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Christmas Weather

-8 right now. There is a yearly battle between towns to organise the first Speedskating marathon on natural ice. Sooooo funny. Grumpy old mam (like me) working the night through to sprinkle layer by layer water to get a nice icefloor.

 
I guess this old thread is back for another year. Time to consider shopping...

It's still twelve days til Christmas, or will be tomorrow. On the first day of Christmas, they predict 10 cm of snow....

It's been warm here again. Winter is changing, but today it's around -8c, which is normal. It'll be my first xmas in the new environment by the sea. The ground is frozen rock solid and the wind off the waves has a bite to it. We could use some snow to take the edge off and insulate things a bit.

I dunno. By February, I hate the snow and the storms. But now, early in this late arriving season (my old house has had several big dumps of snow) it's exciting to see a good snowfall, and 10cm is an easy one to get warmed up with. I would never want to live where there was no snow, or no winter. I put up some solar light strings, and they blink for a few hours, although the lack of sun (it's dark at 4:30) makes their evening run shorter. At least with the warm November and early December (only as low as -5 at night) we save on heating costs. It's the fishroom's first winter, and the insulation is good. The heat has barely come on. We'll see what it costs me when it gets cold in a few weeks though.

The backyard is full of deer every evening. White tails, not reindeer, and there isn't a glowing red nose in sight.
 
Pretty much our day...

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Looks like much of the US will see very cold temps next week....extremely cold in the UK & Ireland, some areas the coldest since 2010

Yep. My family is leaving on the 16th to drive to Texas for Christmas, leaving the day before the snow is to hit, I can’t do road trips so I’m going to fly on the 23rd, but there is a chance I won’t be able to get out of the driveway with the snow 😱
 
It tried very hard to snow overnight. We woke up to perhaps as much as 1/8 inch covering. We could still see the road though it :)
 
Slight frost here, nothing to get excited about. This weekend its going milder again.

As for the holiday weekend, dunno. Not going anywhere or seeing anyone as usual.....I do have a large bottle of Baileys that might make the weekend go away quicker though

Holidays are fine when you have people around you who care or families and friends.......but when you don't have anyone, then its just another day in the week.

The holidays when I was a kid...dad made sure he worked overtime throughout so that he avoided the inevitable arguments with mother.

Not everyone in this world has a happy holiday season, some of us have nothing but bad memories, no family left and not alot to actually look forward to.

Same poo different day. Just like all the days that came before it and all the days that follow it.

Sorry to be a downer but when you have never experienced a "happy clappy" holiday, its kind of hard to figure out what all the fuss is about. Me and the fish will have an ordinary day, just like the other 364 days of the year.
 
Our first real snow is becoming our first real slush as it's crept up above freezing. We're expecting a fair snowfall, about 20cm, on the weekend. That'll get it back up to looking better.

I like Christmas as a last pause before we dive headfirst into real winter. The whole festival of it works for me - I like the lights, the baking, the excuse to get together with my kids who get a few days off work, the feast, the old pagan tree and the decorations that go back to my grandparents and that I see once a year, the works. For many years I celebrated the new year more than the 25th, but I like the whole week. The weather is usually awful - for some reason that last week of the year often has very nasty storms and blizzards. There are a lot of white outs and treacherous black ice roads in my xmas memories, but we generally got where we were going.

Holidays are fluid, like aquariums. A kid's xmas is one thing, with whatever magic their family can offer, to being a teenager dragged around to visit relatives, to being in your 20s seeking adventure with a few days off work, then being a parent of kids of ever changing ages. Here, we're driven indoors by the climate, and outdoors is always boots and coats instead of the free and easy step out the door of summer. Xmas makes us gather together , probably get hit by a snowstorm and make our houses as cozy and inviting as we can, in the hopes that carries over. The solstice gives us the shortest sunlight of the year, and it's all a slog uphill from there.

Before I retired, I'd celebrate any holiday that got me a day off work. As a retired guy, I celebrate getting to spend time with family and friends. On Christmas Day, weather permitting, I'll do what I liked to do when we'd visit where I live now to see the extended family here. I'll wander down to a rocky Atlantic beach and throw snowballs into the sea. I like to look at the sea over the holidays, and enjoy having a day that mattered so much to my ancestors in Labrador, in Ireland, in Wales, in Norway, in the US, Newfoundland, Argentina and so many other places I don't know about. It's a good old holiday.
 
Slight frost here, nothing to get excited about. This weekend its going milder again.

As for the holiday weekend, dunno. Not going anywhere or seeing anyone as usual.....I do have a large bottle of Baileys that might make the weekend go away quicker though

Holidays are fine when you have people around you who care or families and friends.......but when you don't have anyone, then its just another day in the week.

The holidays when I was a kid...dad made sure he worked overtime throughout so that he avoided the inevitable arguments with mother.

Not everyone in this world has a happy holiday season, some of us have nothing but bad memories, no family left and not alot to actually look forward to.

Same poo different day. Just like all the days that came before it and all the days that follow it.

Sorry to be a downer but when you have never experienced a "happy clappy" holiday, its kind of hard to figure out what all the fuss is about. Me and the fish will have an ordinary day, just like the other 364 days of the year.
I know many people have similar feelings about holidays--my dad is one of them. He grew up in a somewhat messed up family, plus he's just a very pragmatic person, and he just never got what all the fuss was about. He would go through the motions to keep mom and us kids happy, because he loves us. But now that we're grown and mom's gone, I think it's a relief to him not to have to pretend to care about it anymore. :)

I think Christmas is difficult for a lot of people who don't have families, or even worse who have dysfunctional families, for much the same reason Valentine's Day is universally hated by single people: The whole world is telling you how wonderful it is to have all the things you don't have. It just rubs salt in the wounds. I think Christmas is wonderful. But for people who are lonesome, it kind of sucks.

I'm hoisting a mug of tea this morning for the people on the forum who are alone for the holidays. If you were closer I'd invite you to a Christmas party and make sure you get a few good laughs and eat a little too much unhealthy food. :) May you find someone with whom to share some friendship during the dark days of winter. Or failing that, may you enjoy some peace and warmth.
 
It's snowing again today! Skiing and sledding are going to be GREAT this year. (Last year we didn't get any big snows until spring) But it was supposed to be partly cloudy and cold today. I think the weather forecasters need to get a new magic 8 ball. And maybe lay off the peyote.
 
Started as rain this morning but its snowing now. I put up lots of lights. Lots of arduinos generating hopefully interesting patterns...
 

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