We have a skimming of snow this morning and it's colder than yesterday by almost 40 degrees, at 21 degrees.  We're pretty much overcast, but nothing is falling out of the sky; we do have a bit of North wind whipping at us, though.  At our house we're pretty much white, but at pond level, there seems to be no snow on the ground to speak of.  I looked at the Rossi web cam early this morning and the grass is nice and green there with open water as far as I could see.  There seems to be ice again in back of the islands.  It's a little difficult to tell from this picture, but with binoculars, I can see there are shades of white indicating there's probably thin, wind swept ice and older, snow covered areas there.  The wind doesn't hit quite as much on that section, so the water is calmer and freezes sooner, plus it isn't as deep so the overall temperature is probably a little warmer.

I noticed the hills above Route 15 are frosty this morning, too.  You can see how the snow cover lessens according to elevation.   We should go to Route 15 and take a picture of our hillside.  I know up by the Plains School there is more snow showing in the fields than there is here.  Last night we went to the post office in West Danville around 4 o'clock and it was raining, but the temperature was dropping, so it was no surprise to find the ground more or less white this morning - not enough to measure, but I did find .54 in. of precipitation in my rain gauge.

We still have time for a White Christmas - just let's hope Mother Nature doesn't go overboard and drop the temperature and then deliver a few tons of snow on us.  However, if we don't hurry up and get some real winter weather, we may not be able to claim a "January Thaw," and then it'll be spring already!  And it's anybody's guess what that would do to the maple crop.  However, I'm betting on getting some real snow by Christmas.

Fred and I have been wearing our "spiked" shoes almost every day when we walk.  With cold nights, there are icy patches where you least expect them.  This morning our driveway was covered in black ice, and even with our spikes on, it was a little slippery.  When we got down to the road, there is ice under loose gravel, so it could be treacherous in spots where the gravel has either blown off or is a little light.  There are no snowbanks to catch us, so it's not a good time to get caught in a skid.  Some of the ditches along W. Shore Road are really deep to accommodate the water that comes off the hills in a heavy rain storm.  

Waterford School is playing the first basketball game of the season at Cabot this afternoon.  The family will come here for supper after the game.  We enjoy watching them play.  Last year they had a good game with Cabot  - both teams were very good, so we're looking forward to an interesting game.

Liz Sargent sent me a scan of part of an article about the big island here at Joe's Pond.  She said her nephew was removing an old shed at the Pearl farm this week and found this in one of the walls.  They didn't find the rest of the article, though.   I was pretty sure there was a copy filed in the Joe's Pond newspaper clipping album, but I didn't find it.  I have other articles about the island, but not this one.  If anyone happens to have the whole thing, I'd very much like to have a copy of the first page to go with this.  If you click on the image it will enlarge so you can see it better.