Late Spring Snow: Might As Well Enjoy It!

What do you do when 4 inches of late season, wet and heavy snow falls overnight?

Some little creatures like to stalk the local wildlife

Some enjoy sled rides pulled by their best invisible friend

Some of those same children like to get extreme, popping wheelies and feeling a face full of wind

Hanging out with your furry buddy is always fun

as is riding with your best friend, who you love a ton
(even if you do bite each other from time to time....)

But best is getting pulled by Mom,
because she is da bestest, the frickin' bomb*


*this is possibly the first time I have ever written this phrase

New Beginnings: Grow Food, Not Lawns

The future home of our food.  I will have a more detailed description of our gardening effort for this year soon.  Currently, we are scrambling to get things set up and built for the season.  It has only been a week since most of the snow has melted and we have been able to see our lawn for the first time.  It seems as if finally, spring has sprung in the far north, but lows are still a bit too close to freezing to comfortably put anything delicate outside yet.  Here is a view of the yard only one short month ago on 09 April 2013:

I did take some new pictures today showing the current progress of things.  I hope to have those posted soon. I may work on those while I wait for a delivery of lumber for an 8'x16' greenhouse I'm going to build, the plans for which you can see HERE.  I still need the ground to thaw out a bit before I can dig holes for the footers and a bed for the gravel, however!  Hopefully warmer temperatures are in the forecast, but I see that the NWS is calling for possible snow next week....

Welcome to gardening in Alaska!

Some Fun Pictures From Last Weekend

What's more fun than wet snow, a pregnant woman, and a dog?  That's right, not much!  Especially when it's a woman pregnant with twins racing a dog down a long driveway while wet snow falls from the gray, dreary, miserable German sky!  A few pictures that we had fun taking this past weekend.  So, I just stood there pushing a button while Dawn and Osu did all the work - and it was fun to watch :)  .....

Looking out from the office balcony

Heading down the driveway

 

Racing Osu

Click this text for more pictures

Having a wee bit of fun the day after Christmas

I hope everyone had an enjoyable Christmas!  Dawn, Osu, and I had a great time in Dresden.  We now have a new favorite Christmas Market!  The Dresden markets were even better than we had heard and we really enjoyed exploring the different ones around the city.  We were a little surprised when we arrived in Dresden on the 23rd that there wasn't more snow in the city.  What little snow there was was dirty and rotten and not too appealing.  However, on Christmas Eve night, a new storm rolled in, ensuring that we would wake up Christmas morning to a new blanket of white.  We had a great walk around the old part of the city on Christmas morning, but didn't stick around for too long.  I knew that the drive home was going to take longer than usual due to the still falling snow.  My fears were realized when the drive that would usually take only 2.5 hours turned in to a 5+ hour ordeal.  It really wasn't too bad, just slow due to the condition of the Autobahn. 
Pictures from Dresden

On the 26th, we all decided to go have a little fun in the snow.  Here is a short video showing what we did.  (the video might take a bit of time to load - be patient!)



The original video can be found HERE

Quickly from Winter to Spring

This past weekend may have been the last hurrah for winter here in our neck of the woods.  It snowed nearly all day on both this past Saturday and Sunday which made for an interesting frozen-slush-on-the-road drive to work on Monday.  Ah, but how quickly things change.  Today temperatures reached the low 50's and there was a little hint of spring in the air.  Most of the snow on the ground is gone now, the grass finally reappearing after spending nearly four months tightly tucked under a cold, white blanket.  As we usher in a new season here in Germany, I'll fondly think back on this past winter, the first real winter I've experienced in four years.  Yes, I do realize that most people think I'm a bit off in my longing for cold and snow, but in a week or two, when the inevitable and nearly constant rains return, I'll inwardly chuckle at the fools who curse winter when their complaints begin regarding the dampness and 'bone-chilling' wetness that marks the German spring.  Ah, yes, it's springtime for Hitler in Germany, indeed.

A few pictures from last Saturday morning and one from this evening to illustrate the quick change in the weather.

Sunrise this past Saturday

   














Then the snows came and came hard

The front yard today (Wednesday).  Good bye snow!