Snow

It has been snowing, on and off, pretty much since Thursday. We had snow showers followed by sunny spells throughout the day on Thursday. The sun tended to melt the snow, until I was on my way home, by which time, of course, it was dark and the snow started to lie. It was very pretty on Friday.

We didn't really have anything to write home about after that in Chesterfield or Sheffield. Just occasional flurries. This was not the case in the south of England, and I noted that there were problems when listening to the news. But I more or less stopped thinking about snow, except for admiring it in the garden and lying in fields, and began thinking about Christmas plans.

First plan. Griddle the lions, grab a brace of shoulders, and brave Sainsbury's on Saturday. Actually, Sainsbury's wasn't too bad, despite the fact that the Saturday before Christmas is meant to be the busiest retail day of the year. And not only that, almost the entire shop was paid for by my mammoth number of loyalty points (I've been collecting but not spending them for a couple of years, so had acquired rather a lot!). Stood the lions and shoulders down for use later. And decided not to go to the Chatsworth shop until Monday or Tuesday.

Sunday dawned. Eventually. Carried on with the Christmas preparations and decided to leave for Sheffield, where we were due to take afternoon tea with Freyja, a little early and call at the Forge in Dronfield (it's a small craft, jewellery, amusing little shops, complex) and drop into Waitrose in Sheffield. We came out of Waitrose - more or less into a blizzard!!! I started thinking about snow again, quite had! Trundled off in Freyja's direction, and the snow got stronger and stronger, and deeper and deeper. Slid gently up the road that leads to her place, decided not to attempt her road (which you have to reverse out of) and also not to stay for afternoon tea. We were beginning to worry a bit about getting back home!! Rushed up to her house, dropped off some stuff we had for her, tested her Christmas baking (well, you have to have proper quality controls on Christmas baking!) and dashed back to the car.

The traffic on London Road was pretty much at a standstill, so we made our way to the A61 - where the traffic was also at a standstill. Took us nearly an hour to get to the Meadowhead roundabout. Not a gritter to be seen, although some of the residents were out throwing grit on the roads. Fortunately, the Dronfield bypass was clear, at least in one lane and the traffic was moving freely, albeit a bit slowly. And by the time we got to Chesterfield there was almost no snow at all.

I was beginning to feel slightly guilty about abandoning Freyja's afternoon tea quite so abruptly. Until, half an hour or so after we got home, we got this:

I think, on the whole, we timed it quite well. Though I hope Freyja has taken a photo of her Christmas tree; she was decorating it as we got there.