A White Christmas After All!

It was really starting to look like we'd have a brown and grey Christmas.  The weather has been really Portland-esque here in the Bitterroot lately. And while that doesn't get me down viscerally, it bums me out on the surface, because I didn't move to Montana to NOT have a white Christmas, ya' know?  BUT. Guess what we woke up to on Christmas morning... SNOW!  Yes indeed, we got our white Christmas, after all.

SNOW! And Delia enjoying one of the Beastie Grrrlz' new Christmas toys, an Unbreakaball!

A "view" of the valley through our trees and behind a piece of firewood abandoned on a chopping stump in autumn. Life interrupts chores sometimes.

Our ornament wreath and the northbound road.  That snowy hump? That's a tarped pile of gravel at the bottom of the driveway.  It's there in case we need extra traction. It's certainly not the most attractive landscape feature, but it's definitely one of the most useful.

I know it's perhaps unusual, but I've been pretty excited to see how the snow looks accumulated on the "new" fence.  Here's a taste of that!  This is where it runs behind and through the lilac bushes.

We did a Christmas Day hike into the National Forest.  Here's a view from nearby the property.

The squirrels have a highway in the forest and we crossed it!

I love "our" forest which is mostly Ponderosa Pine, but I admit to getting a special nostalgia-based thrill when we come upon a little stand of Douglas Fir.  If you look closely you might spot Eric and Betty camouflaged in this photo.

We surely missed our family and friends, but we had a really nice day.  The four of us were visited by Santa (!), we exchanged gifts with each other, we ate yummy snacks, we walked in the forest and had fetching with the Beastie Grrrlz, we all got naps, and we ate a delicious Hungarian mushroom and wild rice soup that Eric made followed by apple pie and fresh whipped cream.  It snowed more around dusk, there was some hot tub time, and some lovely wine from Matello, too.

Life is sweet.