A Magical Snowy Christmas

We now have a wee bit of snow on the ground with, perhaps, a dumper coming tomorrow morning. It's arriving a little late this year — late for this area at least. This will be our fifth winter here in Eastern Ontario, and in other years we've had snow by now: sometimes quite a lot. I don't mind the snow, but I also don't mind that it has taken its sweet time getting here this year as it might feel shorter on the back end when it tends to overstays its welcome.

Snow at this time of year takes me back to a Magical Snowy Christmas five years ago. At that time, we still lived in Sarnia at the southwestern edge of the province, about a seven hour+ drive to Ottawa. It was about a week later than it is now when we drove partway to Eastern Ontario before stopping at the cottage. We intended to stay there for a week or so and enjoy a winter holiday before continuing the journey. Sarnia is almost as far south as you can go in Canada, and it isn't terribly cold or snowy (in Canadian terms understand), so we looked forward to enjoying a more wintry time at the cottage. We were not to be disappointed.



Once we were within about an hour of the cottage we began to notice some accumulation, which seemed to grow deeper and deeper the closer we came to our destination. The cottage region had received a significant snowfall over the previous night, and let me assure you that freshly fallen snow in the woods is, indeed, magically delightful. So, it was upon recalling that winter, I perused my archives, found the above photo of Cuppa in the snowy woods a few days ago and set it as the background wallpaper on my computer. Since I still can't stop thinking about it, I thought I'd share it with you too.

We had a lot of fun that week, even when Cuppa lost her snowshoe and got stuck in the drift along the riverbank. She required assistance, but I took enough time to get this photo before helping my lady in distress.



It was a memorable winter retreat that year, which we've never managed to duplicate. Perhaps, I will post some further recollections in the coming days.