Snow Storm December 2008

Sunday December 15th was the beginning of what would be the biggest winter snow storm in my life time and the biggest to hit Portland in 40+ years. The snow began falling early Sunday morning and dumped just about an inch and a half on Hillsboro. As with most previous snow events we've had we all assumed that the snow would melt and go away by Monday. However the weathermen were saying something entirely different. They were talking of the coldest weather in 10 years! I thought, yeah right. The weather people here were lucky that they actually predicted a snow storm that came! I never dreamed of what was to come in the days ahead.
Monday morning rolled around and the snow was still on the ground and the temperature was only to reach a high in the 20's. School was cancelled and the kids and I made the best of it playing in the snow and having hot cocoa. Tuesday comes, still cold, still icy and still snowy. Drat! I needed the kids to go back to school. I had a million things to do the week before Christmas. This is no good. I'm praying that the roads will be sanded and the school district will find it safe enough to get the kids to school for the last part of the week. Wednesday's here and what do we wake up to? More snow! It's coming down good. School is canceled yet again. The kids are totally stoked and I'm trying to figure out when I'm going to get any shopping done. Eric's work has shut down due to their trucks being unequipped to handle the icy and snowy roads. His boss Don invites us out to his house in Banks and we head out. We were lucky enough to have the use of Eric's Mom's Corolla which has studded tires on it to get us where we need to go. We make it out to Don's winter wonderland and watch the snow pile up in the hills of Banks. At least 5 inches or so over the course of the day. We head back home so I can go to work around 4. I head off to work only to realize that they are closed! I apparently didn't get the message. By this time the new snow of the day has begun to melt with a warm weather system coming from the southwest. The next couple days the snow would melt and then freeze at night. Saturday we were hit with round 3. This storm was the one for the record books. It started about 8 am and continued snowing all day and all night! We ended up with 1/2 inch of freezing rain on top of the heavy snowfall and then another 3 inches of snow on top of that. We topped off with nearly a foot of snow by the time it was all over! The days leading up to Christmas were spent sledding and cautiously driving from store to store to get our shopping done. By Christmas day we were beginning to thaw out. A couple passing snow showers came through on Christmas morning but quickly turned to slush. Today is December 27th and a nice warm rain is pouring down. I can finally see the grass and the snow is melting quickly off the rooftops and cars. Though I love watching the snow fall and gazing out at a beautiful winter wonderland, it's time for life to get back to normal. This was certainly a Christmas and winter storm we won't soon forget!