our little family: big snow 2008

Where it snows more, everyone puts studded tires on their cars and learns to drive more carefully. School kids can pick up extra money shoveling front walks and driveways. Everybody has snow boots and gloves. And you learn your limitations and don't try to fool mother nature. Here in Seattle, we usually see only a couple-few days of snow at a time, and don't prepare in the same way for it. This time, I think it's been going on for two weeks now.

Let's all go sit out on the deck in the back yard and enjoy the lovely weather. Anyone for a tall cool drink?

Just got in after spending a couple hours pouring teapots of boiling water into frozen rain gutters outside in the back yard. My hands are still a bit numb. Not as bad as some jobs I've done in the past (riveting airplane wings, fixing a frozen sewer pump on our houseboat years ago on a bitterly-cold new years day) but still plenty of outdoor fun for one afternoon. The weatherman said it was supposed to start raining today, but these raindrops are looking white and flakey.

If the Google Street View car tootled on past our house, this is what it would see. But it might not make it up our icy hill.

There's a big bird population around our house. We have a popular bird feeder in the front yard and lots of ground-feeding visitors too. Miles and I saw an unfamiliar woodpecker on our big pine tree the other day, and we've been trying to identify him ever since. We think he might have been a red-breasted sapsucker, but aren't completely sure.

A couple of hummingbirds winter with us. In the cold wind and snow, we've needed to bring their feeders in every few hours to warm up. The birds aren't much bigger than a cotton ball, but they're fiercely territorial and will squabble over a single feeder, so we have two, at opposite ends of the front porch. One was so hungry one day that he came up and drank from the feeder while I was still holding it.

All the young people were happy about the snow at first, but now it's starting to get to them. The last few days of school were cancelled this year, and that was fun, but now they're having a hard time getting to the mall, meeting friends, and hanging out. I think even the sledders are getting cabin fever and are ready for a thaw.

We put some lights on the old apple tree in our front yard. The tree gains a little more character every year.

Pal, our springer spaniel, is not crazy about the snow. He's older, his joints hurt, and his feet get cold. He'll go across the street with us and romp around a little bit, but it's not really his thing. He had an ear infection a few months ago that left him almost completely deaf. Although he had lots of training and was really well-behaved, we didn't train him with hand signals, so it's more of a challenge to go play off-leash now. He can't hear other dogs coming up behind him, and can't hear us call "come" or "sit" anymore. Pal still doesn't quite grasp why he has to wear a leash to walk down the street to the mailbox when he didn't for so long.

This clay bunny lives on the cafe table on our back deck, where he dreams of clay carrots all day. He eventually got completely covered up.

Transportation has been a problem all over the state during this storm. The airlines cancelled many flights the week before Christmas, and so many people were stranded at the airport that they ran out of cots. The airport hotels were full of flightless travelers. Greyhound cancelled all bus service in the state, leaving another flock of stranded folks in their depot downtown. For a few days, most of the taxis also stayed parked. Metro transit, seeing a greatly increased demand for bus service, responded by cancelling half their routes and reducing service on the rest of them. Some people waited hours in the snow for a bus, only to see one pass by without stopping because it was already full past overflowing.

We pretty much just parked our car and walked when we needed to go someplace. The dev team at Twisted Pair are good people who let me work from home and stay off the roads. Cheri took this shot of Miles and I on our way up to the grocery store. Did I mention that we're finalists in the Synchronized Blinking championships?

We bought a living Christmas tree one year, and brought it in every year afterwards until it grew too large. Then we planted it in a big clay pot in the back. We put lights on it every year still because we're sentimental that way. Miles and I carried our tree back home from the lot this year since we weren't up for driving. Wish we'd had a sled...

I hope, if you're also having a White Christmas, that you make lots of cocoa and cookies and have a great time with your family. Take it easy out there.