We had a very unusual winter. We had a few days that brought a little bit of snow. Sometimes not even enough to shovel, just to cover the grass and to enjoy some snow soup!
We had a few snowstorms, our first biggest one coming on the last Sunday in February. The plan that day was to go to church and then M&D were going to take us to a minor league hockey game. When C&M woke up at 6 am there was nothing on the ground. When D&I woke up an hour later there were a couple inches already covering. By the time we would have to leave for church, D had already been outside shoveling once and there was more than 6 inches on the streets. Church was cancelled so C&I played outside all day in the snow since we couldn't get out anywhere!
Catch those snowflakes with my tongue!!!
The snow stuck to my hat and hair.
The best part about playing outside in the snow is coming inside for the hot cocoa and enjoying it in nice dry pjs!
After D shoveled, and then M shoveled again 4 hours later, they let us go outside and clear the driveway.
The craziest part of winter came in late April and early May. That's right, I said May! We had 3 major storms in 3 weeks, each dumping at least a foot or more of snow. Then it would warm up to mid 60s by the weekend and melt all the snow. The first storm was a three day storm. The first day was the last day of Spring Break, which M had already planned to take as a vaction day. The next morning M received a rousing phone call made from the school at 4:40 am stating that due to snow depths (ie. almost 2 feet) there would be no school. So we had an extra long Spring Break this year! M stayed home, shoveled the driveway a couple times and let us play on the cleared sidewalk. However, it hardly snowed at all that day. The next day, the snow started again mid-morning (while we were already at school and an early release day) and we received another 6+ inches.
C&I were so looking forward to Spring, that we got a little confused about which season we were playing in--which is why the scooter is pulling the sled!
From the mouths of babes.....
Exactly one week later, we got our second snow of almost a foot of snow. This time school was cancelled the night before and actually pretty much stopped snowing by 6 am, so it would have been ok driving once the sun came up and the plows got out! Again M stayed home with us and while she shoveled, we played.
Since it really wasn't very cold out and no falling snow, M took us to the park for a little while.
Notice the deep snow behind us on the grass.
We had tons of fun playing at the park with such deep snow!
It was so deep the seat of the teetor-totter was buried by the snow.
So a week and one day later (MAY 1st), we again got a snow day. Since M had stayed home the two previous times, it was D's turn to stay home. However, the call didn't come until almost 6 am, so D had already been at work for more than an hour. He finished up what he was doing and headed home. While M waited, she went outside to shovel. The crazy fact about this snow, is that it had rained for 3+ hours before it turned to snow, so it was a very wet/slushy mess on the driveway. M was mostly moving slush and then would hit a 6+ inch drift of pure snow. So it was a very difficult driveway shovel with the different snow conditions. When M cleared off the truck, you can see how much true snow we received. By the time D came home an hour later, M had to scape another inch off the truck before she could drive.
But because it had been so warm just two days before, the roads were just wet, so the drive up to EP was absolutely beautiful. M even stopped to take a picture of the trees alongside the river that she had been admiring the whole drive.
The next day the sky was brillant blue and as we drove on property, C exclaimed, "It's so sparkly!"
One of the results of all that snow, was all the mini waterfalls in the canyon. Even today a few of them are still running, more than 2 weeks later.
M really enjoyed all that new snow. Every other snow either melted too fast or just didn't leave enough of a base, so snowshoeing hadn't been good all season. But those last 3 storms were perfect days for a snowshoe at lunch. The first time M didn't realize just how deep 22 inches can be and ended up going too far out that it took twice as long to get back then she had anticipated, so instead of a short 25 minute hike it was almost an hour to go about a mile. The snow was up to her thighs in places and very soft so difficult to trudge through, but an absolutely beautiful break!!
If you really want to know how much snow the mountains got in those 3 storms--Rocky National Park recorded 80 inches of snow during that 3 week period!
