Four days ago, we were at -20'c overnight. Daytime highs of -6c.
Today? +13. It's been such a rapid shift that we left for the weekend to visit family a few hours north, and we did so in winter jackets. We still had snow piles in my yard that were 3 feet high. My entire backyard was a 1-3 foot blanket of snow.
We came back in T-shirts.
The melt this past weekend was unbelievable! I'm partly happy about the speed, as it means maybe the worst of it will run off into the streets and gutters before my sump pump has to pick up the strain. A slower melt would be nice for the farmers, but, they're used to playing the poor hand dealt to them by mother nature.
most of the snow here? Gone two days later. (And yes, this is a half-second before my son faceplanted into the snow - managed to snap this while he was falling. He was fine, and kept playing without stopping.)
Because we were at the farm, and it is calving season, the kids both got to spend some time near the calves. My 4-year-old loved it - he got to go in and pet two baby cows, and go with his grandpa to check the big cows.
These two above are twins - which isn't great with cows, as they usually will only take one of the babies. The process of getting another cow to take the ignored twin is a little intense, so I won't go into what that entails. One isn't doing too great, so they've been bottle-feeding it and giving it as much medicine as they can. We'll see if it ends up surviving or not.
While my son loved being right in with the calves, my daughter was not a fan of being close to them. I think she thought even the calves were too big. When we were in the barn she looked at the momma cow, pointed, and whispered 'him REALLY big!' and then turned around to leave. 😂
She did like being outside and looking at the cows though - as long as there was open sky above and thick bars between the cows and her, she was happy.
We coloured eggs, and the kids had a blast at it... and then we donned our rubber boots and braved the mud as we left for home.
Amazing how fast things can change! The spring thaw this year has been rapid, we had a couple of days where we could stomp on thin ice while walking to daycare which the kids loved - but I think those days are gone now until the fall or next spring. This morning by 6am it was still warm enough that the water pooling in our street was unfrozen.
But that's okay, it just means more chances to splash in puddles!