Roll on Spring

After  a really crazy weekend probably epitomized by the following photo............

 at least now most of the roads are clear and the milk tankers can get to the farms so they don't have to throw away any more milk.  The stories of how our community came together over the weekend are still coming out and it is great to see so much good in people.  Some people were up for 48 hours making sure the town hall and other emergency shelters stayed open.  We are now in the stage of everything looking really lovely but not dangerous any more.  We have more snow forcast but not the gale force winds which caused so many problems over the weekend.
In our garden our chickens seem to have survived fine as they laid the same number of eggs as usual.  We lost a tree which Rick and 18yos had to go out and chop up today so we could get down the path into the garden.  The newts seem fine.

The photos above are just of our garden which doesn't show much of the snow drifting around.  There are 12 ft drifts around the lanes and the snow is piled up even where it has been cleared.  It is freezing at night also which makes for slippery conditions underfoot.
Yesterday morning I got up early and went and did a 2 mile run by the river.  I used my kahtoola microspikes for the first time and they were brilliant.  I was running on hard packed snow and ice and didn't slip once.  They felt so secure and normally I am uneasy in slippery conditions.  I am really pleased with them.
This afternoon I had various things to do around town and wanted to go to my parents house.  Last Thursday I had gone shopping for them to make sure they had stuff in before the snow came and they were fine as their electricity didn't go off.  They have excellent neighbours who had cleared their path and checked on them so I didn't have to go down over the weekend while Rick was busy with Mountain Rescue.

I ran on some errands and then down to mum and dad's - about 3 miles altogether.  Their garden is still deep covered and these daffodils looked quite forlorn poking through the snow.

  I didn't need the Kahtoola's as the roads were clear to run on.  It was a lovely run although very very cold - about -2.  Enjoyed the run though and it was especially nice alongside the river.

Snow flakes were fluttering down gently although didn't come to much.  As nice as this run was today I am longing for some warmer weather - Roll on Spring Weather!!