Lovely weather for shovelling together

This is the road I drive down every day to take the boys to preschool. Or used to. The neighbours had warned us that it would be closed in the winter, but I hadn't realised quite how closed. On Sunday, it became a ski and sledging run for the local kids and looks set to stay that way.

Over a foot of snow fell on Saturday night (and even more further out on Long Island) during the great East Coast blizzard. Sunday morning was spent shovelling. You get to know a lot about your neighbours after a snowstorm. The mega-organised ones had huge, expensive snowblowing machines and had cleared their drives by 11am (one guy had done that and even built a huge, very professional-looking snowman. He stood there surveying everyone else as they struggled with crappy shovels later in the day). Most people drifted out of the house around 10 looking bewildered and started shovelling with an assortment of implements. Every household is reponsible for clearing their own bit of sidewalk, and some people still haven't bothered - I think that says something....

Our landlady had promised that someone would help us with the driveway, but they had come in the early hours of the morning before the snow stopped. Not knowing if they would return, The Doctor and I donned our ski clothes and went out with shovels. He managed most of the driveway by 2pm, while I helped to clear the snow off the cars and entertain the Littleboys with snowman-building. Naturally, the snow removal people returned just as we had finished....

We managed to dig enough of a channel to actually leave our house, and amazingly, my sister arrived yesterday with no problems or delays, despite snow at either end (she lives in Essex, which has been badly hit by the UK snow) At one point it looked as if the weather really was conspiring against us, so there is relief all round.

Let Christmas begin! And a very merry one to all of you.....