Yes, it’s true, I get excited about snow. You see, I grew up near Portland, Oregon, where we would only get maybe a couple of inches once or twice a year, if we were lucky. If it happened on a school day, it also meant that school would most likely be canceled, which was pretty much the best thing in the world. So my sister and I would bundle up to the nines and play all day out in the snow, building snowmen and sledding, and coming in every hour or two to warm up and drink hot chocolate.

My sister Katy is on the left, I’m on the right. Snowflake added to protect the innocent.

This is what snow means to me, but if you ask someone who grew up with real snow, like Joel who grew up in New York, you’re likely to get a different story. He tells me about the perils of shoveling and waiting for snowplows, and the icy temperatures that can last for weeks on end. Add to that the fact that he usually had to go to school during all but the worst of storms (uphill, both ways, of course), and you can see why he has more of a “glass is half empty” vision of snow than I do. Living in Yosemite for as long as we did, we dealt with our share of snow, but I was always way more excited about it than he was. Although, after a few hot toddies, I could usually find him outside building an awesome igloo style snow fort, or an intricate and well sculpted snow creature of some sort.

Here in Southern Oregon we get a little more than what you will find in Portland, but not usually as much as we would get in Yosemite. So when we woke up to this the other day we were quite shocked (and I was excited!)

This may not seem like a lot to those of you in areas of the country that have real winter, but for us this is a huge amount! I let Cosmo the kitten check out the snowy scene. Of course the first thing he did was stick his arm straight into it. It went all the way in, haha!

He decided not to venture any further into the cold white stuff, and skirted the edge of it for the rest of the day. By late morning we had about a foot.

I think that snow is absolutely gorgeous. I am one to appreciate all seasons, and while I don’t think I would like a long, cold winter, I do like to have a little snow here and there. This is part of why we chose to homestead here, as all four seasons are really prevalent, yet not excessive.

As the snow slowly melted over the following days, the plants in the garden started to show themselves again. The Brussels sprouts didn’t show any worse for the wear, although they’ve barely grown in the past few weeks.

The herb garden seemed to do just fine, as most perennial herbs are fairly frost tolerant. Even with the snow it rarely gets much colder than 30°F here. The thyme was peeking out yesterday.

My beautiful lavender patch looks a little sad, but this is the reality of a garden in winter. It’s not always pretty, but it’s an important part of the plant life cycle.

The Oregon grape, however, looks gorgeous. It turns to a beautiful red color in the fall that persists through the winter.

A very Christmas-y looking plant, if I don’t say so myself. It would be perfect for holiday decor!

And that’s about it for this week – snow! Besides the obvious holiday that’s coming soon, please remember that December 22 is the winter solstice, the shortest daylight hours of the year. Your days will only get brighter from then on!