Our First Ever Snowman!

A momentous occasion: Our first snowman.

With two button eyes and a carrot nose, black scarf and a bowler hat. Bless him. AND we made him together, as a family :)

As One Of My Facebook Friends Put It...

"If this country was a business it would be constantly in liquidation.

The slightest bit of SNOW and it causes chaos!

The slightest ray of SUNSHINE and we have a water shortage!!

The slightest dribble of RAIN and we are flooded!!!"

All Dressed In White...Still

Despite all the blinding sunshine we're having, the snow isn't melting.

Our garden is still under a blanket of white, and although most of the main roads are back to normal again, the side roads are still dangerous.

Just this morning we saw two cars sitting at the bottom of the hill, hazard lights flashing, one had gone down the hill too fast and tried to turn left at the bottom - unsuccessfully - she ended up smashing into the car waiting at the junction instead. Daddy's been driving everywhere very slowly, not taking any chances.

You're not in a hurry, what's the point? Better to be safe than sorry. We already had two near misses on friday, when we went shopping. Not good.

Read what happened on Friday 18th December, if you haven't already.

It's Snowing!!

It seems the snow was waiting for the holiday's to begin! I woke up at 4am, desperately needing some cough medicine, and spotted the snow falling outside. J.R heard my footsteps on the stairs and asked me for a drink, lucky thing got to see the snow before her little sister. I pushed their bedroom curtain aside and lifted her up onto the window sill to get a better look. She got so excited. "It's a snow! Lots and lots and!" Indeed.

The snow was falling pretty fast. And now our garden has disappeared under a blanket of white. It's freezing, but it does look lovely.

Last Minute Xmas Shopping

Last minute shopping today, this is the last chance we'll have to get out and do any bulky shopping with daddy before christmas day. But despite the crowds it was surprisingly easy to get what we wanted. I've found if you do all the 'thinking' at home and put your final choices on paper, you can't go wrong!

Anything I think of later i'll have to manage on my own with the girls, and nothing is gonna be easy in this weather... The traffic is slow cos the roads are still hazardous, we ourselves had 2 near-misses in the car this afternoon. First one was coming down a very slight incline towards the junction at the level crossing, Daddy braked but the wheels crunched on the ice and the car kept moving. We were sliding slowly, but because of the traffic, the first car in the queue was unable to move back and Daddy had to swerve so as not to clip his headlights. No damage done.

The second instance was in the multi storey car park, we were on the 4th level and there weren't any cars around. We approached the down ramp slowly but on turning right (to go down it) the wheels crunched and slid on the ice again, meaning we slid left - towards the barriers. SO CLOSE to clipping the front of the car on the corner of the brick wall! But once again Daddy managed to steer us out of trouble and thankfully we got home safe.

Snow Forecast?

This week? We'll see.

But this is what we've woken up to this morning...

Ok so not really snow, more a light frosting LOL

But one thing's for sure, it's REALLY chilly!

The bookies have started putting the odds on for a white Christmas

- Now wouldn't that be nice :)

Storms & Flooding Hit UK

On the bank of the Thames/Pangbourne.

Heavy rain storms and high winds hit Britain this week as forecasters warned that flooding would spread across the country. The Environment Agency has flood warnings in place for the Midlands and north England and Wales and the Met Office has issued severe weather warnings for north west England and south west Scotland. The official Floodline service received more than 7000 calls over the past 24 hours, all from concerned people wanting to know if there was a warning in place for their area.

Meanwhile, it's all over the news that Cumbria (in the north of England) has been affected most so far. Rain is still falling on land that is already saturated in water and it's not flowing away. A total of 21 schools have been forced to close due to flooding.

But the rain is expected to ease off the area very soon as it moves into south east England - where we are. And although the rain continues to fall for most of the day, we are lucky enough so far to have no warnings in force for our area.

The Weather Is Terrible

What's going on? So much strong wind and heavy rain...

It feels like some sort of hurricane season, and we don't even have a hurricane season!

We've been given an storm warning this week and I feel sorry for those who live on the coasts, 'cos according to the weather reports it's gonna get a hell of a lot worse. I'll keep you posted.

It's Raining It's Pouring!

If you hadn't already guessed from the title, it's raining.

And it has been for the last two days here where we are, pretty much all day. I've never liked the rain, since I was young i've felt like Rain = Dirty. Dunno why, just always have!

So this time i've come up with a solution. Don't get wet.

I know, I know it sounds really obvious but when I say don't get 'wet' I mean AT ALL. Not your hair, or the bottoms of your jeans, nothing. Since i'm short i'm used to the bottoms of my jeans catching puddles and the dirty water soaking me up to my knees. So we are - all three of us - wearing leggings, tucked into our boots, hats and our hoods over the top. (Except for J.R who refused to wear her hat on the way home from school 'cos she said it messes her hair up!)

Mind you, all these cosy clothes didn't stop my girls having fun splashing in puddles...when you're that age you don't seem to mind the rain do you? Bless.