The Weather in Early Spring is Crazy

After living in the desert climate of Las Vegas valley for the past 24 years my husband and I are rather amazed by the differences in the weather of Southern Utah at 5800 ft. in the spring time. One day we get 9 inches of wet snow and everything is a Currier and Ivies print. It’s really beautiful, but horrible to drive in. Twenty-four hours later the snow is almost all gone!

We wanted to plant a dogwood tree in our yard, but the lady at the local nursery explained that the tree gets too confused by the weather and doesn’t do well here. The weather warms ups, the tree buds out, and then it freezes and/or snows and kills the new growth. I finally understand. So instead we planted a dogwood bush, a variation which does much better but still has the white blossoms.  [This is our Juniper tree that has the bird feeders--the local McDonald's of the Thistle Seed.]

When we want a change of pace, or want to thaw out we drive down to St. George, 45 miles south and 2500 ft. lower to warmer temperatures, and visit Costco and Barnes and Noble. About 15 miles south of our house the altitude starts dropping and the snows start disappearing. It’s really quite amazing what a difference a few miles make.

A few weeks ago we had two birthdays in the family. Jordan , Dustin and Erin’s youngest daughter turned one, and Carlee, our youngest turned one year older.

Carlee and Tom celebrated with a weekend in San Diego minus children. Sleeping late and visiting the aircraft carrier, the USS Midway, headed the list of activities for the weekend. In the meantime Katie Jane had an “unbirthday” day at Winner School. Tom’s been enjoying the above average snow pack in the mountains for his Friday ski day. (Those four day work weeks for Utah state employees are something to be envied.) Jack at age 7 is pretty accomplished on skis too. Check out this video that Tom posted:

Jordan and invited guests had a special cup cake party with the birthday gal really getting into it with frosting everywhere. She’s taking her first steps so what she’s not getting into now, she soon will be. She’s a really cutie, but then I’m biased.

This past month Dustin with the help of Grandpa Bobbie, made Paige’s Park became a reality. Paige loves to play outside. Now if we can only teach her to leave the woodchip outside in the yard.

Mile High Spring In Southern Utah

Bob and I had to make a second trip Thursday in the same week to Las Vegas, and we woke up ourselves before the alarm went off. (He never sleeps too well the night before a dissertation defense of one of his students.) It was good we woke up early, as the electricity was off and the wind was howling. Bob said there was snow on the ground, oh whoopee. The electricity was “clicking” on and off and the answering machine on the kitchen telephone was issuing instructions on how to set up. We might as well get up.

Spring at 5800 ft. is not a straight line, it is a series of dashed lines, and some are smudged. Snows in the morning, melts in the afternoon. Sun shines the next day, and then another storm blows in.

We drove to Vegas on Tuesday morning with two inches of snow on the ground, and saw two trucks in the ditch on the Interstate at our entry exit. We came home at 9:30 that night and the snow was all gone.

We left home Thursday morning with the electricity out. So there was no hot tea for the trip, and Bob had to manually open the garage door to get the car out. There wasn’t that much snow but there was a bit of ice under the ice when the rain turned to snow. Fifteen miles down I-15 we left snow behind as we lost altitude. Spring in southern Utah.

(The photo is our neighbor’s fence to the north, that Thursday morning.)