A Day Trip. An ALL day trip.

This has been a snowy year so far.  We've had two snow days of our own this year, and we almost never have snow days.  Like ever.  Like we've had one or two in the past 10 years of Ryan working in the Sunnyside district.

Yesterday we thought looked like our best chance to make it across the Cascades to go visit my mom and grandma according to the weather report.  (If this was a good day, heaven help the rest of the week.)  We left around 6:30 am, loaded some sleepy and pajama clad kids and got started on our day.  It was snowy, but doable.

We had a nice (short) day with my mom and grandma.  We exchanged some presents, ate some yummy food, and took some pictures.  Ryan played photographer for this bunch of females.

About 2:30 we figured we needed to head out again so we could make it home.  The weather looked like it was going to get ugly.  And it did.  They closed the freeway and we parked there for 3 hours.  We listened to our audiobook until we were desperate to stretch our legs.

 You can see our van in the background.  Miles and miles of cars, all just waiting for avalanche control to let us through.  We went for a little walk along the freeway, and then threw snowballs at the exit sign.

 Once they finally let traffic go through again, we had to chain up at the pass.  Poor Ryan.  At least he came prepared.

Once we made it through Snoqualmie Pass, we figured we would probably be fine.  It might be slow going, but we were going to make it.  Well, at Ellensburg, they closed I-82 going to Yakima.  We got to take the Canyon Road, the extra long, really snowy, and very windy long way.  At this point, we were like, "What can they throw at us next?"  We considered driving to Ryan's parents and spending the night there, but felt ok about pressing on home.

We did make it.  We made it home around 11:45 pm.  It took us over 9 hours, which is well over the usual 3 hours it takes us on that trip.