Well, as warm as it was in the beginning of November, from Thanksgiving on has truly been Winter weather. Very cold temps and some snow & ice. But December 11th gave us a whole new definition of winter. 
The Ice Storm...It began about 10 PM Monday night, with a light rain falling. By Tuesday morning there was a definite layer of ice on everything. I stayed home from work, the boys stayed home from school. About 9:30 or so, the power went out. Power...it makes you realize just how much we depend on it. We are luckier than a lot of folks... we have a gas stove and while the oven works off the electricial controls the burners work and I boiled water the whole time to put humidity in the air and we burned candles in the evening. I can tell you, doing anything by candlelight is tough. I did manage to read the boys a story...let's just say they were bored enough to listen. No TV, we did find a battery operated radio and listened to that for awhile. 
The rain in the mean time just kept coming until about 10 or 11 AM and an inch or so of ice covered everything. We could step out the back door and hear the trees in the timber crack and break... sometimes you could watch out the window and see them break and fall. Very sad. Then the rain turned to sleet mixed with the rain.
Eventually the sleet was the only thing that was falling and then... it stopped. Later that afternoon we got some snow, nothing to really worry about and it was over before we could even think about worrying about it.
Mike got a call from work...can you believe it, they wanted him to go in...he did, of course. He drove the truck in 4-wheel drive. He said the worst part of his journey was our gravel road and our 2-lane paved county road, S23. Other than that, our DOT Crews did a wonderful job of keeping the roads clear and driveable. Makes me proud to work for the DOT, even if I'm not the one out there cleaning the roads! So Wednesday I went to work... I went slow and took it easy. No problems! The boys had no school again. I wasn't really that surprised... But now it's Thursday and the boys are still not back to school. Not sure what that's about. Maybe tomorrow...
We hope you all faired as well, if not better, than we did. I'm glad it's mostly over...we still have to be careful driving, but that's what an Iowa winter is all about!! Be Safe!!
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