It's not that bad

It's that time of year again.

The wood has been cut and stacked (thank you dear), the pool has been drained, the trampoline taken down, the lawn chairs put away. Now we wait for the snow, which usually starts around Thanksgiving.

This is what we're burning now, pine and fir. It's pretty light and burns fast, which is good because the real cold hasn't hit yet. Now we have the fire turned down most of the time, so the wood burns more slowly. The pine and fir were generously donated to us by S and J, who still have a lot of downed trees on their property. We used to harvest our own, but our supply has dwindled. We have about 2 cords of this.

We also bought and had delivered 2 cords of a birch/tamarack (larch) mix, which is in the back row there. It's much heavier and denser so it burns longer. It's good to get this going with the lighter stuff and then throw on a birch yule log before bed to last through the night.We had more insulation put into the house this year, and J put in a bathroom heater. This morning it was 14 degrees on the thermometer, but I didn't know it till I went downstairs and looked.

Before the arctic air mass arrived, we had a few days of rain via the pineapple express. It was nice and mild and misty and moist. I imagine it's what Seattle feels like.

It was good to get all that moisture, but I can see how it would get old fast.

After the deluge, it was dry and windy, with the occasional bit of sun.

Rusty was pondering the universe here in the hot spot. Not 15 minutes later the clouds returned and it started to hail.

There isn't much color around anymore, everything is brown brown brown and grey and dark green, except for these bright spots:

Arctostaphylos uva-ursi - Bearberry

Willow?

Oregon grape with Bearberry

Gaillardia trying to bloom, better late than never.
It's cloudy and 41 degrees at 1:50 pm.