Catching Up on December …

Minnesota conversations in December centered around “SNOW” … big snows. Winter had peeked in a few times early in the month, but quickly hid again. By mid-month, winter had decided to make itself at home in a big way. Signs that it was obvious it was here to stay came in two waves.

Wave One – in the Cities ….

Winter visited the southern half of the State (the “cities” of Minneapolis and St. Paul), first … Ironically, at the exact same time I visited the cities, too. The weekend of the 9th had me leaving my mostly brown woods and driving straight into a blizzard. My 5 hour trip to Minneapolis was more like 8 hours as we found ourselves in wind, cold and lots of snow … 16 inches of snow. The freeways presented us with a game of sorts … “make your own lane” (as the 4-5 lanes of roadway were not plowed) while you dodge everyone else and “guess your exit” (as the signs were completely covered up in icy snow)

Tons of the white stuff made the cities feel like Christmas town even though I was too late to see the holidazzle parade. The snow made the city quiet, whitening everything and giving all the city lights a very special glow. It also provided many opportunities to see our famous “Minnesota -nice” in action.

The trip was definitely an adventure. If I would have had to travel on my own or was not extremely excited to attend the technology workshop I was going to attend, I would not have attempted driving through the middle of the storm. Fortunately, we did … maybe because there is a feeling of safety in numbers or maybe it is a team mentality .. “we are going to do this .. the weather will not win”! The group excitement a moral support of old friends and new got us through the storm.
(The workshop was amazing … I will write more about everything I learned in another post)

Wave Two – the woods …..

The following weekend, winter settled into my northwoods, too. Mother Nature painted our world very artistically with snow and ice. The view out every window of my house, down every road I travel presents an amazing sight as everything is coated in several inches of icy snow. It rained first, turned to snow and then the temps dropped and froze everything. Every tree, bush, shrub .. fence post, fence wire and electrical wire is covered in this mixture. Everything is coated … and what is unusual about this is that it has lasted more than a week. Normally, it melts or blows down the next day or it is just flocked on one side of everything … but this time it has completely covered everything.

A few twinkling lights on a cabin in the woods reflect the light everywhere … the trees are closed up like umbrellas providing amazing shelters for animals and birds … the sun sparkles everywhere .. the snow is muffling all noise It has been the most beautiful wintry sight I can remember.

~ by bearyweather on December 31, 2012.