February 4, 2012: The Day Winter Finally Arrived in Nebraska

Last Monday when it was 68 degrees, I thought to myself we may skip winter entirely this year.  

Aunt Natalie joined me for a long walk that included picking up the girls from school.

Madeleine played in the backyard . . . in flip flops. 

I also put a new app on my phone to good use.  It mapped and recorded my walks telling me how far I went, how fast, and how long it took me. 

A couple days into my lovely spring-like week I started hearing rumors of snow.  Even worse yet that we could get a lot of it.  I had my doubts since we had such an abnormally warm January.  However, when the weather man's predictions started to come to fruition, my doubts faded.  It started as heavy rain on Friday and when we woke up on Saturday, 6-7 inches had already fallen. 

It was a very wet, heavy snow & many of the older trees couldn't withstand the weight.  

Like this one, for example.  Half of it fell, landing across the street like a bridge, blocking traffic.  Steven and some other neighbors worked together to remove the debris from the road.

 

 

By 9:30 in the morning we had just under 10 inches, and the total rapidly climbed throughout the morning.

In 45 minutes another inch fell  . . .

 . . . then another . . .

 . . . until you could no longer see the ruler.  Over a foot of snow fell at our house. 

Our snow covered vehicles

 The heavy snow also caused many power lines to snap.  While we were without power for a little while, the girls made the best of it by using a flashlight to read each other stories.

This morning the sun came out and in combination with the bright blue sky it made a beautiful backdrop for the snow laced tree branches.

The sun's appearance gave us the illusion of it being warmer than it really was, so we took advantage of it by sledding.  We walked to the girls' school and sled down the large hill they have there.  

Steven and I got to be kids again.

Weeeeeeeeee!!!

Audrey was a dear and helped her old mom up.

Steven wiped out.

As you will see from the following pictures, the girls had a blast!

By accident, Madeleine discovered this bump would make her go airborne.  After that, they both made it a point to go over it again and again. 

And because sometimes it is more fun to watch it in action, here are some video clips:

I should have warned you to turn the sound off before watching that one.  There was some crazed lady hollering in the background.

In conclusion, Winter finally arrived in Nebraska on February 4, 2012.