Time to un-hibernate

The weather in this corner of the northeast has been a real challenge. Since January 1 we've accumulated 4 school snow day cancellations; thank goodness this week was a school vacation week or we'd be adding at least one more snow day to the list.Spending your vacation at home is not very exciting. Yes, we got some things accomplished, but there were no adventures for us this week. Unless you find shoveling heavy, wet snow up and over your head onto snowbanks the size of Mount Washington adventuresome. Or you think chipping 3 inches of ice off the driveway is fun.It is hard to be spiritually uplifted when everything around you is the color of slate, crusted with sand and embedded with the roadside detritus tossed by commuters on the way to somewhere. The endless supply of grey, overcast sky seems to be a constant lately.Yesterday, badly in need of a break from all this winter ambience, I took a detour from my to-do list of errands and ended up at a local garden greenhouse, miraculously open at this time of year. Oh, the beauty of the greens - ferns, prayer plants, coleus, African violets. There is something about the smell of the wet soil that is heavenly.And so, I've declared this the end of my winter hibernation. We are moving toward spring, even if the spring is within the walls of a greenhouse.And my soul is filled with promise and hope. 

There is nothing like a snow day!

Okay, while I don't like to have to make them up, we needed this snow day. Every school year needs one.  And this one is a lollapolloza. The weather dudes predicted it way in advance. And while no one believed them (the last 2 snowstorms were duds), they stuck to their forecasts.Our current superintendent of schools comes from the Canadian Maritimes. It snows there. Lots. So over the last couple of years, we have come to expect to have to go to school when it's snowing. Because it's New England. It snows. Get over it.You can imagine my delight - and surprise - when the school department's communication system robo-called last night with the new that there would be no school today. Even though over 500 eastern MA school systems had already called school, I didn't expect to learn whether or not I'd be going in until the morning. Whoo-hoo! Bring out the french toast!And the actual snow fall? I'm looking at about 24 inches on my patio table right now. This time the weather dudes were correct. Good for them! No matter how much of a pain in the behind the clean up will be, there is nothing like a snow day to make us all feel like kids again.