I'm now wondering what they are going to do with this latest storm we just had...because, once again in the first winter after the birth of my child, this time the Mini, we got hit with another major snowstorm. This one ranks in 5th placement overall, at a total of about 19 inches (and since the wind didn't blow as hard this time, coverage was a little more even--our backyard, which tends to get somewhat windswept, was up to my knees in most places)...but really, what's an inch or 2 when you already have more than a foot and a half? But here's the kicker: This thing hit us on January 31st and, just like the last one, lasted until Groundhog Day.
What are the odds??? I'm thinking that if I do have another kid, which isn't something we're planning on, I will make certain that I and others I know don't have travel plans on January 31st in the following year, ha! ;) But I digress...
Even though the storm started on Saturday, the majority of it fell Sunday. That morning when we got up, I looked at the snow and thought, 'Well, we can still manage that, it's only a few inches so far, but it would be nice to know how much more will come down.' Daddy looked at the falling snow, calculated the fact that it takes us 15-20 minutes in good weather and much more in bad, noted the fact that more snow was still falling and would continue to do so, didn't care how much that amount would be, and said (roughly .000025 seconds after the initial calculation), 'We are NOT going to church this morning.' I still know that we could have managed, albeit more slowly...but I'm glad we agreed not to go, because it would have created more stress than it was worth. And in fact, when the time came that we would have needed to leave if we'd decided to go, I was starting to get uncomfortable with the depth as well.
This is what we were looking at at that point...and no side streets would be cleared until the storm ended.
So we spent the morning nice and toasty warm in the house, except for the 45 minutes or so that Daddy and the Munch went out to play in the falling whiteness. We were already dreaming of the giant snowmen we hoped to build.
The Munch insisted on holding Daddy's hand as they wandered around and played--she wouldn't budge otherwise.
They were disappointed to find that it was not good packing snow (a common issue here which is very frustrating--the snow is just too dry), but Daddy was still able to create a flatter sculpture with it...A turtle. :)
He called it his guard turtle.
It got buried pretty quickly, but it was fun all the same.
As before when the Munch was an infant, we opted not to take the Mini out in the snowfall...so we took pictures of her looking out, just like we had for the Munch! A natural choice, right?
Hmmm, which baby is which? At least for this one, the difference in location helps make it more obvious. :)
Monday morning, Groundhog Day, arrived. The Sun was out and the sky was crystal clear. The world was beautiful...But rather dangerous.
This was the backyard...
The snow was level with our third step.
This was the front:
Daddy had already been busy for a while by the time I got up and grabbed the camera.
He always clears our neighbor's place too, and on the rare occasion that they get to it first, they clear ours. :)
This picture makes me so very, very, very grateful for a garage...
The mound on the porch roof, seen through the attic windows, which are about 4 feet tall.
On a winter Monday, 2 things generally happen:
1) School-aged children go to school.
2) I work.
Neither of these things happened this Monday, although one of them almost did, snow or no snow.
The Friday before, I'd worked an extra day for my nanny family because the mom was taking a quick weekend flight out of town for a friend's birthday. She was to return late Sunday afternoon. You already know what was about to happen.
Except, by God's grace, it didn't. She ACTUALLY made it home Sunday night about 8pm or so, amazingly only about 3 hours behind schedule. It was an arduous journey home from the airport, during which she saw at least 4 cars just in our neighborhood that were firmly stuck in the rapidly deepening snow. Up until that point, I was prepared, by hook or by crook, to do my darnedest to get to their house Monday morning--the expectation being that she wasn't going to get home and the dad was going to have to work--and their dad and I had been texting back and forth with updates on everything with this in mind. The alley wasn't bad...but the side streets were another story. By the time their mom made it home, she was firmly convinced that she was not going to go ANYWHERE else for a good couple of days. She called off from her work, and told me to stay put. I can't say I complained... Although (If I'd managed to get to them) playing in all that freshly-fallen snow with my 5 would have been an awful lot of fun.
The Munch and I ended up staying inside all day Monday AND Tuesday--after the snow hit, it got ferociously cold, and the Mini didn't nap at the right times for me to leave her inside while the Munch and I went out. So we waited to play in the wonderland until Wednesday, when Superman once again came to play, and we had ourselves a glorious time:
Superman has no fear of the deep stuff, and he strode around like he owned it!
Munch gradually overcame her fear of immobility, and trudged out after him. She quickly adapted to the deep stuff and had a blast.
Rolling around in the snow. Check out that face Superman is making!
It didn't take long to discover snow balls and headfirst diving into the playhouse.
An attempt at a deep-snow snow angel.
Then Superman found the slide...And that's what they played with for prettymuch the whole rest of the time. :)
Daddy didn't dig along the sidewalks in the backyard this year--a lesson learned from last year difficulties. This picture shows my leg up right up against the drift by the garage, so the snow was deeper than in most of the rest of the yard, but I'm also standing on a few inches of packed, unshoveled snow.
This was the eventual result of our hard-core play. The Mini slept beautifully inside while we played (Daddy kept the monitor upstairs with him, ready to call my phone if she made noise), and only started to grunt a little just as we were coming back into the house...Perfect timing.
The city has slowly, ever so slowly, dug itself back out of the snow. It actually feels like it took much longer this time around than it took for the blizzard 4 years ago, but that may simply be due to the fact that I've had to be out in it more. It was a major pain to try to park anywhere for a couple of days, and it can still be a hassle, as only about half the snow has actually melted. Traffic is still moving more slowly than normal, even on the cleared and dry main streets, and we've had a couple days of some pretty serious black ice on the side streets. It's also snowed lightly several times since, but there hasn't been much more accumulation...just enough of a dusting to keep the snow looking pretty while not affecting the streets, which is nice. :)
But seriously, don't fly in January around here...especially if we get surprised with a third kid.
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