Skip to main content

It looks like our first non-white Christmas since moving to North Idaho.

As I had said the last post, while winter is here now, it just isn't here!

Two hours north, in the Cranbrook, Canada region, cold and snow. About two-hours east, in the Kalispell, Montana area, winter is there too with cold and snow!
This area, more like late fall continued with overcast and cloudy with temps in the low 30s at night and high 30s in the daytime. Maybe some rain in the next day or so or a trace of snow overnight to melt away with the "high" temps for what used to be normal for this time of the year.
Last week if the temps had not gone into the 40s with heavy rain by Saturday we would have some snow but the temps and the rain washed it all away.

I checked with my records from last year and on December 23rd we had gotten 4-inches of snow. Not much but still a white Christmas. Christmas Day we had heavy snow showers but not much new accumulation. This morning the low was 33 degrees with a high expected to be 36 degrees.
Sad face! I like the winters here! Stacy, not so much and the locals I've talked to are happy with the winter, lite, as it has been so far.

I know it is somewhat crazy to feel that way as I never grew up with any white Christmas, not growing up in Southern California. I guess that my Christmas brainwash of years of snow and white Christmas's are supposed to be that way is the root of the issue!
My very first white Christmas was way back in 1989 when Stacy and I went to her parent's property in Oregon near Medford and there was a lot of snow that Christmas.

Oh well, it is what it is here and the apparent new normal thanks to our climate change.

As I said last week, below is a random selection of photos taken over the year.
Starting with Christmas, 2018.



After generally lite snow most of the winter, January above, another big snowfall in February, below, of about 2-feet overnight.



Aerial via my quadcopter of the area of the main street where our offices are after the snowfall in February, 2019.  




Above, March 3rd and 5-below zero that morning!!


My hand showing the scale of Turkey tracks from an area flock that was staying nearby for a couple of months. Turkeys, the modern-day size of the Dinosaur, Velociraptor! 
Below, more tracks.



April, we decided to clear an area for a possible small house build. Above; an area picked out and below, the area cleared in early preparations. 



Above; a summer sunset in North Idaho.
Below; An early stop in Washington and on the way to Oregon on our summer trip in July 2019.




Above: Stacy sees a celebrity at the KOA along the north coast in Oregon
Below: photos from our Oregon adventures from the 2019 trip. 



A stop at the old jailhouse famous from the movie "The Goonies."



Where we stayed near Newport, Oregon above, and below, the nearby bridge of the101 Highway. 





We went to Crater lake for a couple of days too!



Then it was back to the Portland area for the last few days of the trip with day trips like this one to Multnomah Falls. 







Above: in late August we helped a friend stock up with hay for his cows. 

Below: a late summer look at our part of the area from above.





Above and below: in September we took our small two sleeper trailer for a week of conferences in the Boise area. It is ALWAYS much nicer to have your own stuff and your own room on a trip!


Below: Around Columbas Day is usually wood splitting and stacking weekend in preparation for winter.



Above: we all made a 'spooky stop' at the building we work out of for Halloween candy.


Below: and lastly, the weekend before Thanksgiving day we went to see the new edition show of the Trans Siberian Orchestra. It was again, a great experience! Just bring your earplugs!!!




Until next time! Tad

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

2021, the long hot summer of our discontent!

 Yes, it was one long HOT summer!  In addition to the record-breaking heat along the coastal ranges in Oregon, Washington, and into Canada, we saw temperatures in this Northern Idaho area I NEVER thought we would see again after moving away from the high desert of Southern California in 2006! The hottest temp was an afternoon high of 112 degrees (44.44 C) on June 30th. But, hot, hot days, too warm evenings, no rain so dusty and dry.  Record heat, the hottest weather ever recorded in Idaho, and, according to the stories, only the beginning of the heat that will probably be the "new normal" from this point on. Seems that the same "high-pressure bubble" that causes the cold and snow of winter weather to almost completely bypass our region of the pacific northwest in winter causes record heat in our same region of the pacific northwest in the summer! Since my last post, mainly, we have just been living and trying to avoid getting Covid. Stacy and I got our vaccinations...

I can't say I'm on a roll just yet, but here's a new post!

So, to continue with last weeks story. In August, Stacy finally got the trailer she's been wanting all along. Yes, while I like the larger, around 28 to 30 foot or so, RVs, Stacy has kept the idea that smaller is better. Smaller can go pretty much anyplace you'd want to camp and our 5th wheel, at 34-feet long, while it can go most places, it can't go 'anyplace' due to the length. When we got the 5th wheel in July 2017, I was surprised Stacy was willing and even suggested, we go for it trading in our 33-foot travel trailer to get the Jayco. Again, the "Wildcat Maxx" was a nice travel trailer. It had made several short and two long trips in the almost two years we'd owned it. We lucked out as in an era of the rapid assembly to make the crazy sales numbers the RV industry has been having, the Wildcat was "completed on a Wednesday by happy Amish at the factory" as we didn't have any of the build issues I still read about from the appar...

Spring, and warmer weather is in the air!

  I had started this post on April 15th, now it's the 23rd so this is now history! Warmer temps, for a few days anyway. After the last few weeks of more like winter than spring temps, it is pushing 70-degrees (21.1 C) today! It's been clear, not windy like the last three days, and generally nice weather. We can only hope it will continue to be good weather with it not too dry for the late summer since it has been a dry winter and spring so far. The last time it was particularly dry it was a very bad summer for Hornets. Most places in the region have many of those yellow and greenish hanging hornet traps set all over the place. We do too!  Time to get the traps out, cleaned, and set out for the season. You have to get the traps baited and up soon as with the warm weather the hibernating queens come to and start looking for places to set up new nests. That one year though, hornets were everywhere! The forest was alive with the buzzing of thousands (millions?) of hornets. Dozens ...