Inside Chores, Outside Snow and Ice

Day 3 inside because we have had revolving systems of bad weather varying from snow to sleet to freezing rain to rain.  We think about a foot of snow has fallen overall and at this moment it also carries a thin crispy layer of frozen ice on top.  Enough freezing rain has fallen to classify it a storm and many areas have lost their electricity.  Luckily, we were spared that but have been left a laneway that is rimy and slippery, very difficult to walk and even the dogs are preferring to follow rather than lead and attempt a trail.  Sadly there is no sun today to give all this ice some dazzle and beauty.
Our old birch in the front has taken a real beating.  It is very sensitive to bad weather and seems to have no resistance to damage during rain, wind, heavy snow and the like.  The ground around it is littered with its branches and twigs today. 
Meanwhile, I've been catching up on all the inside chores.  I have all the gifts wrapped for the big day, done an extra cleaning, and worked on my granny square afghan.  Turns out it was a challenge to figure out how to join the squares especially because they are all different colours.  A number of tutorials are to be found on Youtube  and though they were useful to me, I was not happy with a couple of methods I tried. I had to do some unsewing, my least favourite thing to do with a needle.  I finally found one that seems to be working okay for me.  It is a simple slip stitch joining two squares, chain 3, slip stich into the next space, chain 3 again and repeating this to the end.

Here is one side, the front, I'll call it.

And here is the back or wrong side...

 

So pretty but I still have a ton of work to do with the squares before I have an afghan.