Snowed in over Christmas!

As I write this, snow is falling outside. That has been the case, off and on, for the last 48 hours. Although today for at least ten or so hours we had a break. I don't think that it's supposed to snow much longer, the system is moving on out, as I understand.

Jenny and I came down to Mom and Dad's on Christmas Eve, since they were forecasting a lot of snow and wind, and the blizzard conditions virtually guaranteed that we weren't going to be able to come down on Christmas Day, as we had planned. So we came down in Dad's pickup, with the gifts and our quickly packed suitcase in the back.

Christmas morning dawned in a perfect blizzard. Peter's decided after a quick evaluation that there was no way they could make the trip from Beaver Crossing out to us, and Matt's and Dave's were down in Lincoln since they had to plow snow Saturday morning, and had been afraid to stay home, they didn't think they would be able to get out. They were right, if they had stayed home they still would be there, two days later. We had an unusual Christmas... It's a nice feeling to be inside on Christmas with snow falling outside, it's even okay to be snowed in as long as the family is there. Unfortunately, they weren't and so it felt a little lonely compared to what had been planned. We spent the day playing games and deciding which pies to eat and which to save for Sunday, when we hope the rest of the family can join us.

Saturday morning, Dad, David, and I went out to try to get to town and push snow. We made it about a mile and a half before turning back. The tractor and loader got us through a drift or two, but they weren't very bad drifts (comparatively) and we decided it wasn't worth trying to go further, since it was still blowing snow. David and I went over to Matts (by taking a tractor and shortcutting through the field for a mile or so) and did his chores. They have a really nice eight foot drift over their garden that I know Zerrick will really have fun with. I would guess you'll see pictures of it on Amy's blog soon. We came home and had lunch, and then worked at getting the snow out of the drive. After a while, we decided to try again and see if we could get to any place the snowplow had gone. We got the pickup stuck, dug it out, and decided once again to turn back, when we reached a drift four feet deep, fifteen feet long, and hard as a brick. We heard that the snowplow got stuck on Jenny and I's road, and broke his blade getting out.

Church has been cancelled for tomorrow, as of now no one has managed to even get to the church to try to plow it out. All the county graders are being used strictly to help the power company get to downed lines to fix them. That and other emergencies. We don't know when they'll get to actually trying to clear roads for all of us without emergencies, but they'll do it when they can, I guess.

We planned to leave for Wisconsin today, but that is totally out of the question. Even if we could get to the interstate, it is closed, as are all the major highways. They should be open soon though. We hope to leave Monday, but we don't even know for sure that we'll get out of Mom and Dad's before then. I guess we don't have a lot of choices, so we'll try to enjoy ourselves!

In the back yard here at Dad's is one of the largest drifts I ever remember seeing. David took a shovel and dug into it's side and determined that it's 9' 4 1/2" deep. To see a picture of that, you can click here.

I'll put my slideshow above right to show the Christmas pictures I have, and that should grow as we get more pictures here in Nebraska, and then in Wisconsin.

~GB