see the difference,” said Aunt Lily. “If you can fly in a storm, we can fly in this storm if we have to. And that is that.” (11)