Reflections from Crumbly Acres: snow storm

Today looks to be a bit chilly. We shall see. I just hope we have sunshine. It makes all the difference.

I am terribly happy I chose to do the snow half way through the storm. The snow just kept falling on the weekend! That was yesterday's post for Part 1. The clouds cleared away, and the sun shone Monday.

My second job was the sidewalk. I didn't do the sidewalk on Sunday, despite doing the driveway. It's crucial for getting out in an emergency, not so the sidewalk. I knew, too, that the wind was going to blow, and move the light, fluffy snow flakes to end up on the driveway.

This was Monday morning. There is a sidewalk there. Honest! We had gusty wind all night.

Storm Feb. 16

🌤Behold, the glorious sunshine!

How much snow did we get? Mebbe 30 cm. It's really hard to tell, what with blowing snow. A lot of this was blown off the roof, but it still had to be moved. I couldn't get to the bird feeder. That is a metre/yard stick behind the shovel.

There was about 30cm in the middle of the sidewalk. I took my time. I had to. The birds were winging, and singing. They were happy I cleaned off the feeders! The oak leaves are blowing everywhere. Someone in my house has to sweep out the garage.

That done, I had to start work on the driveway for the second day in a row. This is what the driveway looked like as I made it to the highway. It was daunting.

This is heavy snow, knee-deep. It took a lot of work. I had to take little bites out of it over several passes.

This is a respectable pile of snow. It's almost too high to blow it over the pile off the drive. Almost. Aside from the wind flinging it in my face, I made progress.

The highway wasn't too bad, but I'm going to have to wash my coat. When traffic roars by, it splashes the slush. Most drivers are kind and pull away from me at the side of the road. This wasn't true for the propane tanker. It flew by at top speed, and splashed me. Fortunately, I'd turned my back as I know what happens.

The house looks cosy, nestled in the snow. We had a propane delivery last week. They'd never get through the snow to get to the tanks on the far side of the house today. It's about 60 cm on the front lawn.

I'm nearly done. Progress was being made until...

Disaster struck. I ran out of gas. Just metres away from the garage the motor sort of flickered and I put it in top gear to hurry. I had to resort to two extension cords to restart it after I put gas back in.

Thanks to another face warmer from Jean in New Zealand, I lived to tell the tale. It snowed all day, into the night. My hat belonged to my late father. It was a gift from BJ. It says Bee Jay's Grill Breakfast Club! That's where mom and dad used to get their take out meals in Bala.

This used to be BJ's in Bala, Muskoka! Once dad had his licence taken away due to his brain tumour and subsequent dementia, they would phone in their fish and chips order. Mom would drive in. BJ would bring them their meal to the car window and they would take it home to eat.

This was BJ's place! He was a sweet man. His older parents helped him at the grill, as he was mentally challenged. Eventually it was sold. Ah, good times!

Cinnamon was mushy! After I'd shovelled out, and had a hot shower, I got into jammies and got my blanket.

I suspect we may have two Labbits! I'm seeing our bunny about, more on that later.

❄️ SUNDAY☃️ First, there was 9mm of rain, then it began to get colder. Ice accretion was the difficulty Monday. It is now buried under several cm of snow. And it kept snowing.

Our power flickered off and then on. There was a small outage, quickly fixed.

The icicles on the feeders looked pretty. The tree branches, not so much.

Then the snow began... They just kept drooping more and more.

❄️ Monday morning ☃️

We had some snow. It weighed down the branches, sticking to the ice coated branches. I do have my spiffy red boots with cleats, but the ground was warmer than the trees and it was just sludge.

First I shoveled the sidewalk. It wasn't slippery, but the snow stuck to slush and it was heavy. Next, using the snowblower on the driveway to clear a path to haul out the garbage all was good. Next, I put out garbage. It was coffee and breakfast and I tackled the rest of the driveway.

The oak trees still have leaves, and they are weighed down with ice and sticky snow.

All the bushes lean heavily.

And those beautiful white pines... Cross your fingers for us. We spent several thousand dollars having them cleaned up with breakage from last December's storm. Then another ice storm happened in April – three days after that mess was cleaned up. I worked on it cleaning it up myself, from December to about February, when I gave up and we called in the professionals. There were broken branches high up.