A very, very cold Monday morning! And it’s going down to 4° tonight. It’s been a long time since early December has been this cold and snowy.

As I was making coffee just now, I watched a squirrel go up and down the black walnut tree right outside the kitchen. He was clearly looking for something. He jumped down, dug in the snow – nothing – then dug in the snow two more times. Finally, he found it. A black walnut! He carried that large nut off in triumph. Squirrels are amazing.

We put the lights on the tree yesterday, with a delay in the middle of the process when we realized that 3 strings of lights were no longer working. Off I went to Lowes to buy some more. I ended up buying an extra box so we’d have them on hand. Back home, then lots of adjustments to the previous placement of the lights as the new strings were longer than normal. Finally, we finished.

There it is.

We love it.

We’re going to leave adding ornaments until tomorrow, as we always waiver at this point. Do we want to ruin the beautiful simplicity of a tree adorned in pretty white lights? So we’ll sit with it for a couple of days.

Plus, we’re tired today. And we have to go grocery shopping.

Stay safe.

Happy Monday.

Our reward on Wednesday evening for shoveling snow. Isn’t that glorious?

Shoveling wasn’t as bad as we had anticipated. The snow was not heavy and wet, thank goodness. We ended up shoveling and didn’t need the snow blower. It took us about an hour and a half to clear the driveway and the parking area, as well as shovel paths to the shed and the porch. My back was complaining, but I felt just fine on Thursday. No lingering side effects. We were quite proud of ourselves.

It is frightfully cold (6° as I write this) and will stay that way for a while, so no melting. Because it got so cold last night, the porch plants that were still hanging in there have finally surrendered. I brought the pansies indoors last night in case I could save them. It didn’t work.

The pansies get an award this season – they are the first flowers I potted in early April and they hung in there until this morning. They are real troupers. I just love pansies.

Today is the day we get our Christmas tree. But we’ll have to wait for a few hours – it’s too darned cold right now. I like to get the tree during the week because the nursery gets too crowded on the weekend.

Oh, and we had to deal with a couple of unknown purchases made on Don’s card. The bank was incredibly helpful and the card has been cancelled. He’ll get a new one next week. The “purchases” have been credited back to our account.

My hands are still cold as I type this! It’s taking a long time for the house to warm up.

Remember that series of photos I took last Christmas with the girls wearing a crown?

I added another. Audrey had to have her very own Queen for the Day photo.  Miyoshi will be up next.

Okay, my friends. I’m off to make our second cup of coffee.

Stay safe.

Happy Friday.

We got about 5 inches of snow, but the pretty fluffy snow we were envisioning was not to be. It was a heavy wet snow with gray skies. It was not particularly pretty until later in the afternoon when the flakes got bigger. We have a lot to clean up out there today and we’re not looking forward to it. We would love for someone to plow our driveway but since it is covered in Item 4 (a kind of gravel) and the plow has to go uphill, the gravel is plowed right up along with the snow. We’ve had it happen a few times in the past. That’s an expensive loss. This is the one time of the year that I envy our neighbors across the street who have flat properties and driveways.

So, it’s the snow blower today, along with the shovel. It will be quite cold for the next several days, so it’s not going to melt.

Winter is hitting us with a big old wallop!

Anyway, this will be short because we’ve got things to do!

Hope you’re all warm and cozy and that Mother Nature has been kind to you. Hopefully, the sun will come out today and it will look pretty out there.

Stay safe.

Happy Wednesday.