Snow Day(s)

What was supposed to be a dusting of snow here in Vancouver turned out to be a dumping of snow. Well, that's what it looked like anyway. We'd taken Charli down for a run by Vancouver Lake when I first heard the dreaded snow forecast on the radio. Randy poo-poo'd it saying snow would only fall in the hills of Portland.

On the drive home, we noticed flakes on the windshield.

Then, later that afternoon, I glanced out the office window and noticed a few more.

But it was almost 5 the next time I looked out. And...holy smokes...it was really coming down out there!

Of course, I grabbed the camera and started shooting. In case you're wondering, the white dots on the pictures (some looking as big as snowballs) are actually snowflakes at various distances from the camera lens.

This was all supposed to be gone by Wednesday morning.

However, it's now Thursday - New Year's Eve - and we still have snow. I'm hoping this is all we get for the winter.

One thing is for certain. I was glad I wasn't on the highway when those big, wet, white flakes were falling!

I'm still thinking Spring

Okay, so maybe Spring is just a bit further away than I hoped.

We awoke yesterday morning to snow...a couple of inches at most but it was still snow.

When I woke briefly during the night, I'd noticed that it seemed awfully light outside and that's when snow first entered my mind. I burrowed further under the covers and hoped I was wrong. Oh well.

And while I still don't like snow, I have to admit that it was pretty. Of course, I also knew that it would be gone by afternoon and that helped...a bit.

I shot these pictures at two different times. The bluest ones were taken about 7:30 am; the rest were taken about 9:30. Interesting how the light changes the colors.

Sure signs of Spring

We’re having an inversion here. An inversion, in case you don’t know, happens when the cold air is trapped below the warm air. In other words, it’s colder here on the valley floor than it is up on Mt. Hood – and that’s just not right by anyone’s standard. It’s hard to complain too much, though, since an inversion usually means we actually get to see the sun during the winter months. If you’ve ever been to the Pacific Northwest in the winter, you’ll understand that our skies are pretty gray. So having sun for a full week is almost as good as a tropical vacation in January. Well, okay, so maybe not that good or even close but it is still pretty nice. Or maybe I should clarify that a bit; it was nice on the west side of Vancouver where we live. The Columbia River Gorge areas and some of the eastern sections of Portland and Clark County were howling with winds to 50mph and over. Trees were blown down and many people lost power for hours and days at a time. That’s one reason we don’t on that side of town; we had our share of wind when we lived in ND. We took advantage of the nice weather on Sunday by: 1) taking Charli to the fetchin’ fields in the morning; 2) taking Charli for a 3-mile walk in the afternoon (we saw the first flowers of Spring popping through the ground in one yard); 3) taking Charli for a ride (can you guess where?); and 4) taking a nap with Charli in the late afternoon with the sun shining down on us. Man, you can’t beat that! (And yes, Charli was pretty happy about it, too.) So, you’re asking yourself, where did they go on that drive? No-brainer …it was the first trip of the year to the Dairy Queen for that first Peanut Buster Parfait of the season. And oh my, it was good! Keep thinking Spring – it’ll be here soon!

ND Winters

I was born and raised in North Dakota so I know about winter. I know about the bone-chilling cold, blocked roads, houses that never really get warm, layering on lots of clothes before heading outside, and I know all about headbolt heaters. And while it wasn't really ND winters that made me leave ND, I'm awfully glad I'm not there this winter "enjoying" the 60 inches of snow and artic temperatures they've had. I've included a photo that my mother-in-law snapped yesterday morning. And yes, that is 42 below zero. I do remember a three-day blizzard back in 1966 (does that sound like a line from an old western movie?). [Ed. note: I'd originally typed 1996 but it should be 1966 - thanks, Kim.] The weather was so bad that my Dad was unable to get to the barn...he couldn't even see the trees in our shelter belt through the blowing snow. Here's an arial photo of our farm taken over 30 years ago. As you can see, the house in which we lived was pretty much out in the open and a long way from the barn where the cattle were.

For three days the blizzard raged and Dad had no idea if the cattle were safe inside the barn or buried under the snow.

When it was all over, we discovered a ten-foot snow bank in front of the barn. Here's a picture of my sister Janis and me (in on the right) standing on the snow bank. See that little 4-paned window on the left? The bottom of that window is about ten feet from the ground. Oh, and the cattle were fine. They'd all taken shelter inside the barn. They were thirsty and hungry but they were alive. Thinking back, the one I really feel sorry for was Mom. After all, how do you keep five kids entertained during a blizzard? Remember, this was ND in the 60s; we could get 2, maybe 3 channels on our black-and-white television. Our house wasn't large; my two sisters and I shared one large bedroom upstairs and my two brothers shared the other. That was pretty much it for the upstairs. We didn't have a theater room or a great room or a game room; in my house, the living room was where we...lived. When the blizzard was over, my older brother Dennis conned me into helping him build a tree house. Granted, building a treehouse in March isn’t the norm in ND but since the snow drifts were 15-ft high in the trees, it kinda made sense. Well, we were young so it made sense to us.

We didn’t have to climb the trees to get to the right height; we simply carried the boards over, climbed up a few branches and nailed them in place. It wasn’t until the snow started to melt that I realized I’d been conned. You see, as the snow melted, the lower branches were exposed. Dennis simply sawed off those branches so I couldn’t reach them. Here’s a picture of our soon-to-be treehouse with me holding the first branch in place. I can’t imagine either of my sisters would have allowed their kids to do this when they were our age. And I’m sure my Mom wasn’t all that happy about it but remember, she’d just spent three very l-o-n-g days locked up in a house with us! She was probably just happy we weren’t inside. But one really good thing did come out of that blizzard though; I learned to knit.