More Snow?!

Gosh, I just about forgot that today is the 1st. Happy New Year y'all!
On Wednesday, our boy and I took a harrowing drive to Amarillo to get my Mom on a plane.

                          

Actually, it was only the first 15 miles that were sketchy, but my poor Mom probably aged 10 years in that 15 miles. She was a good sport, but I am worried that she really will never come visit again for Christmas. We left at 10 in the morning and sledded our way back to the ranch after 10:30 that night. It was 4° when we got home.

                            

It's a 4 hour drive one way on good roads and as we drove, the snow lessened considerably. In fact, I think we were ground zero for this storm.

About halfway home, traffic was backed up and stopped...and we sat for an hour outside of Friona, Texas

                              

before we began to crawl once again. It looked like someone plowed their truck into a snowbank that hadn't been completely cleared. Sure prayed that no one was hurt.

Yesterday was DH's birthday and I jumped in with him to make his morning feed run. Or to at least attempt to make his morning feed run. Any normal person would think we were nuts to be out in 2' of snow plowing our way over dirt roads and through pastures. DH said it wouldn't be a big deal if we had proper equipment to combat the snow. The wind was just awful and it drifted into many of the roads that sit below the pasture. Poor fella had to spend most of his day breaking ice and shoveling snow

                        

You can't drive slow in this stuff or you'll just get stuck so you end up fishtailing and sliding and plowing your way through it. The road is about 2' beneath this:

                             

DH is a good steward of this land

                             

And if cattle can be grateful, then surely these are some very thankful bovines

                            

We only got stuck once when we tried to turn around:

He loaded hay for the bulls:

                             

Happy boys:

                               


We still couldn't get to everything, but we fed what we could and prayed for a little sun. DH said that the fog never lifted on Wednesday and yesterday, it stayed cloudy and overcast. Hello fella! Bet you're hoping for a little sunshine too!

                             

We had to put up some panels across the cattle guard at headquarters as it was snowed in and the bulls just sauntered over it and headed for the hay. We herded them out the first time and set up panels to keep them out.                      

Everyone gets equal time at the working end of a shovel around here

Walking through deep snow sure does wear a desert rat out. We're just not used to this much, but even with all of the trouble it brings, there's no denying that it is beautiful!

And it's easy to spot cattle!

                                         

We've got a friend who told me that they lost 7 hd that got into a dirt tank and froze. That just breaks my heart. I hope there are no more losses. It'll be a while before we can even get to all of our country. I've got to take our boy to El Paso Saturday and presently, we are getting...yep..more snow!

                            

Did someone say, MORE snow?

                              

A Record Snowfall

Around here we always keep a close eye on the weather. Not that we can change anything, but we can prepare for it if need be. The forecasted blizzard blew in on Saturday afternoon and dumped a record snow on us.

                                

It's really hard to measure how much snow fell when it was accompanied by 50 mph winds. I love it when it snows, but this snow was not fun. Livestock needs to be tended to, blizzard or not.

                                

The tractor has been working overtime:

                                          

I will say that having the kids home has spoiled me. I didn't even go out to tend to my chickens today as our boy trudged and shoveled his way through the 4-foot snow drifts to bring hot water to my girls and keep them in pellets, as well as gathering the eggs. This morning they got oatmeal. :)

                                       

He found this little bird hiding out in the coop...smart little thing:

                                             

Our girl had a friend come out on Saturday night and he ended up staying the night on our couch. Made no sense to have him out on the road and he's stayed here often in the past. It snowed most of the day on Sunday...accompanied by those ferocious winds. DH had to check on a few pump houses and got stuck so DD and DS drove off to the rescue and also got stuck after pulling DH out. Our new camp man came over and he got stuck. I imagine there will be a few more rescues on the horizon

                                                    

On Monday the day dawned sunny and cold with no wind. Yay! Time to pull on those boots and venture out. Harvey sure enjoyed his first snow

A lot!

                              

Since we don't have grandchildren, y'all get pictures of our grand dog:

                             

And the horses were thankful for full bunks of hay:

                             

Its funny to watch the quail scurry about:

                            

We ended up with probably 15-18". Its hard to measure when the winds were so strong, but town is completely closed down. Roads in all directions were closed until today. The county doesn't have snowplows so they have to call in the state to bring in equipment. The National Guard has been overwhelmed rescuing stranded motorists. This was a record snowfall for our area. Yesterday our propane tanks were barely keeping their heads above the snow:

                               

We're not expected to get up above freezing for a week with lows in the single digits, but the sun is shining in a brilliantly blue sky and the landscape is breathtaking. My mom was supposed to fly out today and all systems were go until we got to town and received a text that her flight was cancelled. No flights available until Saturday so we booked her on a flight out of Amarillo tomorrow. It's not looking good as it snowed pretty hard again today for about 3 hours. The main road was good, but DH bladed the 2.5 miles to the pavement yesterday. It was still a harrowing ride. Last year my mom was here for 4 extra days because of an ice and snow storm and we still had to take her to Amarillo. She said she was going to stop coming at Christmas. :)

We kept busy with our annual Christmas puzzle.

Everyone joins in, but DH and I are the die hard puzzlers in the family. We don''t put together puzzles any other time of the year, but its a tradition over Christmas and we have a hard time stopping. We've been known to be up past midnight searching for the next piece. This year we had some extra help compliments of Harvey

                               

Who was plumb wore out after his adventures in the snow this morning: