Well, we finally got some . . . here's what it looked like yesterday afternoon, after a day of freezing rain and sleet:





All evening it kept "silting" down in that way it has: Small, small particles fall steadily and never amount to much. But this time, they amounted to Just Enough - which means I could no longer see the tips of the grass, which means Enough to Ski On, as far as I'm concerned. (How about Ann Arbor? Any Treetown residents want to speak to the snow depth there? Hint: The appropriate answer to the question, "How much snow do you have?" is "Less than Lansing.")

Today was sunny and cold (relatively speaking) - the high was in the teens, and the skies were cloudless. Here's what the light looked like this morning, streaming off the newly-fallen snow and into the living room:





We haven't seen that much sunshine in months.

Gosh, I love winter. Once the snow falls, everything seems like another planet . . .

I broke out the skis this afternoon when I got home, and went around the golf course near our house. I found the access point (Bancroft Park), right near the big sledding hill . . . It wasn't exactly woodsy, cruising around a golf course, but it's a heckuva nice course. And I realized that there's a huge advantage to skiing on very manicured grass if there isn't much snow; I didn't have to worry that I'd hit a tree root or a rock as I was accelerating down a hill. (I managed to avoid the sand traps. And the water, which, alas, was still water. But I did see a very nice pond that would probably make a nice place to skate.)

I don't know how long the snow will stay good - but another advantage to a golf course is that it would take a really long time before you had to go in someone else's tracks. Besides, even if the snow disintegrates tomorrow, this is already more skiing than I counted on this year, so I'm happy.