Buried Alive

Wow… I’m not sure I have ever had this much snow fall on my house this quickly. Yes, it’s still snowing! The stairs are again covered, and we have started marking it off by the height of the snow piled on the back deck. Even with a day of melting (yes, we did have ONE day that it didn’t snow all day, and some melted down) there is a fully packed in 19 inches sitting back there. And 12 inches is sitting piled up on the railing, blocking the view of the backyard.

It’s pretty funny really, Mo went out yesterday morning and fed the birds some bird seed, so our yard was full of birds all day. Two days ago the girls wagon was pulled out into the middle of the yard (on top of the snow that was already there) and it is now almost completely buried. We are talking about one of those plastic wagons with the removable side walls… the kind that are pretty tall… Buried.

The car, which is sadly being parked outside now that E is home with the Passat, is buried. And I just parked it last night around 6:30! It was clean then!

I guess when NW Washington decides to get snow, it decides to get snow! This is pure insanity.

Our internet has been sketchy at best (I suspect the wires are freezing) so I wanted to at least let everyone know that we are alive… just buried under a couple feet of snow!

And they are expecting more…

Another full weeks worth of snow and below freezing temps. Saturday’s high (the ‘sunny’ day) was a balmy 16F. 16 DEGREES!!!! Nope, we won’t be melting off anytime soon.

Now I realize that those of you who live in the northern mid-west will look at me and wonder why I am feeling a bit of pain over a couple of feet of the white stuff – and there, it wouldn’t be a problem. But we are talking about Seattle. Rain we can deal with. Gargantuan amounts of rain, we can deal with – we are used to that. But let it turn into this fluffy white stuff, and
the state of Washington is just not equipped to deal with it. It happens so rarely that they don’t have many plows – and they don’t really know how to use them anyway. They don’t realize that you are supposed to actually scrape the packed stuff off of the road… no, they just scrape off the top layer of fluffy stuff (if you are lucky) and drop some sand on it.

At least it’s not salt.

So here we sit – no UPS or Fed Ex (yes, I have had a package sitting at the hub 20 miles away for 4 DAYS) and I’ve only seen one mail person out in the past week.

Parking lots are a moon scape of ice, unless someone is smart enough to put down some de-icer. Then they are messy and slushy. It takes 40 minutes to drive a 10 minute drive, because everyone is going 5 miles per hour. 5! My car barely idles that slow. Seriously… it dies & I have to re-start it.

But, the kids are having fun playing in it. The neighborhood kids built the base of a giant snowman. The bottom snowball must have been 4 feet tall. I’m not sure how they are planning to stack them up – they had 2 giant snowballs sitting next to each other, but no way to put them together. Sledding and snowball fights have become the neighborhood pastime – it’s too cold to do anything else! We are thinking about building a snow-fort in the yard, but I’m not sure we can even get to the backyard now.

And to top it all off, E’s watch is out there somewhere… hopefully it will still be ticking when everything thaws out in June.

So, when did Global Warming become Global Freezing? Are out polar ice caps going to be re-built? Is there now a cooling trend happening? No complaint on that from this corner – I don’t much like heat anyway. I just want to plan my Winter.

The best part of all of this snow… it is forcing people to spend time with their families. It is cutting out the hustle and bustle of “Holiday Shopping” – because half of the people can’t get out anyway – and slowing things down just a bit.

This is a good thing.

We have been baking cookies… making salt dough ornaments… playing games… watching movies… just spending time together as a family. It’s been really nice.

speaking of which, I think I have a couple of girls who want to get our house a little more ready for Grandma to visit… assuming her flight isn’t canceled and she can actually get here!

I hope that you have a wonderful Christmas wherever you are – snow or no snow – and that you take some time to slow down and focus inward on your own family.

My the Blessing of Christmas fill your home and heart!

Oh, and before I forget, Happy Chanukah!