Our First Winter

Amazing things happen in our new neighborhood when it snows; I can’t get enough of the snow canopying in the pines, or the lantern lit over our neighbor’s driveway.

We have reason to believe our house had a light at the end of the driveway too. Maybe it was just a lantern on a post, it probably wasn’t a cool lantern strung between trees, but maybe one day we’ll get something re-installed. That little light definitely does something to make a home seem super welcoming. Plus, you know, I want to keep up with the Joneses.

It’s the first winter we’ve been in our house, the first time being able to pinpoint drafts in the exterior doors, the first in which we realize how screwed up our thermostat zones are, the first opportunity to realize that the unfinished basement stays a balmy 72-degrees, even when it’s only 10-degrees outside. This place is built like a fort.

The roof insulation in our home seems to be good too, something you always have to wonder about when you find and buy your home in the spring/summer months. The winter leaves plenty of opportunity for surprise, but for us, no icicles, and a thick blanket of snow covering the shingles is a great sign.

We’ve had plenty of down branches so far this winter, and Pete has been keeping busy trying to keep them gathered in the area of the fire pit we began to establish last summer. I’d say I’ve been helping him, but this was actually one of the first times I’ve been in the backyard since the baby was born last November. Short of letting Cody in and out, I’ve been keeping pretty cozy.

Deer have been everywhere during the winter. They’re all fatties with thick, thick furry coats wandering through the backyard, flirting with each other in the woods, and approaching within just a few feet of the house; one morning we woke to see one looking in the bedroom window, another day one passed by a window so closely that I was startled. Cody usually doesn’t even notice them, and when they notice him, they just stop and stare. Rabbits, always interesting. Deer, always boring.

The snow covering the barn roof completely is a friendly reminder that it is healed, that the interior of the barn will stay dry so that we can continue to make some more structural repairs to the building this spring. Eventually, and maybe not this year, it won’t be yellow.

My favorite Tamarack that stands in the backyard is really, really beautiful when powdered with snow.

The trunk of the fallen tree that still lays in the backyard is a daily reminder that we have a lot of cleanup to do when the snow melts.

It’s a really beautiful morning in Rochester. How are you spending it? (Hopefully not sitting on 590.)