When the snow began...

Now that the snow in Portland has been gone for a couple weeks, it's almost impossible to believe these pictures are for real. We woke up on a Sunday morning to discover it was snowing hard. It continued to snow all day long. We drove to our friends' house to pick Delaney up from a sleep over with her best friend and watched the kids sled down the street. After we returned home, we went sledding in the church driveway across the street. Delaney went all over the front yard making snow angels and Dave walked across the street to take this picture of our house. Look closely, you can see how hard it's snowing! We were very surprised when the weather forecast said the snow would be with us for a while. Our schools ended up being canceled all week, which made for a 3 week long Christmas break. It's nice that Dave is working at home now, so the four of us hung out at home together.


Just a few days into the "Arctic Blast," as the news people called it, the sun came out. Delaney & I headed into our backyard to build snowmen. It was so cold and dry, that the snow wouldn't stick together enough for snowmen. So we decided to go back across the street to sled. I took this picture at the end of our yard. The pond was a bit frozen and got more frozen as the cold lingered on for 10 more days after this. I'm sure everyone who lives where it snows and ponds freeze over every year think this is no big deal. But in the Portland area, we NEVER see anything like the storm we had in December. It cracked us up to look out at the Canadian Geese who winter in our pond and see them walking through drifts of snow on top of the pond.

During the time we were "snowed in," Jake got 4 teeth in one week! It was a tough week for him, but it was nice that we were more or less trapped. We did chain up our SUV and were able to get out to check out movies from the store up the street. But in our area, the roads aren't plowed or sanded until you get to the main roads, so it's better to stay at home than end up in a crash with someone who doesn't think they need chains. I do think we're weather wimps around here, but as long as I have the option to stay home, it's fine with me! Maybe next year Santa will bring more plows to Portland and then we'll have to join all those other places where snow doesn't close down whole cities. But until then, we'll hang out at home sledding and making hot chocolate!