BlizzFest 2011

First we had a white Christmas - it was wonderful.  Perfect fluffy, packable snow.  We made snowmen and played.  Fast forward a few weeks, and here we are mid-January and we got over six inches of snow.  With ice mixed in.  There was a hard crust of ice on top of the snow and a layer of ice on the bottom.  Walking in it hurt my shins, and I had rubber boots on.  The boys all covered their shoes in bags, to keep the wetness out.  It worked pretty well.  We tried to make snowballs, but the ice/snow mixture was too crunchy.  And rolling for a snowman didn't work either.  So, we ran and played and tried to sled a little.  We went in the backyard and tried the little hill beside our waterfall.  The top to the sandbox worked pretty well, but we needed a bigger hill and a slicker sled.

The boys and I picked out a new hat and some gloves for Abbie.  It looks so wrong when he wears my fuzzy girl gloves.

This was Sunday evening.  It actually flashed lightening and thundered.

This morning, we had a nice breakfast, took our time and went out when it was warmest.

There was a hard layer of ice on top of the snow and a layer of ice at the bottom, with dry snow in between.

Our car was stranded at the end of the driveway for a while.  But, we dug ruts and got it back up.

Icicle that had been hanging from the van; it was standing up in the snow.

Abbie got to be a Yankee for a while and shovel the drive.

John Campbell took some photos, until he took off with our camera through the yard and Abbie had to chase him down.

We need to get a little disk sled, but the top of the sandbox worked pretty well.

Our waterfall is still running.  Hope the fish are okay.

Our pond lamp is melting the snow.