Cold, cold, cold

Our high temperature today was -13 F.  Wind chills as cold as -47 F today.   The overnight low is predicted to be -30 F.  It is -18 F right now.  It is cold.   The temperature in my house was 39 degrees when I got up. The windows inside were frosted over. I've gotten the house warmed up to the mid 60s finally.  Burning a lot of firewood. 

I spent an hour and a half outside and shoveled walking paths through the snow.  I'm not sure how much snow we got as the wind blew it around.  There are snow drifts, and there are areas without snow.   I walked to the river.  The river is almost all frozen over.  The pasture has lots and lots of smallish pine cones that blew off the tree.   Only one tree blew over in the north pasture.  I didn't see any downed trees in the middle pasture.  I didn't walk to the south pasture as it was so cold my face was freezing up due to the wind.

The cattle are hanging in there.  They are eating from the large hay bale.   The wind is much less today.  By 1 pm the wind slowed down from the 20s mph to the teens, and dropped the wind chills to the upper 30s from the mid 40s below.  At least we had sun today which made it feel warmer than -13 F.  Some cattle stood out in the corral and not just in the loafing shed when not eating hay. 

Otherwise my day has been burning wood to heat the house and sleeping by the woodstove. Wake up, put some more logs in the stove, then fall back asleep.   Rascal even came to lay next to me a few times when I was near the woodstove.  Usually he will walk through the area but not stay.  I guess his long fur keeps him warm unlike my previous cat who liked to be near the woodstove.

I can't wait until next week when the temperature gets above zero again.

The inside of my windows at noon today.