Winter Storm Jonas

Ever since Hurricane Katrina it seems meteorologists and city officials can be a little overprotective when it comes to dealing with potential natural disasters.  However, I definitely prefer it to the alternative: not being prepared at all.  Still, I approach most of their predictions with skepticism.

We heard about this potential storm system moving across the southern states on Monday, and the speculations began.  There was also a wave of low, cold air coming in off the east coast and the 2 were going to meet up to some potentially disastrous consequences.  I held off preparing until Wednesday; once the Canadian, European & American agencies all forecast basically the same path and intensity of the storm... us... the DC area.  We watched the projected path about eleventy billion times over the course of the week.  It looked like a snowicane.  The storm was twirling out into the ocean and slamming back into DC over and over again as the moisture fed into it.  It was going to be a long few days!

There was still a tiny northern snowstorm inching its way down to us and it dropped enough snow for them to cancel school on Thursday, which was nice for everyone who still needed to prepare I suppose.  The kids had fun sledding in the inch of snow and leaves.  They thought this was Jonas... HA!  Not yet, my children.  Thursday we spent a lot of time writing lists of things to do or buy or locate.  We mentally walked through possible scenarios for which to prepare ourselves like power outages which would mean a loss of heat, running water, lights, and netflix.  What do we need?  What should we do?  We set up preparation timelines so as not to get anything done too quickly, but also not be too late.  Jonas was going to make it to us at approximately 1pm on Friday.  Josh and I are masters of disasters.  We get a little giddy planning for the apocalypse.  I blame our military backgrounds.

Friday morning was pink and orange and sunny most of the day.  I was quite skeptical we'd ever see the storm and I couldn't help thinking about the past.  How the heck did people know a storm was coming?  Seriously... I never would have known just by looking outside that a ginormous monster blizzard was about to vomit snow all over the coast.  Still, I trusted the satellite images of the projected path of Jonas and prepared our foods for possible power outages: chicken, sausages, baked oatmeal, pasta.  In a pinch any pre-cooked food will do.  At least with a winter storm you don't have to worry about food spoilage (just being able to cook it).  We knew heating up a grill would be nigh impossible with the winds and snow they were talking about.  After all the prepping I was hesitant to eat anything we had made and we needed to grab a few more things from the store.  We called 5 Guys and they were open... with only 2 hours before snowzilla.  The herd of teenage boys working there surely had snow-driving experience, right?  I hoped they would let these kids go home early, as well as every other employee everywhere else.  There were tons of people out doing exactly what we were doing.  We brought our food home and no sooner did we finish eating than we caught sight of the very first flakes.  At precisely 1248pm on Friday, the snow started.

 

We watched it snow for awhile and then ventured outside when it was at roughly 4" (at 4pm) to sled and enjoy finally having winter snow before the sun set.  Josh and I knew the storm was supposed to kick into high gear sometime during the wee hours and into Saturday morning.  We ate a hot dinner (YAY), played some games, popped popcorn, and watched some Harry Potter.  We also brewed up coffee and boiled water for hot cocoa to put in our super insulated thermoses in case we became electricity-less.  It wasn't until Friday night that the winds really started picking up and I got a little worried about the power going out.  I was glad we had everything ready to go.  The winds and sleet woke me up at around 0330 on Saturday morning though.

All day Saturday it snowed.  We went outside quite a few times to sled and play.  We even took a walk down the street, curious to see how everything was looking.  As soon as we made it up the driveway those winds were whipping.  Our house is down a hill and I think we miss a lot of the winds... that also explains why we had so many birds hanging out in our yard.  We did some sledding in the blizzard.  White-out conditions and high winds can't stop us!  It was exciting!  The snow piled up and by time we put the kids down at 9pm it was still snowing and we had about 13".  Once the snow slowed down we all passed out from a long arduous day in the wind and snow.  We did lose power Saturday night or Sunday morning, but none of us knows when or for how long because we all were asleep.  The snow finally stopped at midnight, technically Sunday.  We also lost wifi and it was out most of Sunday.  Comcast came through eventually though.  The final count at our house was about 20".  It had snowed for 35 hours straight.  This was quite a memory for all of us!

We have been playing in the snow with our days off... and doing some work.  We dug ourselves out on Sunday and took a quick look around, and Monday we were thrilled to get the hell out of here and go out to eat! The kids had a 2hr delay today after getting Thursday, Friday, Monday & Tuesday off for this storm.  It left us with about 5 gojillion cubic feet of snow with which to sculpt and play.  We've been enjoying it thoroughly.  

My Jabba the Snow Hutt looks like a sad fat blob now that the temperatures have climbed to nearly 50.  Hope everyone else enjoyed the snow and made it into a fun adventure! :)