First Snow

Our first snow of the 2011-2012 winter season. It is always so beautiful and exciting. Now, if I can just remember what I did with all the winter gear.

Big Snow

We had our first major snow storm of the 2010-2011 winter season overnight. This was a true nor'easter, working it's way up the coast dumping snow along the way.

It started last evening and snowed all night. I watched the snow swirl under the spotlight out back. It piled up very quickly.

It is hard to tell how much snow there is with all the wind. There are many places where it is well over two feet deep, but others only a few inches. My best estimate would be someplace in the 15-18" range.

This poor little bird feeder is somewhat protected from the wind, so the snow piled up high. The birds don't seem to mind the snowy hat on the feeder as they flit and fly back and worth for seed and peanuts.

The younger guys spend a lot of time making trails and sledding. The snow is very dry and powdery. It took quite a few runs down the sledding trail to pack it down enough to get a long run.

The birds are very busy today taking advantage of the steady supply of things to eat at the feeders. It must be hard for them to find food with so much food and I imagine the cold temperature and high winds tax their energy. We try and offer a wide variety of foods for them to make it a bit easier.

I usually bring the gazing globe inside, but I think it looks pretty interesting with a the snow cap and reflection of the house.

The wind caused some very interesting snow drifts.

I hope everyone in the snow area is staying safe and warm. Thankfully, we were all home today and didn't have any place to go, so we are enjoying the fresh snow, a cozy home and being together.

Full Moon

Tonight's moon will be the brightest moon in 2010. It is often called the Wolf Moon for obvious reasons. With our new fallen snow, it seems even brighter outside. I enjoyed trying to capture the moon with my camera, although it was very cold outside. For a point and shoot, I was pleased with the results. If you get a chance, be sure to pop outside for a few moments and enjoy the gorgeous view.

First Snow

We had our first accumulating snow yesterday and overnight. The children were so excited. They spent hours outside yesterday toting snow from the trampoline to the sliding hill so they would have enough to go sledding. A few more inches fell overnight, so the hill was covered nicely this morning.

There is always something so magical about the first snow.

Frosty Morn

Twenty-nine chilly degrees this morning as we waited for the school bus. Everything is coated with a heavy frost, many trees are already bare and it is looking more and more like winter. No snow yet, but mornings like today foretell things to come.

I try and find beauty in each day, no matter the weather. I didn't have to go far this morning. It was lovely out.

Stormy Weather

We had an ice storm this week. It left much of our area without power. We managed to dodge the outage bullet and except for 2-3 short term losses of power, we have maintained our electricity.

This is my first attempt at a slideshow...hope you enjoy.

Make a Smilebox slideshow

Oh, the weather outside.....

Well, I knew it had to happen sooner or later, but this is a bit sooner than usual.

We did have a few snow flurries this week, but check out the video...this is snow.
(The ticking sound is the water dripping off the roof. I was standing under the side porch.)



It started about 4pm this afternoon and continued on for several hours. The ground is totally white. The prediction was for 3" or so, but I'm not sure that much actually accumulated, as the ground was terribly wet from all the rain we have had.

The wind has picked up and it sounds like winter.

They, the meteorologist, are saying we will have 50 degrees by Friday, so this white cold stuff will hopefully be short-lived.

The children are sure hoping that the ground will still be white in the morning.

Stormy Weather

As I mentioned before, the weather predicted for our camping trip was not good and was complicated further by the approach of hurricane Kyle. The rain Saturday night into Sunday morning was tremendous, a downpour that lasted for hours.

There are many reasons I love our camping trailer, but none more than staying warm and dry during rotten weather.

Below you can see the river that developed flowing under the trailer. We were a bit concerned for erosion, but it seemed secure enough.

The water poured off of our awning. We made sure it was slanted heavily to one side to keep the water from pooling on top.

This was the result the next morning. We weren't really sure how we were going to get out of our site with this very large washout. It ended up not being difficult as Brian drove over onto the lawn.


These little adventures always add to our trips and make for some of the most interesting memories.

Hmmm...what is this?

Okay, it is still August, but I have been seeing way too much of these colors already! Add to that temps in the low 40s and I would say, fall is fast approaching. I absolutely love fall weather, those gorgeous days of blue skies and cooler temps, but I am not ready at all for what comes close on its heels...I'm not even going to mention it. I'm going to try and enjoy those wonderful days without thinking too far in the future!

And the Rain, Rain, Rain Came Down, Down, Down

After a beautiful sunny day, the afternoon turned much more humid and the storms rolled in.

We have been having quite a bit of unusually hot, humid weather this summer, which almost always produces late afternoon, evening thunder and lightning storms.

Today's storm was particularly wild, with heavy winds, tremendous rain (2.25 inches in just over an hour), and hail.

The hail was about nickel size. I do not dare look at what this storm has done to our garden! Three times during the duration of the storm, the hail came and coated the ground. It was quite interesting to see and I do love weather, but I am very concerned for our plants.

To top it all off, with the last wave of the storm, the power went out. It was only off for about two hours, but with the heavy rains on top of the close to four inch storm we had a couple days ago, the ground is saturated and our cellar soon flooded.

We do not keep anything down there of value but the house mechanicals and our big freezer. Because there was no power, there was also no sump pump. Everything is up on concrete pads, but the water came in fast. The water reached over the pads and up above the motor on our furnace and maybe the motor on the freezer. We will have to wait until the water pumps out to assess what damage there is. Brian is certain the furnace is heavily damaged.

Note: Brian spent several hours in the cellar lastnight pumping out the water and assessing the damage. He still doesn't know why, but the furnace motor was undamaged. He said it must be a sealed unit as the motor was under water. So, praising God, nothing of importance was damaged. We have a lot of cleaning up to do, but we are so thankful. Our cellar is just a cellar, not a nice basement or anything, so we really don't have anything of value down there. We had another round of storms run through, but we did not lose the power, so the pump was able to keep up with the extra water. Thank you all for your kind words and prayers.

After the Storm

In our area, with hot and humid weather, comes late afternoon thunder and lightening storms, often with heavy wind and occasionally hail. One day last week, a storm blew through with very heavy winds. This tree in our back yard split and came down on our chicken coop. Thankfully, just the top hit the coop and there was no damage.

The kids enjoyed playing on the tree for several days until Brian cut it up this past weekend.

Finally Some Spring

Spring, spring, spring!

We finally had a wonderful spring day. The temps made it into the 60s today! It was so nice to prop open a few windows and let in the delicious fresh air.

We did our seat work this morning and then the kids enjoys a little bit of time outside before we had to head to co-op. They were not thrilled to have to go, but they had a great time once we got there.

We are winding down our co-op year and today we only did art and then the kids played. The group is small and everyone gets along great. Co-op has been especially good for Gabe who is quite shy and often has difficulty in larger groups. There are several boys around his age and they have been so gracious this year, including him in their play and now he feels very comfortable and enjoys these friendships.

The kids went back outside as soon as we got home. They enjoyed their bikes, the tramp and some bubbles. The wind was blowing quite a bit, so the bubbles worked great.

Hannah can be especially funny at times. She has such a tremendous sense of humor and just finds life, well, funny. Bessie was trying to help her do some flips on the tramp. She wasn't having much success, but each time she landed on her bottom, she would just laugh and laugh. It was so contagious, we all had to laugh with her.

Here she decided to try a somersault instead. Hurrah, Hannah! Great job and what a super attitude.

We heard the peepers tonight. What a joy that sound is after our long winter. I am sure we will get some more cold weather, perhaps even a bit more snow before we can officially declare winter over, but these little milestones give us hope for the warm, sunny days to come.

Spring Snow

Friday we woke to more snow. I really can't complain too much as our ground was just about bare and there are plenty of places in the area that still had a lot of snow.

The kids thought this a great boon to their plans and we made a short school day and they spent several hours out playing in the white wonderful stuff.

This may very well be the last snow of the year...at least accumulating snow. Well, one can only hope.

One last big snowball?

Time for An Ark?

Sometime Friday, it started to rain. And it rained and rained and rained all night, all day Saturday and into Sunday morning. It wasn't that warm, but warm enough so it wasn't snow. I am happy about that.

The kids decided they wanted to brave the elements and I am not one to prevent such exploits. Everyone bundled up in coats, hats and cloves and ventured out. Within a few brief moments, they were totally soaked. They did manage to stay out for about 30 minutes, but the incredibly cold water finally drove them in. They couldn't have been wetter if they had showered in their clothes, but they all seemed to enjoy the fresh air.

I donned my coat and gloves and grabbed an umbrella to take a few pictures.

Can you see how hard the rain is coming down?

Gabe always manages to get the wettest...I wonder how?

Yes, this is our yard under water

I was a bit concerned for one of my flower beds as it was also under water. Thankfully the rain stopped, the temp shifted and became quite a bit cooler and the wind picked up so most of the water evaported very quickly.

I am going to have to work on making better drainage around my gardens before next winter.