Tuesday, December 29, 2009

An Oregon Winter

There comes a small sadness when taking down the Christmas decor. Part of me wishes we could have a tree in our house all year long. I love the smell of the fresh pine and the cheery glow of the lights. However, I definitely won't miss having to squeeze between the tree and the kitchen doorway. There is also a beautiful chest freezer waiting to occupy the tree's imminent vacancy. That's pretty exciting!

While we've been missing the Wisconsin snow this winter, we've had the opportunity and blessing to enjoy God's creation in moderate, though icy (fun) weather. We decided on a whim last Saturday to drive out into the hills east of the valley to see what December had brought to Silver Falls State Park, one of our favorite easy hiking spots. We stopped at the Silverton Reservoir on the way since we had never checked that out before. I think we found the perfect place to kayak! As we gained elevation, we saw heavy frost and then snow for the first time! There are very few things as beautiful as a winter waterfall. Though it's not as comfortable as a West Coast summer, the winter has beauty to rival the sunniest summer days. See for yourself:



Silverton Reservoir



Leaning Tree - Silverton Reservoir



Upper North Falls - Silver Falls State Park, Oregon



Upper North Falls B/W, Silver Falls State Park, Oregon



Silver Creek - Silver Creek State Park, Oregon


Happy New Year, Everybody!

3 comments:

Patty O. said...

I was terribly sad when I read that you are taking your tree down already, but I guess trading it for a chest freezer isn't a bad deal!

I just picked up a book at the library today called, "can i freeze it?" and it's got some good tips. (though alot of the food is stuff we don't normally eat). I've also been enjoying sharing an upright freezer with the Jungs - so nice to have extra space!

Kari Hornaday said...

I just read on Tammy's Recipes about how she uses a "foodsaver" vacuum. I love how she lines the pan, and freezes the dish into shape then pulls it out of the still-clean pan and stacks it neatly in the freezer. So cool! I may continue to be one of those cheap ziploc bag + straw people...

I'm keeping the tree up until Jan 2nd (Saturday), but I took down all of the wall, door, and table decor. I wanted to get a jump start on it, or else it would be there until February! haha I'm not ready to give up the tree yet. I can't wait to mail some packages though! Did I mention it snowed in Salem today?? Sweet!

Patty O. said...

I saw that and I would love to get one, but I think I'd go broke buying the bags for it! (Though I did pull some pretty freezer burnt stuff out tonight and rethought the whole system - but I'm too cheap to even throw that away! We'll still eat it once all 57 layers of ice fall off!)

Glad you finally got to enjoy some snow! Hopefully the sleet part will go away. We got lots of that last week, so it took some of our snow with it :(