Well, we got Winter for a Week!

Wow, last week was brutal. It wasn’t as brutal as I have seen in January, but it was cold. I guess you could say we are in “real” winter now. Next will come false Spring: a time which fools us into thinking our winter is going to be short and sweet. Don’t believe it.
Speaking of brutal, I remember a couple of winters that were brutal, but no, neither of them were the Winter of ’78-‘79 — we weren’t here then, so I can’t speak of it. The first was back in the mid-60’s; I know I wasn’t a teenager yet, and I know we were raising pigs, so it had to be about 1965 or 1966. The winter started off a lot like this winter did: warm, open, with no snow to speak of, but then, just after Christmas, the storm came in and the temps started dropping, and dropping some more. When it finally hit bottom, it was on the lower side of -40º. The clouds went away and the sun came out, but the temperature didn’t go up: it was like there was no heat in the sun. The daytime highs were hovering around -30º. That lasted for what seemed like weeks, although I am finding that sometimes my memories are skewed a little, so it probably wasn’t more than a week. I just remember it being so cold. The water pipe to the pig pens from the well froze, so we were forced to run hoses from the house to the barns, and it was so cold we had to turn the water on before we started stringing hoses, because otherwise they would freeze before we got them strung out. My kids will tell you I am completely OCD about rolling hoses up and this is why: the hoses had to be coiled so they wouldn’t tangle when one of the boys grabbed the end and headed for the barn. If it did, we had to roll them up, bring them back in the house to thaw, and then pack the water by buckets all the way from the house. Believe me: 30 head of pigs drink A LOT of water.
The next winter I know was the winter of ‘75-‘76. It started early though: that year, Rick came home from Grand Junction to visit, pulled in the night before Thanksgiving, and by the next morning it was -35º. In the month of December, the average high hung around 0 º. By January, the nighttime temps hovered around minus 20-30º and we had about 2 ft of snow. I remember that January because I was helping Rick work on a pickup for his dad and we walked back to my house most nights about midnight. We were young and in love, that has to be what kept us warm.
So we have had one week of winter. Will that be all? Who knows, but I will be getting ready to start plants soon, because I have the confidence that Spring will come.
A friend asked for a play dough recipe yesterday. On these cold days it can be a lifesaver for a mother of preschool age children, and even older ones. I still love to play with it.

Play Dough
2 cups all-purpose flour
¾ cup salt
4 teaspoons cream of tartar
2 cups lukewarm water
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
Food coloring
Stir together the flour, salt, and cream of tartar in a large pot, then add the water and oil. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until dough has thickened and begins to form into a ball. Remove from heat and place inside a bowl. Allow to cool slightly and knead until smooth, then divide and knead coloring into the smaller batches. (Wearing gloves or kneading in a plastic bag will protect your hands from dye stains.) Keep stored in tightly sealed bags. It will keep for up to three months.