Living in Ottawa one becomes winter-hardy and winter-wary but still we were taken by surprise when mid-November suddenly lurched into mid-winter temperature-territory and brought us one large snowstorm after another. People panicked. No one had yet got around to changing their vehicles into ice tires, an absolute necessity here. For awhile the street we live on was a morass of snow and ice, even after being plowed by the municipal workers. Another story once you got onto a main street.

My husband's first instinct, like everyone else, was to call the garage to see if his tires could be changed. He no longer does that tedious and strenuous seasonal job himself with either the car or the truck, but he did up until two years ago when he was only 80 years old. If he drove over with his vehicle/s and left them in the parking lot they could 'guarantee' the switch would be done sometime in the week. So he waited. And yesterday after the big rush was over drove the car to Canadian Tire prepared as usual to walk back home.

In our close community we have all kinds of amenities within walking distance. It takes about a half-hour to walk to some commercial destinations, more like three-quarters of an hour to an hour to access further ones. Someone he's known for years in the auto parts section asked if he'd like a drive home because he was preparing to drive another customer home, so that was lucky. To retrieve the car he walked down in the afternoon after our ravine walk. And he's repeated that performance today with his truck.

As for me, I was busy baking. Decided on a cheesecake. And thought I'd do a sweet-bread dough for dinner rolls. Made enough of it to bake croissants on Sunday to accompany a good hearty vegetable-bean soup for that day's evening meal. By the time I was finished my husband returned.

Yesterday he had more than his share of walking. We took Jackie and Jillie out for an earlier ravine walk in the afternoon. That's the thing, though. We don't enjoy walking them or us on streets. The pavement isn't kind to our feet and the noise and bustle is the precise opposite of what we anticipate when we set out for a walk on quiet forest trails among a proliferation of various types of trees where our puppies are able to amble about unleashed (unless they misbehave -- Jillie...you hear me? and then they're (she's) leashed). They can cut and run and we can watch them easily to keep track of where they are, their black forms nicely visible against the snow on the forest floor into which the bracken had previously vanished.

Although it was mild yesterday at 2C, there was a sharp wind and the amount of moisture in the air made it seem much colder. Still, nothing can dampen the pleasure of walking freely along a forest trail; not for us, not for our little dogs. And it's beautiful in that atmosphere when snow flurries create their magic. Two weeks ago the creek had started to freeze over thanks to the -17C temperature at night rising to -10 during the day. It's now fully open, streaming down to the Ottawa River. We can anticipate another week, perhaps two of this mild weather and then the cold will once again enter the scene. Unless nature has other ideas in her inexhaustible bag of tricks...