flop-eared mule

I hear you Kentuckians are iced-in at the moment. My folks in Berea have been without power for one of the first times ever. They went over to Richmond for supper and then returned to a very cold house and were going to sleep in front of their fireplace. When I was talking to Momma last night another big limb fell and sounded like a gunshot. Ice storms have a way of taking out a lot of those big old trees around their place and it makes me sad to lose them as they hold so many memories.

My favorite tree, a huge maple, decided to park some icy limbs on their deck yesterday. It's my favorite because my great-granny has a collection of rocks underneath from every county in Kentucky. And Kentucky has a lot of counties. When I was little the rock pile was simply astonishing to me but now when I go home it looks very small and the grass has grown up and hidden some of the treasures. Last year I took out an old rock (not sure which county it was from!) that had the imprint of a snake inside. Wyatt loved it.

Today is fiddling Wednesday for us. Paul and I go to Sequim for lessons and today he practices with an old fiddler for a performance in February. They're playing "Going to Boston" and a couple of other old tunes. "Flop-eared Mule" is a favorite. It's fun to watch his little fingers fly over the strings as he improves. He likes to play really fast. And yes, he's still sawing on those strings. Not sure how we're going to break his intensity.

On the scribbling front, I am past page 300 on Red River Daughter and have trimmed 14,000 words. I'll be getting the pages for The Frontiersman's Daughter soon for a last read-through/edit before it goes to print. I need to get back to book 3 but am not sure when.

And I have a Silas House book to pick up in town. A good day is always made better by a good book:) Happy Wednesday.