You’re probably sick of my play-by-play snow updates, but here it is anyway: snow is now melting so quickly that the ditches along the road and hundreds of tiny streams are bubbling and splashing through the woods and between the boulders at a slight deafening roar… the sound of water running through the woods. Mmm, mmm. Water is now actually flowing through our gutters and not just the downspouts, because the former are no longer full of ice. We lost the last of the roof-ice at about 11:30 last night – a bunch from a dormer window onto the front porch roof created such a quake that everything on the opposite side of the house fell and bounced down the deck stairs, coming to a halt on the driveway. I thought a massive tree had fallen on the house. Mikey was sure that every gutter had been ripped from the eaves at once. Just ice! Ice that we no longer have to worry about serving as a gateway to death’s door every time we dart from the house and out of the danger-zone. I dare say that by this time next week we might actually be able to use our driveway. And this was hiding underneath all along:

This is the first day in Hazel’s walking-life that she has really gotten to play outside. We don’t have a clear yard, still, but it’s such a remote, quiet place that we spent an hour and a half walking up and down the gravel roads and roaming around in the driveway(path). She clearly has a fierce, instant love for the outdoors. She could barely contain her excitement over all of the things to touch, the mud, the sounds, the sticks, the rocks, the breeze in her hair. She cried and cried and cried when we came in the house and promptly fell fast asleep under a lightweight blanket with a spring breeze swirling through the screen and around the room – it’s a whole new life, really. How do children lose this love for nature? I hope she never does. Mikey’s mom got me this last year – it’s time to dive in!

People thought 17 floors was high up: our neighbors don’t have a backyard, they have a cliff.

Listening: nothing at all
(I am) Reading: The Poisonwood Bible
(Hazel is) Reading: The Shape of Me and Other Stuff
Working on: blanket; custom jewels; things things things