For a long time, I have held tight to the notion that winter lasts for 5 months in Indiana - November through March - and have often argued this point with others. When I say the word winter - I don't necessarily mean snow blowing solid for five months. But I do mean wearing gloves, scarf and a winter coat for five months. That means cold mornings and cold nights. That means an extra blanket on the bed and the heater on in the Little Deuce Coop. In fact, our aptly (or ironically) named Windy Acres enjoys a strong and measurable wind chill most days. Think if we had named our place something more like Windless Haven - weather would be different? Hmmm...
When we moved back to Indiana, I really had no idea how flipping cold this state was! When we would visit family, it tended to be in the warmer months or when we were moving between states. We moved from Connecticut and most would assume that Connecticut was colder. I beg to differ. The mountains (ok...hills by Colorado's standards) tended to break up the weather systems. Nor Easters whose very name can send shudders down your spine, didn't really hit as far inward as where we lived. In just our 2nd winter in Indiana, we "enjoyed" wind chills of 50 degrees below zero! A coworker describes Indiana as both colder and hotter than Ireland, and I would say that goes for Connecticut as well.
Here we are in the middle of March with more snow showers on the way. Maybe we haven't had feet of snow like other states, but we have had our share of snow - accumulating, blowing, wet, dry and constant snow. We've seen a blizzard and an ice storm that kept everyone home. Every once in a while, Mother Nature has teased us with a day above 40 or even 50 degrees - only to see the mercury plummet right back down. In late February, we took a short vacation to the Grand Cayman. Upon our return, it proceeded to snow every single day the next week. Every single day! Not necessarily accumulating snow - but does that really matter? When you're cold - you're cold - snow or no snow.As you know the chickens have been on some sort of egg production protest for quite some time and the longer this winter hangs on, the longer the protest. This past week, when the temps dared to reach above the freezing mark, the girls actually left us two eggs a day for four days in a row! Irish luck in time for St. Patty's Day. Egg count all winter has never been better than 1 egg per day between 9 chickens. When the days were the coldest, it might be only 1 egg every 4 days. So maybe this is a sign that spring is on the way. I did see some robins be-boppin' around. According to the calendar, Spring starts on Wednesday, March 20th. My money is on early April, no matter what some fuzzy groundhog may have seen on February 2nd. He doesn't live in Indiana.
