hey phil ...

its winter in MI [not arguing about equinoxes or whatever in 14 days or so] ...

what more can i say ...

and i am not going to whine and moan .. every time winter does something wintery ... eh???

ken

Yes, Phil, Dallas got it pretty good. I was surprised that the tree damage was not as bad around town as it is at my house. It may be worse in the northern suburbs, I haven't been there. It seems like the problem was mostly the city being paralized by the sheets of ice and sleet on the roadways. The streets are mostly thawed now, though. Everyone's electricity is back on, too.

Ice storms are not the usual occurance for us. The last big one we had was on New Year's Eve in 1979. There was a lot more tree damage then.

bk

Oddly enough, here in southern Ontario we currently have much less winter than many parts of the US. We had about 8" of snow in early December, but most of it melted last week and grass is green again. There will be lots to come though, and the advantage we have over many American locales is that we have copious equipment to clear roads. Snow removal (and road repair resulting from winter damage) takes a big chunk from municipal tax revenue. Gotta love it - or go crazy complaining.
Jan

It has been 80 degrees here. Got to love it! Paula

In the North we keep our 80 dgr weather for summer. We are now in the cold half of the year. Trees will have leaves again starting in 4 months. The yard is all tidy, we had a 1 inch cover of snow which melted, now a liitle white dusting every day of this week. Most days are below 32, nights in single digit.

I must add I have hosta seedlings growing in 80 dgrs humid weather in my basement under lights though. So I do hosta gardening 12 months of the year, independent of weather! Bernd

It was 86 degrees here the day before the ice storm.

bk

got down to 10 last night and just warm enough by day to melt off a little bit of snow. I tried starting some hosta seeds to keep my spirits up but they just dont want to come up even on a heat mat

Well its -3ú now and it will be a balmy 18ú and sunny tomorrow. It has snowed but in Minnesota we move snow out of the way pretty efficiently. I'm not starting seedlings until after the holidays though.

Beverly

Currently -26C (thats -16F) as I write this with perhaps 10 cm (4 inches) snow cover. All seems normal to me though the current temp is below average but certainly not unheard of.

Hostas are all sleeping and they are made to take this kind of winter weather.

As for humans ... well ... we do know what to expect:)

Zero degrees during the day, five months to go...

We are not in the frozen north but by golly it sure seems like it this year. We got caught in the last round of storms here in the Ozarks and still have about 4 inches of snow on the ground, with the temperatures not much above freezing, if at all, and single digits at night. It's unusual for us, we seldom have snow or cold like this before January in lower Missouri.

Looking like more snow to come, too, but I am grateful for it on one level as it protects the plants from the dry cold we usually get, even tho I hate driving in it. It does keep me from feeling guilty about not working in the garden!

Getting a lot done on the walking sticks, leather bags and jewelry we do in the winter, tho!

Sandy

Silence!

I am hibernating.

zzzzzzzzz

Spent 8 hours walking around in 8 degree (sub zero wind chill) wed and it felt like I was walking around on frozen clubs (my feet).

dave

and its not even winter yet ... on the calendar.

Dave, Dave, Dave...It's COLD out there. Put some shoes on, silly!

Good Night,
Don B.

Phil,

Regularly into the teens at night here which is January weather. Ground is crunchy and slightly frozen. Heading into heavy snow Saturday night most likely followed by rain and freezing. Sounds like a recipe for falling branches and power outages. I bought a generator and a transfer switch so I can run the furnace, refrigerator and a few other things. Right now it looks like a good investment. Toughing out cold weather without power is no fun.

Jon

We have had it really mild so far this winter with only one snow day and two frosts all back in November, there has been a "high" sitting over Europe and it has been funnelling warn air from near the equator keeping us in the low to mid teens Celsius the norm would be 5-8 C .

All change tomorrow though as a series of wind storms are to hit on sat, sun and tues we are expecting gusts of 70- 90 mph nothing too unusual for an Irish winter in the north west, might be a little snow too.

Methinks it will be a weekend for feet up in front of the fire with a nice single malt, nice.

Most of November was moderate here in central WI. I managed to get a lot of yard stuff done that I should have done in Sept. & Oct. Of course, that had me lagging on catch-up work inside. But December has been a whole nuther story. Very cold. A number of days with single digit highs and below zero lows. A day in the teens or lower twenties feels downright balmy by comparison! What's scary is that December weather has been more like a bad January or February. I'm hoping that we're paying the piper early & that we'll get some reprieve when real Winter gets here post solstice. If not, at least the days will start getting longer. Being a Sunbelter for most of my life, Wisconsin winters were a real shocker....not just the cold but Dark at 4:30 in the afternoon? That is just crazy!! Of course, that was exaggerated by having lived at the western edge of the Central time zone in Oklahoma and moving to the eastern edge of the Central time zone here in Wisconsin. (And being more of night person than a morning person.) Oh well--winter shall pass and in only 5 1/2 more months I'll be seeing the hostas peeking out after their very long winter sleep.

As far as 'storms', we've experienced mostly just the brutal cold and not much in the way of snow. I'm thankful for the bit of snow cover (around 2" so far) as a winter blanket is good.

I'm sick of overcast and cold. I need sunshine! That's the great thing about Texas - we have sunshine! I really miss it when we have a week or more of bad weather. I can't even take the dog out without a coat with a hood. It's been nasty.

It's supposed to be sunny on Sunday (fingers crossed).

That will help my attitude a lot.

bk.

bk, 12 degrees Fahrenheit the last 2 nights. My 'puppy' gets up at 6 AM like clockwork, gets fed and out the door (with me) when it is about 14 degrees. 6-8 inches of snow tonight, then rain, then back cold again.

My alarm clock aka Shasta.

Jon

Nice dog. I love labs.

Cleo has a 6 o'clock alarm clock, too. She licks me in the face when she first wakes up, which is about 5:30. I tell her to go back to bed, and that lasts about 30 minutes.

I just picked up a stray this week. I'm afraid I have another dog. I posted her on Craig's list, but got no response. I had the vet check for a chip, but she doesn't have one. I haven't posted any "found" signs, yet. I checked, but Chihuahua rescue is full. The SPCA doesn't take strays. I'm a little reluctant to take her to Animal Services.

Well, we'll see. I haven't named her, though.

bk

A female Chihuahua? How about 'Juanita'?

I'm here to help : )
Don B.

Call her Hostia for a Latino flair.

It looks like 1 ft of snow outside, hate that, will wait to blow it away until noon, had already several coffees. Bernd

bk, I understand why you think Shasta is a Black Lab, but she is not. She looked exactly like a Lab when a puppy, she now has some brown and a white patch on her chest, some on her haunches and a sucked-in stomach look of a boxer or bull dog. Her mother is a big silver and grey German Shepard (for sure) and her father is thought to be a Brindle Bull Dog as her sister has all the markings of one.

Shasta's mother. Found starving with six puppies in a barn and after being adopted by the foster home where the 11 year old son was the only one Shasta's mom didn't growl at when anyone came near her puppies. She was starving, but she stayed with her puppies and wasn't about to leave them.

Shasta's sister

Shasta as a puppy. She is smart, beautiful, demands affection, loves people (kids especially), is a great hunter and a genuine pain in the butt.

Jon

Shasta has a really great face. She looks smart.

I understand. Dan is my Shepherd Mix. He's 10. I got him from the SPCA when he was a pup. The vet thinks he's Shepherd and Chow. I think he also has lab in him, as he loves water. I also think he would be "fluffier" if he only had shepherd and chow and he is fairly smooth coated.

I love dogs. What can I say?

bk

BK - KEEP HER OF COURSE!
So while we're on the subject of winter, snow, and dogs, here's a bit of both with my Cooper playing in the white stuff:

The mighty bear repositions the rock he is using for a pillow ... sniffs the air ... nope ... not yet ... and rolls over ... dreams of don and juanita frolicking in a bed of hosta

dave

4 days until Winter and officially 4 degrees at the airport and 6 degrees (F) at my house, with another 4-6 inches of snow starting. To quote Ken, carp!

Jon

Very unusual weather for us here in Sweden.It's been like Fall and Spring. 1 dusting of snow.

Right now it's about 5 celsius.I will take global warming for this part of the world.You all are getting the snow that we were supposed to get.But it's still early...

Beautiful pups,love the pix.

Ahhhh, a lovely season to welcome a new family member. That fuzzy dog with the snow in his face is a winner....and my heart just melts when I see a mistreated dog saved from oblivion. My DH says we're full up at the Inn with two dogs, but if one shows up on my doorstep, he'll not be turned away.

The emaciated dog protecting her pups had a LOT of class.
While we're at it, if anyone has a supply of old blankets and such, the Animal Services might could use them to help keep the animals warm. Call them and see. Last time I took some warm covers down, I stood there and boo-hooed because of the "owner turn-ins." Each one seemed to be saying "There is some mistake here, I have a family, what am I doing here? They'll come and get me, I just know they will."

Yeah, Animal Services can be a really bad place. Dallas has improved a lot. We have a new huge facility. But still, there are too many pit bulls and chihuahuas and not enough owners. We have a large illegal alien population. They seem to love both and they don't believe in spay and neuter. They aren't too crazy about keeping them up, either.

The rescue organizations are doing a great job of turning the dogs into pets. The number of dogs put down is way down because of their efforts.

Yes, we have named her. So, she's ours. She's "Fuzzy". I guess the vet knew she was ours, too. He said bring her back and he would "shoot her up". He said you have to assume she's had no shots. She has what may be a scar on her belly, so he said she may have been spayed already. We just have to wait and see.

I can't get her to sit still long enough for a photo, though. I'll keep trying. That's the great thing about digital - if it's no good, you just delete it.

bk

BK, sometimes the little canines become escape artists and find ways to get out. I think a lot of them sort of panic when they find themselves confined again. That may be a contributing factor to Fuzzy who could be a repeat rescue. The first time they would have spayed her. If the scar is still easily visible, I'd say it was in the recent past.....because my 7 year old doxie was spayed when she was 6 months old, and the scar is almost invisible.

Hopefully your new baby will know a good thing when she sees it, and stick with you and Cleo. I just love happy endings.

Here is my 1 year old doxie girl, who loves her toys and digging in the yard.....and raiding the wastebasket beneath my desk!

BK- congratulations on your new addition! What a big heart! Chloe must be going crazy with happiness to have a canine companion....let's hope she doesn't teach it how to terrorize the hosta! Lol

Fuzzy is a lucky doggie to have found a home, and just in time for Christmas..how lovely for all of you. Can't wait to see her pic! :-)
All the best,

Jo.

Finally got a photo. Here's Fuzzy.

bk

BKay, what a honey she is. Unique two layer coat. I think she has some surprises in store for you as she grows and changes.
Merry Christmas to the new member of the family and to you as well.

We had a doozy of a rain and thunder storm. Lights went off just at dark last night. Stayed off about hour and half, we ate dinner by candle light. Humidity was outrageously high, and hung with us in the form of dense fog until the wind began. Now it is coolish/cold in the mid 40s. I had to buy more bird seed today, the wild birds are famished. Would you believe a male bluebird came to check out their old nestbox from the last spring? Now I'm sorry I already cleaned it out. But in case they come back, I got a supply of mealyworms for those insect eaters....a real protein Christmas dinner for them.

Thanks Mocc. Merry Christmas to you.

It's cold and damp here, too. Highs are in the low to mid 50's all week. That's about what it will be from now until we begin to get those nice days in February (hopefully).

I hope you enjoy your holidays.

bk