Snow in England

On Friday evening, Boxing Day, it began to snow. Even the sight of flurries was enough to get the children excited but the flurries increased and began to stay on the ground. They were excited and even though it was 8:00 in the evening they went outside. Miss K didn't stay long but J was out for a long time.

I grew up with snow in the winter. When snow is forecasted, everyone goes to the store for milk, bread, and toilet paper. I remember once walking a mile uphill in the snow to get milk. (Mom, we walked to Farmer Brown's.)

Where we lived on the East Coast in the US, with the forecast of snow the snow plows would be out putting grit on the roads, and then as soon as it stopped snowing, they would be place to plow. You had to shovel your sidewalks and if you lived in the city, you would shovel out your parking space and then leave a chair in the nice cleared space reserving your spot.

When it stopped snowing, we had about 6-7 inches. For England that is a snowstorm. We had been told that we wouldn't get that much snow here. Compared to the first year couple years we lived in the States when we had some record breaking snow for the winter, this is not much. The buses stopped running at least in our area, the taxis were not coming here, my grocery delivery was delayed.

I saw a snow plow this afternoon almost 48 hours after it began snowing. Very few people have shovelled their sidewalk.

This afternoon a friend called and told me they were going to the hill near the park for sledging. The other week we were in the sports store and I saw a snow shovel sledge. I thought that a sledge was a name for that time of sled. After listening to a friend at church this morning and my friend inviting us to sledge, I realised that what we call sled and sledding here is called sledge and sledging.

When we moved to this city, someone told us that you either go uphill or downhill. That is not fun when walking around town but when it has snowed it is perfect for sledging.

It was a perfect sledging hill. I remember sledding as a kid down a country road that was closed so we could sled. That was the old sleds with the metal runners. I also remember once sledding with a toboggan down a snow covered field.

Miss K wanted to do it herself but we didn't want her to end up in the creek at the bottom of the hill.

As we walked to the hill, we past some sheep in the field. Miss K thought they were cold but we told her they had on a wool coat.

I have to say that it was a beautiful view as the kids were sledging. We saw the sun go down and then the kids were doing their last run with the moon in the sky.

The roads still have some snow on them. I did see the bus running a bit in this area. Hopefully my groceries will be delivered.

We enjoyed a snow day or two here in England.

Beth