Snow Day! Part II: A lovely day for a picnic

Just after we returned from our first foray into the snowy outdoors, Miranda and I both learned that we wouldn't have to work today. NC State canceled classes, and Miranda's boss told her not to come in as the roads were quite treacherous. After spending an hour or so watching some of our neighbors try to negotiate the icy parking lot (several were unable to make it up the hill and eventually gave up!) we decided that venturing anywhere in the car was out of the question....but that didn't mean we had to stay inside.
We hatched a plan to go have a picnic in the snow over at Lake Crabtree, which could be reached entirely by foot along one of our local greenways. We donned our cold weather hiking gear (which as you may imagine gets little use down here) filled up my new thermos with vegetable soup, rousted the hound from her slumber on my bed, and headed out into the wintry goodness. There were a suprising number of people out on the greenway, many with sleds in tow, as even the slightest slope was being turned into a sledding hill.
It took us an hour or so to make it to Lake Crabtree, where we enjoyed our soup, and of course, took more pictures.

Miranda enjoys some soup during our wintry picnic. By the way...if you ever decide to go for a walk in a snow storm, and want to bring some warm soup along....I highly recommend a Thermos brand thermos. Definitely burned my mouth with the first sip, even after an hour of it sitting in the thermos strapped to the outside of my bag!

To give you an idea of how much snow there was, I took a picture of one of the benches with the accumulated snow on top...we probably ended up getting about 3-4" from the storm, not too shabby by NC standards.

In addition to soup, trail mix was also on the menu, and Dixie wanted a sample. Apparently the two biscuits she'd had by this point were insufficient!

A view of the greenway heading toward the lake.

The picnic shelter where we had lunch. Miranda is surveying the lake while enjoying her soup.

Between the two pictures below, I managed to catch Dixie in mid-sneeze....note the facial expressions.

It was still snowing pretty hard while we were at the lake, as evidenced by this picture, although it began to let up shortly after we left, and was pretty much done by the time we got home.

One last shot of our intrepid explorers braving the frigid fracas.

What better way to end a day of playing in the snow than with a nice nap in the sun on a warm bed!

Thus ends our wintry adventure for 2009. We ended up with around 4 inches of snow, although it was already starting to melt by the time we made it back to the apartment. There may be some lingering effects though, as threats of black ice as the snow melt re-freezes has already closed many area schools for tomorrow, and State has canceled classes until 10AM. These effects shouldn't linger too long though, as temps should be up into the 50s by the weekend. But for now, we're enjoying our little taste of winter!

Snow Day! Part I: Snow-hound

Central North Carolina received its first significant snowfall since Miranda and I moved down here today, resulting in an extension of the MLK weekend for both of us. The snow started early this morning, having accumulated about 2" by the time we got up around 7. This was a bit of a pleasant surprise, as the latest model trends by bedtime had suggested that the heaviest snow may end up shifting south and east of Raleigh, leaving us with a bust. Since this was the Hound's first snow experience (as far as we know, at least) we of course had to document her morning walk for posterity.

At first, Dixie wasn't so sure about all the white stuff being a little cautious as she descended the stairs. This was after some quizzical looks out the window at her newly whitened domain.

In short order, though she realized that the snow wasn't going to hurt her and it was business as usual, with the occasional shake of the head to clear the flakes off her nose!

By the time we were on our way back, Dixie was kicking up the flakes in her dash for breakfast (much to the chagrin of Miranda, trying to keep upright in the slippery conditions!)

The greenway didn't look too green this morning!!

And the creek looked downright cold!

Dyansty dr. was snowy...no plows had visited yet.

And tree-lined Sudbury was very picturesque as well.

Just to prove the snow did fall in NC...here's our apartment sign nestled in a new blanket of snow.

10 Months and counting

Over Christmas Miranda and I visited Talltree Arboretum, where we're going to have our wedding ceremony. Hopefully it will be a little warmer (it was 10 degrees!) and less icy come October, but the site still looked beautiful nonetheless!

This is a view of the whole site....the lake is on the left (kind of hard to tell with the snow and ice) and the pavilion where the ceremony will be is on the right.


This is a front view of the pavilion. There's a large grassy area in the foreground, where we could seat people if we decide to have everything outside the pavilion, or we could have seating inside the pavilion. We haven't decided which we'll do yet, although it will be somewhat dependent on the weather.


This is the inside of the pavilion....including a really nice fireplace, although I doubt we'll use that.



This is the view looking out from the pavilion. If we decide to do the ceremony in the pavilion, we'll likely have people sitting facing this direction and Miranda and I will be on the steps (where Miranda is standing) with the lake in the background.



This is the view from the steps of the pavilion looking towards the lake. If we have the ceremony outside, everyone will sit in the foreground and Miranda and I will be down by the benches near the lake.


This is another shot of the benches by the lake where Miranda and I will stand if we have the ceremony outside of the pavilion.