Technically it is spring. But if you can overlook that, the Winter of 2012-13 turned out to have several good snowfalls. Yesterday we got about a foot of snow. Last year around this time spring was in full bloom.
This is winter in St. Louis
This has been another weird, warm winter. We have had only one decent snowfall all year, which I previously posted photos of. Since then we’ve had some slight sprinklings of snow, but it has been too warm for anything to stick around.
But this morning everything was blanketed in a very thin layer of white. Yoli and I took Joseph and Josie to Jadzia and Ludi’s school for a special program featuring storyteller Bobby Norfolk. When it was finished we came back home, and already the white was melting away. I figured I should try and grab some photos while I still had a chance.
VIDEO: Unhappy in the snow
Jadzia has been waiting all winter for us to get enough snow that she could make a snowman. Finally the moment arrived. She and Ludi came out with me and we began working on a snowman. But the fun didn’t last very long.
Northern Lights
This past Sunday, Yoli bravely trekked from our house to Florissant Rd. so the girls could watch Northern Lights, Ferguson’s holiday parade/festival. She did this in spite of the threat of snow.
As she tells it, everything went well until the end. Jadzia was so happy she wanted to stay forever (these days she never wants to come home, anyway, and she always tells us so. She wants to be out and about.) … while Ludi was tired of it and screaming to go home. It was a no-win scenario, to borrow an expression from Star Trek II. Unfortunately, Spock wasn’t there to resolve the scenario for Yoli, so she just went home, and dragged the screaming girls with her.
Snow = sled time
We’ve had several snows this winter, but today was the first time we were able to take Jadzia out for some sledding action. We put some hot tea in a thermos, dressed Jadzia in triple layers, and headed out.
We took her to the place my dad always took us when we were kids: Killer Hill in Florissant.
Since we didn’t own a sled, we took our trash can lid. Unfortunately, it didn’t work — at all.
So we decided to drive around and buy one. Of course the roads were still treacherous, but we eventually made it to a K-mart and found a nice blue sled. We drove back to Killer Hill and I tested it several times while Yoli fed a hungry Jadzia in the car. It worked very well and much fun ensued.
If you click the image below, you can watch video of us sledding:
Powered down
A winter storm walloped the St. Louis area. Lots of sleet Thursday followed by some snow and ice Friday made roads treacherous for a bit, but worse than that, it caused nearly half a million people to lose power. Our family is among them. The friends and relatives I talked with by phone on Friday were also all without power, as were many of my coworkers at the Post-Dispatch.
So far it hasn’t been too awful bad (says the guy who has been working in a warm building all evening), but overnight it’ll be very cold and in the days ahead it won’t be anywhere near as warm inside the house as it was Friday during the day.
We just moved into this house in August, and we haven’t yet had our chimney cleaned and the flue opened, so we can’t light any fires yet to keep warm.
Today we spent most of the day outside the house, eating out, and going to Target to buy a few Christmas gifts. And I hurt my lower back trying to break through the ice on the driveway so I could back the car out.
Hopefully power will be restored soon, but realistically I know it could be as much as a week before it’s fixed. That’s how long it took for many when back-to-back storms this summer knocked out power across the region. (yeah, it’s been one of those years for St. Louisans)
On a positive note, everything is covered by ice and the tree branches look like they are encased in crystal when the sun illuminates them. With luck we might try and take some photos tomorrow.