Talk about the weather

I wanted to say a word about the weather here. Even though technically winter doesn't start for another week, we started into winter weather way back in early November. Maybe sooner.

And then a couple of weeks ago, the temperature dropped suddenly and drastically. It went crashing down under the freezing mark. It stayed way down there for a long time, probably a little dazed from the fall -- you know, shaking itself off, wondering if it would be worth the climb back up, seeing that it's nearly winter anyway and all.

Just over one week ago we got our first real snowstorm.

See? We even had to shovel.


It continued snowing Monday, Tuesday. I stopped biking to work and walked instead, past all the cars skidding on the ice and all the cars stuck in the snowdrifts and all the people chiseling their windshields out of the arctic cold. I love love LOVE living close enough to work to walk.

Until the snow plow drives by and dumps heaps of brown slush all over the sidewalk.

Wednesday the temperature plummeted even further, cracking through the zero degree Fahrenheit mark overnight. Hovering just above 0F in the mornings, stretching just into the teens during the day.

COLD!

We bundled Jonathan in layer upon layer upon layer, and showed him how to tuck his face into his scarf when he felt threatened by frost bite, how to pull it out occasionally for air. Walking to school became painful, with the boy stopping regularly to ask if his nose had fallen off yet.

Friday night it snowed again, so Saturday morning we bundled up to shovel, preparing for the worst. But suddenly somehow it was warm! Sweating-in-the-overcoat warm. Buy-a-new-bikini warm. Well, ok. Not exactly bikini warm. But definitely above freezing. Maybe even 38 degrees Fahrenheit. Writing that sentence makes me want to cry. I have suffered such torture that 38F is warm.

So in the new warmth, Saturday morning we hiked up the hill and went sledding.

Yes, that hill. Isn't that picture amazing? It took us 17 minutes to walk to the park in the shadow of those mountains.

We live here! I took lots of pictures, my fingers actually warm enough to hit the button. My body was warm enough that I could be in awe of these beautiful mountains, this spectacular place where we live -- for the first time in days and weeks and months! (Rather than cursing out the miserable winter).

Here are some pictures of my men.



Not even very crowded at the sledding hill. Perfect Saturday morning.


Because it was so warm (balmy 38F), the snow was a nice, wet packing consistency. So then my men built a snowman.


And then kept building....
Until we had a lovely snow thing.

Isn't that nice? See, I should blog with pictures more often.

Anyway, this would be a good place to stop, with me warm and happy on the beautiful hill. But unfortunately, not all posts have happy endings.

A new storm moved in Saturday afternoon, but the weather never really cooled down to meet it. So all that afternoon and all day Sunday, slush fell out of the sky and coated the sidewalks with 3 inches of mush. Sloppy, slippery mush.

And then Sunday night, the temperature dropped below freezing again.

And all that mush turned to 3 inches of ice on everything.

And I've had it. Winter sucks. Time to move.