Snow in Austin, Texas!
Fat, fluffy snowflakes have quieted the garden and outlined the trees.
After our super hot summer, lengthy drought, and record cold temperatures over the past year, I don’t know why this surprises me. But it does.
According to Mark Lisheron at Statesman.com, it has snowed in Austin on just six days in the past decade.
Today, make it seven.
It’s really beautiful, especially on the cacti and succulents.
I’m not worried about the plants this time because everything tender has already been zapped by our earlier record cold, and it’s not that cold today, only 34 F (1.1 C).
Looking across the street, you can see it’s really coming down. I hope they’ll dismiss school early so my kids can enjoy this rare sight.
Update: We ended up receiving 1.3 inches of snow in northwest Austin, the most accumulation since the Valentine’s Day snow of 2004.
All material © 2006-2010 by Pam Penick for Digging. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.
Love those big, fluffy snowflakes. We got about 7 inches yesterday (finally)! How rare is snow in Austin? (Sorry if you’ve mentioned it before.)
Actually, I just mentioned it in this post: 6 days of snow in the past decade. It’s pretty rare to see snow here, so we tend to go nuts over it. —Pam
Pretty pics. Hope your kids get to enjoy the rare snow day.
Wow Pam snow in Austin Texas! I hope the kids get sent home early to be able to enjoy being out in the snow. You can have all our snow too if you want it! We’re due to get alot of snow tommorrow. That little dusting of snow is just like icing sugar on your gazing globe.
Pam, that looks like about what we got back in December. I’m waiting to see if the snow makes it as far as Katy this time. I think it may just miss us.
I will bet that the children are all huddled around the windows watching the snow descend. There won’t be much studying going on. 🙂 Your garden looks lovely with all those spikey plants with their veil of snow.
Oh…you got a lot more than we did. Mostly sleet, here in Wimberley.
We did get a few minutes of the big, fluffy flakes. It’s already melting.
You have REAL snow! Great for fun, probably not so much for traffic.
Snow, mist and ice pellets all at once here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gmg60D
Good day for hot chocolate, isn’t it?
Prairie Rose said it right, Pam – except for drivers on the icy overpasses and flyovers… this is decorative snow, designed for kids and photographers ;-]
Hope it lasts long enough for the young ones to make small snowpeople!
Annie at the Transplantable Rose
Wow, it looks beautiful. And I think it’s heading our way! For a while it seems like it used to snow once a year in Austin. But then it got warmer. 🙂
Oh my! Pam! That is crazy! Here we’ve been enjoying what feels like spring (5 almost 60 degree sunny days) and you get snow! Glad it isn’t a damaging event. Enjoy!
Merry Christmas! Uh, wait a minute. I find it hard to believe that many places in the south have more snow on the ground than I do, but it’s true. It’s got to be one of the weirdest winters on record.
It’s so pretty. If you’d like some more, I can send you some this weekend. We are 20 inches above our normal for the year and more predicted to be on its way. I’m so glad you are all getting to experience it.~~Dee
Snow! Isn’t it pretty? I’m glad you got to get out and enjoy it.
Seven times in ten years?? I’m moving there Pam!! That’s snow I can handle. 🙂
Looks like it did the one yr when we lived in Dallas.
I’ll bet the kids really loved it even more than the garden. Poor man’s fertilizer is what it is. I am sure it is gone by now, though.
It’s always fun when you know it won’t last — and it does look so lovely coming down. Fun to see your garden with a coating of white; it also helps to highlight hardscaping and give you a quick exercise in how your design is working, which it clearly is! We’ve been getting light snow everyday for the last five days. Luckily the roads keep melting pretty fast which makes it easier to deal with.
How sweet. I remember what real cold and a chance of snow did to folks while growing up in Florida. It still does that down there. Today I have another six inches of snow and counting. We just may get that foot of snow after all.
Snow is very pretty when there’s just a bit of it like this.
Random Blog stalker – I love your blog btw! I live in Austin and also got hit hard by the cold winter. We have about 20 bottle brush shrubs… do you know if they are be completely dead after this freeze (they look it) or if pruned back could come back? (like a bougainvillea?) Thanks!
Hi, Russ. The bottlebrush may be toast, but I’d give it a few more weeks of warm weather to be sure. In the meantime, you can scratch the bark here and there to see if there’s any green showing underneath the bark. If so, the branch is alive and should releaf. If not, the shrub may yet come back from the roots and would benefit from a hard pruning. If a few weeks go by with no sign of life, it may be time to lay it to rest. —Pam