Sunday, January 2, 2011

Is That Snow?!?!

The city where I live, just north of Los Angeles, has had snow three times since I have been alive – 1973 (the year I was born), 1988, and 1989.  The newspaper reported that we also got snow in 2007, but I don’t remember that so it must have been very little.  So January 2, 2011 goes on my record book as the first snow we’ve had in over 20 years.  Yes, we got snow!

Rain was predicted for the day.  Although it was cloudy this morning, we didn’t see any rain until about 12:30 PM when I left to pick up a friend at  the Los Angeles Airport.  Driving over the hill on the freeway the rain seemed to be a little flakier than usual, but as the thought of snow popped in my head, I drove down the hill into the Valley where the rain was falling.  Traffic in LA is bad enough on a delightfully sunny day, so when we have any type of weather, it often comes to a stand still.  My ride down was fairly quick, other than the rain, but the ride back into town was very slow moving so by the time we arrived back into town, about two and a half hours had passed since I had left.  As we drove over the hill it took us a minute to realize what we were seeing.
snow 008
That’s snow you guys!

snow 009
snow 013
Driving Into My Neighborhood
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snow 022 My house
snow 024 The View From the Front Porch
snow 046The Backyard
snow 048Rigby’s first snow…she seemed to enjoy it! snow 049Footprints
snow 053
It continued to snow into the evening and actually started to accumulate over time.  This is the backyard a couple hours later.  
snow 057
My trees (especially the poor palms) are drooping with the weight.  But as I write this, the precipitation has stopped and the temperature has gone up a tiny bit.  It sounds as if it is raining, but it’s really the water melting off the trees, fences, and roofs.  We probably won’t have much left when morning comes. 

Granted, I know that those of you who live where there is actually winter weather on a regular basis are probably laughing at these pictures and asking, “You call that snow?!?!”  I lived in New England for 8 years so I have seen my share of snowy weather, but I have been back in Southern California for 11 years now and this is the first snow I’ve seen since then.  I’m basking in the excitement of it!  I love winter!

12 comments:

  1. It is crazy to see snowy pictures from sunny Californiia. My friend Sarah must live sort of close to you : ) She took 500 pictures of her kids playing in the snow just because she doesn't think they will ever get to play in snow while they are in California : ) Have a good day back at work!

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  2. I was totally excited! Snow!!!!!

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  3. How'd you know that I was laughing at you? Do you have ESP?
    Well enjoy the snow(?) anyway.
    Oh, and here's to global warming! I've never been so cold.
    Your Friend, m.

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  4. I'm sure it was really fun. I thought it had been about 20 years. I remember a certain principal calling an emergency meeting after school in 2002 about school canceling if we saw flakes. I woke up early but no snow. Didn't it snow a few years back for just a minute and Alexis made everyone go outside? Anyway, here in VA they got 14 inches over Christmas and it was the 2nd biggest in 100 years! It was chaos! Sorta glad I missed it being in Bflo with barely any snow.
    I agree with Mark, global warming my freezing butt!

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  5. My daughter drove back from Vegas in that....the Grapevine closed after she drove over in that!! No snow here since the 60's....but it is cold enough each night here...but no snow.

    Have you finished your Art-House Gallery journal? I just began mine! Yikes! Just 11 days to get it postmarked and I have ehr BIG CKA Conference to plan and work at.....YIEKS! again.

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  6. Crazy! It's kind of exciting when things out of the ordinary like that happen. We just had our first real snow of the year...and we live in Colorado for Pete's sake!

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  7. Very pertty...but really you might want to have your head checked out...it's not normal to like snow that much! ;)

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  8. Thanks for the sweet words on my confession!

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  9. I hope we don't have to wait another 20 years for an inch of snow. Sure was fun!

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  10. Ha, yea you may want to move if you love winter in the snow! Here in MN we've been so dumped on. We went to visit LA sometime in the winter months. We arrived and were in short sleeves...the workers at the airport were bundled up in down jackets, hat, mittens...it was funny!!

    I heard on the news that on this day 49 of the 50 states had snow on the ground. That must be a record or something!

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