ANOTHER Snow Day!

I know! Twice in one year! This was expected though. In fact, I was going to be pretty upset if it didn't snow over night. It has been warm and nice all week. We had a snow day planned up in the mountains, up where the snow actually stays on the ground and is good for sledding. But we had to postpone it to next week because of this storm. We can't drive up the mountain on snowy roads, so I'll have to wait until they clear it.

Our snow was even better than I had hoped. Lot's of it. Light and fluffy. Crunching under my feet. Cloudy day, so it might stay more than an hour. And not windy so I can actually go outside and not freeze immediately. And the best part? It was gone by 1pm. No shoveling, no mud, no frozen pipes. It's the best of many worlds out here!

Here are some pictures. I took a ton, but these are my favorites.

My strawberry plant experiment is very confused.

My awesome cottonwood trees.

No this is not a squirrel!

They aren't "December Snowflakes". Perfectly ripe.

You've got to love my look here. The sun was bright and yes, my hair is wet Mom!

The doves are mad about their snow filled nest nearby.

Just look at the fluffiness!

Looks cold.

Snowy Cholla...it will still bite you.

Jake is keeping some. 

Snow!

We woke up to snow! Dan was already up, but when I came in after sunrise and there was snow all over, I yelled "SNOW!!" and ran back to wake up the boys. Yes. I'm a nerd. Snow is exciting. And it was completely unexpected.





Dan expected my reaction when I saw it, but the snow was not expected at all. The weather report didn't even say anything about rain. It was clear and cold when we went to bed and I woke up in the night and heard the wind blowing crazy hard. And this morning it was bright and sunny with just a couple small clouds around the edge the valley.



I ran yelling into the boys' room and told them about the snow and they jumped out of bed to see it. Tom grumbled only a bit...it was 6:30 in the morning and he usually doesn't rise before 9. It was only a little early for Jake.





We went out and ran around in it and took pictures of it. It was so soft and powdery so the wind was blowing it off the trees and making it snow again. It was piled up on the north side of things!






By 1pm, it had all melted away. Tom was disappointed because he wanted to ride the dirt bike in it but it had a throttle problem and he didn't get the chance. He did roll a few snowballs for us though.






It sure was a nice surprise and so pretty!

No Water and Some Dam Pictures

Jake and I decided this morning that we needed to go for a hike. We've all been sick and cooped up too long and the weather has turned warm so it begs us to be out in the sunshine! So we woke Tom up early, got our chores done, and headed out.

We went to Joshua Tree National Park (lucky us with a National Park in out back yard). We thought about doing the "Boy Scout Trail" but it was too long for today. We've decided that we need to plan that one for the future. Maybe have Dad drop us off at one end in the morning and have him pick us up at the other end in the evening. It's 8 miles!

So we chose the "Barker Dam" loop instead. It's only a mile but very pretty and loops around so we don't have to worry about reserve energy for getting back.

There was not a drop of water in the reservoir though.  I really thought there would be since we had a couple days of rain last week. Cool though, because we could walk all the way down to the dam. There was another place we could have walked back to because of the lack of water, but the boys weren't up for that kind of an adventure. We need to get our walking legs back into shape anyway.

I told Tom that if he was a "real man" he would walk upright across the top of the dam but he promptly replied that if he was a real man he would be off the dam and safe because he was smart. That amused the other hikers quite a bit.

He did start to scare me here though. The fall is about 10 feet onto more rocks and work boots are not very conducive to good footholds.

We did a bit of rock scrambling and found some nice plants. It was about 60 degrees so gorgeous warm in the sun and chilly in the shade. Like I said, it rained last week, so the ground is wet in places still and there were pools in the rocks. There were lots of people on the trail with us. We saw four Alaska license plates! Everyone we talked to seemed happy to be there and it was a pleasant walk.






We found this cool water trough beneath the dam.







Can you believe this date? The trough was from when Keys' lived here. It has his name on the other side.

Gorgeous view. That's Gorgonio in the distance.

And some Petroglyphs to wrap up the day! Tom translated it for us. It says "Fish fell in love with Dog thing and had headless cactus babies". I think it says "For a good time call..." Something about being upside down on a teeter-totter too!

So we headed back for some Carl's Jr. on the way home. It was just what we needed!

Day Trip

Decided to take a trip to Boron and see the Borax Mine! The original idea was to drive out there and then go see Randsburg as well, but it was so stinkin' cold and cloudy. Yikes! I can take 35 degrees when the sun is shining, but this was not walking around outside weather.

These boys love the road. Good thing too, because they have spent a LOT of time in that back seat.

We made it! It looks strange going up to this huge mining operation, but there is an awesome visitor center there and it is totally worth the trip. It's the biggest open pit mine in the United States.

The docent working there was awesome. She has lived there her whole life. Her Dad came to work the mine when it was still underground in the 50's. The Visitor Center explains all about the operation and what they mine there, where it all goes, and what people use it for. It was very interesting. The money that the Visitor Center makes goes to help people in the town. They support Little League teams and give scholarships to kids going to college, things like that.

This was my favorite thing, microscopes set up to look at different "borates".

This model kind of bugged Tom, not enough information about what it did. It had a name on it, but no details.

The next sign cleared it up a little, but not enough so he had to try to find someone that knew more about it. No such luck.

For some reason "boron gas filled golf clubs" were really strange to us, so much so, that we took a picture, but now can't remember why we thought it odd.






This was the highlight of the place though. They were dying to get out there and climb on this huge tire. Personally, I thought I might freeze to death just getting a picture of them on it, but they were having a blast.

 They were trying to get Dad to get inside it too. 

The pit! It's huge! The boys were using their new iPod Touches to take panorama pictures of the spot.








The next stop was the Twenty Mule Team Museum in town. There was a lot to look at there and the docent there was eager to share everything he knew about the place. He was a little annoying, but he was in such earnest to show us everything we had to encourage him. It was fun!

There was a video playing about how they drove the mules. Turning corners was hilarious! I wanted to buy the video.

Dan found a dry washer and a bunch of old mining equipment.








And they even had Prince Albert in a can!









There was an air museum next door with a more interesting stuff related to Edwards Air Base.









And on the way home the clouds really looked menacing against Big Bear. It was snowing a bit when we got home, but not enough to stick to the ground. We went to the Mexican place in town for dinner and it took us over an hour to get our food and it wasn't even busy. That place is crazy.

It was a great way to end the year!

Christmas

This is crazy, but I didn't really take many pictures at Christmas this year! I totally forgot about the tree! Grrr...but it was a great Christmas anyway.

We had a big family party at my brother's house because his oldest two kids were in town. We had a great time talking with them and seeing a bunch of other family members we hadn't seen in a while.

Christmas Eve Grandma Bonnie and Grandpa Bob came over and we cooked a huge prime rib on the rotisserie all day. It ended in the best Christmas feast ever! They got the boys a mini-bike and they haven't stopped riding it since. That little bike is getting some serious use!




















Christmas Day was nice. "Santa" brought some nice things including iPod Touches and new Leatherman tools. Happy kids, a boat load of food, and a peaceful day....just doesn't get any better.