It's official

Yes, the KNMI (the Dutch equivilent of the B of M) have declared xmas 2009 officially "white" !! As far as I can work out, this means that at de Bilt (a small city in the middle of the country near Utrecht, and the home of the KNMI) on both xmas day and boxing day there must be a sufficient layer of snow - and this year there was ! 9cm on xmas day and a whopping 4cm on boxing day :-) According to the records the last offical white xmas was back in 1981.

Here at home in Nijmegen it was actually snowing on xmas day (only in the morning), but by yesterday most of the snow had turned to ice; and meant our street, where the salt truck has not made a visit, is now one big skating rink! Over the past few days both Jeroen and I have fallen with our bikes due to the slippery ice-covered roads and I now have perfect purple bruises on both knee caps to show for it. The photo you see here was taken from our living room window a few days ago, and you can see just how much snow we had. Not sure if my poor little Japanese black pine bonsai (outside on the balcony) will survive !

The temperatures during the day are now up to a relatively balmy 5-6C, and overnight are not below zero so the rest of the ice/snow will probably all be gone again by tomorrow, and we will just be left with huge puddles of water everywhere. There is a forecast of colder weather and more snow to come later in the week - just in time to drive to Keulen (Cologne) for new year's eve!

Alli xxx