Arctic Blast

It's safe to say, we need to get used to our winters lasting longer...and snow. Definitely need to get used to snow. We have been here less than 5 months, and winter (although the calendar says it's fall) has rocked us!! We've been told several times this was an unusual arctic blast and it's so rare to have snow days...well I guess the McMillans brought it with them. It's funny, when we moved to McPherson we were told snow and snow days were rare...our first winter there brought 8 snow days and our third winter brought the same. So go figure the weather is all out of whack when we moved to Glenwood Springs.

I don't recall ever being in such cold temps. (I know...my Kansas friends and family had the same blast too) We would wake up in the morning to -18 degrees...and that doesn't include the wind chill. It was so cold that poor Jake's truck didn't want to start. (It gets temperamental in negative temps.) With the blast came 6-10 inches of snow, depending on which part of the canyon you were in. We've been told snow will usually melt on the streets right away...well not with these drastic temps. 

Let me tell you about a few nice things about winter here... The snow is beautiful!! As you see from the above picture from my back door. Snow is so much easier to drive on than ice, which was common in Kansas. Although getting an AWD vehicle could easily contribute to that fact. Lastly, there is very rarely wind here to cause that wind chill to be a factor. During the extreme cold days, I kept saying these were the warmest sub zero temps I've ever been in. It's true!! It's amazing how "not cold" it feels here in the mountains. It's mind boggling! 

Well, we've survived our first blast and so far I think we can do it...check back in April or May when the white stuff has a good chance of still being around to see what I think about it then.