Winter Wonderland

As anyone in the Northwest knows, snow is rare. Snow is exciting. Snow is an “event”. Snow pretty much shuts down our entire region. So…take some extremely cold temperatures, ice, and snow accumulations….the week before Christmas….not just once, not twice, but three times….this has been an interesting week!

When the snow first fell about a week and a half ago, it was SO exciting. The girls were jumping up and down, Macy was running around screaming “SNOW!!!” and Morgan was following close behind, yelling out like a crazy child, simply because her sister was doing the same thing. Morgan has never seen snow in her lifetime….but that has certainly changed over the past week. I took a few pictures of the girls outside in the yard – frolicking in our one-inch of snow – happy as can be. But, being ill-equipped with snow gear in our household – along with the wind-chill factor, our time outside was brief.

As usually is this case in this region, we expected the temperatures to warm up and for the snow to quickly melt away. However, Mother Nature most certainly had another plan this go-around. By mid-week, the temps stayed low and the snow started falling again….and by this past Saturday afternoon – a winter storm warning was issued. Gregg left on a trip that morning, and the girls and I hunkered down inside this house with our blankets by the fireplace and watched the snow begin once again. It started to snow, and snow, and snow, and they actually cancelled Gregg’s flight back into Seattle. The next day, we thought the snow might be over….but it started snowing again by early afternoon on Sunday. It started snowing heavy…and it just didn’t stop. I started sending Gregg pictures from my cell phone every few hours and he couldn’t believe how much was coming down. Meanwhile, he was stuck down in California, with no planes or flights available to get back home. Wonderful Grandma Miller ventured out shortly the Sunday snow started again, and joined us in our “snowed in” venture. Given the rarity of storms like this in our region – I have to say that I loved it. All of it. That night, after the kids were asleep and everything was quiet….I went outside to try to capture this winter wonderland.

The next day, Grandma and the girls made a snowman out in the front yard, and when Gregg finally made it home later, they all went out and went sledding down our hill. We invited all the kids in the neighborhood to use our hill for sledding as well, and it was so fun to watch the snow ramps that were built and paths that were made….so much fun.


On Christmas Eve, the temperatures finally started to warm up and we knew the end of the snow was near. So, I ventured out onto the deck to build one last big snowman…in an attempt to keep the snow here as long as possible.

Some more snow fell on Christmas Eve….and the ground was still thoroughly covered by the time we woke up on Christmas morning – it is such a rarity for us to experience a white Christmas – which was just icing on the cake for this wonderful & magical day – Merry Christmas everyone!