Last night the weather forcasters started warning us that an ice storm was on the way here, and would hit by 3 pm today.  So this morning people started taking precautions.  Area schools and businesses set early closing times.  Local evening events and Christmas programs were cancelled.  Everyone was gearing up for the ice to start falling from the sky at precisely 3 pm.

I did my part and rescheduled the children’s music lessons.  Normally we have lessons from 1-2:30, and another one from 5-5:30.  I was able to get piano set up for 9 a.m., and the guitar lesson for 1 p.m.  But as Illinois weather is prone to do, the forecast shifted a bit, and then shifted again… and the icy weather didn’t actually arrive until around 9 p.m.  The good news is that means folks had longer to prepare.  The unfortunate thing is that schools and businesses and Christmas programs (and music lessons) could have still kept their regular schedules.

Around supper time I was settling in for a quiet evening, and Michael’s brother, Todd, stopped by.  After chatting for a minute he reminded me that this is our regular weekly babysitting night, so he was ready to watch kids if Michael and I wanted to go out.  I quickly sent a message to Michael and asked if he wanted to go anywhere.  We aren’t the type to turn down free babysitting very often, so we eagerly accepted the chance to go do our shopping for the children’s Christmas stockings.

We had a delightful, relaxing time choosing the various things for the children.  It’s rather a daunting task to choose items for six different people (Lilly won’t even realize she didn’t get anything in her stocking.), so it took us a couple of hours.  When we were finally done and heading to our car, we realized the rain and ice was here.  We scraped the ice off the windows and cautiously headed home.  The main roads were passable, so that got us most of the way home.  Turning into our neighborhood, we slid most of the way down the hill, and managed to make the turn to get on to our street, and then we were home.  Fortunately Todd lives across the street, so he was able to get home safely.

Now we are snug and comfy and ready to see what ice comes our way.  I love winter weather, and we don’t have to be anywhere tomorrow, so we’ll stay put until it’s safe to get out.  The one thing I hope doesn’t happen is any trees or power lines breaking from the heavy ice.  Having a power outage is no fun.

What is the weather doing where you are?