Expat: Nemo!

So, we’ve survived our first proper snow storm: Nemo! The official count was 26.5 inches where we are, and it drifted to several feet in places; including our back door!

The 3yo has absolutely loved it. The 6yo is more like me, and has been less impressed – not a fan of being cold and wet :)

I have been very impressed with how the storm was handled. Unlike the UK where a few inches of snow generally brings things to a standstill, the disruption has been fairly minimal – considering that there is a layer of snow more than 2 feet deep covering the entire town!

On Thursday, the day before the storm hit, the decision was taken to close the schools on the Friday. This allowed parents to make plans as required for child care etc. My husbands company also took the decision to close, which meant that we had an unexpected family day :)

The snow started at about 10.30 on Friday morning and continued for the next 24 hours! The photos below show the progression from about 11am on Friday to 4pm on Friday through to Saturday morning, looking out our back door and out onto our street…

A traffic ban was put in place (for all non-essential travel) from 4pm on the Friday and was in force for 24 hours. How very sensible! This allowed the snow ploughs to do their thing, and left roads clear for emergency services. And no ridiculous scenes of countless cars stuck on a motorway/freeway (I’m thinking of the M8 in Scotland two winters ago…!).

Waking up to that much snow was actually quite spectacular. Not quite so spectacular was the fact that we couldn’t open our front or back doors… My husband managed to open the back door enough to get a hand out and use a dustpan to gradually clear snow and edge the door open! He was then able to make it round to the front door to clear that – using his new snowshoes, which has to be one of the funniest things I’ve seen in a long time!

The neighbourhood got to work on clearing the pavements/sidewalks – no mean feat. Several of our neighbours have snow blowers, so they did the bulk of the pavements while others, hubby included, dealt with the remainder. The snow piled up along the road edge got higher and higher. The 3yo had a great time helping…

My husband took the boys sledging on Sunday morning – the 3yo was a much bigger fan of this than his brother. The roads were still pretty treacherous at this point, our street having only been ploughed sufficiently for a single lane. During the afternoon we got the call to say that the schools were closed on Monday too!

Our street was finally cleared on Sunday evening. Diggers and dumper trucks employed to remove the snow! I guess they’re driving and dumping it off the edge somewhere!

While the road was being cleared ‘plow guy’ came and cleared our parking area so that we could get the cars back in properly. He created a snow mountain in the garden, which the next day became a sledging hill… The snow looked so beautiful before he cleared it – because it had been so windy, it had left the top surface looking like sand dunes!

Our Monday ‘snow day’ was enjoyed by all. Hubby worked from home, so we were able to have another nice day with lunch and dinner together. The boys sledged in the garden, again the 3yo staying out for ages, the 6yo coming in ‘cold and wet’ after about 10 minutes!

Late in the afternoon I decided to see what the school run was going to be like… Hubby needed the car (bit too snowy to cycle in!), so I set off to walk the route on Monday afternoon… Hmmm. At its best the snow came to my knees, often my waist, and at its worst was actually above my head! This photo shows one of the trenches – it was level with my head – and certainly not passable with a buggy/stroller!

But at least the pavement here was clear… There were big sections that weren’t, so walking in the road was the only option! And this was the pile of snow outside my 6yo’s school…

So, the school run today was… interesting… to say the least! I’m hopeful that tomorrow might be a little better! We shall see :)