Let It Snow

Nope, not a Christmas carol post, just a comment about the suddenly-winter we have.  This fall has been gloriously autumny.  The leaves have turned brilliant shades and clung to their branches long enough to really take a good breath of the gorgeous.  Our miniature maple turned crimson, and the contrast with the green and the yellow of our honey locust was lovely.  I love watching golden leaves dance on a tree with the sunlight shining through them.  Quaking aspens in the canyon are some of my all-time favorite things to see.  This was one of our super-tall cottonwoods, which are a close enough relative to the aspens to take care of my yearly quakie longings.

I know I posted this before, but it was so golden and happy!

Some years the leaves just turn brown, then fall into soggy heaps in the yard that need to be scraped off before they kill the grass.  This year the weather was crisp and dry, with lots of crunchy leaves for kicking and raking into mammoth piles and dumping into the chicken run where they can scratch through them.  It really was a beautiful autumn, all the way through Thanksgiving weekend.

And now this.

Overnight, winter was coming.  I got a weather alert early Monday morning and Trent took the day off work to winterize the chicken coop and button up the yard.  He worked hard.  What a great man he is.  The storm rolled in with wind and snow and the little ones spent the day in and out of coats and mittens.  They couldn't get enough of the snow.

The storm blew away but left the cold.  We haven't been above freezing since, and the nighttime lows are in the single digits.  The biting air takes your breath away.  We'll be cold, cold, cold baby for another week at least.  We stay inside and drink herbal tea.  I think it's casserole night - again.  Or maybe hot soup and scones.  Do I have time to make chili?

And in all the bitter cold, there is so much to be thankful for.  Freddie and Georgie have taken to saying gratitude prayers.  Hemmy Fader, dank you for mine socks and bweakwast, and dank you for this and this and those and these and that over there... as they point to different things in the room.  The other morning Trent and I endured a particularly long breakfast prayer when there happened to be a grocery store ad on the counter and they had to point to every. single.  item and express thanks for it.  The twin not praying helped the prayer to not forget anything.  It took a long time!  But Trent and I were stifling laughter because it was so cute.

How often do we look around and say THANKS! for every single thing we see?  Made me think that maybe we ought to take a moment every now and then to do it.  Warms your heart.  And keep your toes warm too, willya?