Winter Solstice, come and gone - My first Alaskan winter

Typical "daylight" in Girdwood in December... makes for dramatic sunsets, but rarely get to actually see the sun!

The shortest day of the year - Winter Solstice - was only three weeks ago. On that day, we had about 5 hours, 28 minutes of daylight. Being nestled in this valley though, means that the duration in which the sun actually breaches the mountaintops and hits the ground is much much less. So while it may be daylight outside, glimpsing that bright orange globe in the sky has been a fleeting treat, mostly dependent on whether I leave the valley - usually on my drive to or from Anchorage once a week. Today, on a perfectly clear and bitterly cold day with 6 hours, 1 minute of daylight, the mountains surrounding Girdwood were glowing with light; days like this are few, especially given the barrage of snowstorms and blizzards we have been getting all winter! I followed the light, just for the sake of seeing the sun... and sat in the parking lot of the gas station for about 10 minutes, simply so I could feel it hit my face! Oh it felt so good!

Portage Lake...on a rare, cloudless winter day

It's not that I tried to be a lazy ass and just sit in the parking lot though. I did try to walk Logan. But, there are two problems. One, is that the poor boy is limping again. I have to take him to the vet, his front leg has been bothering him and it hasn't improved at all in a week. But his mood perks up when we go for walks, so I don't want to keep him cooped up in the apartment all day. However, it was so cold, his paws couldn't handle it! His cold threshold on his paws was about 14 degrees earlier this winter, but today was -4 degrees, and he's just not adapted to that temperature yet. It's interesting that this prolonged cold has made the hair on his paws grow thicker than it's ever been, and it's the first time in his life that he hasn't shed continuously all winter. For the most part, his hair is staying on his body! Which mean my apartment is marginally cleaner than normal. ;)

We add 3-5 minutes of daylight per day. At this rate, on March 17, I will have as much daylight as my family back in Detroit - 12 hours of daylight. From then, Alaska will continue to have longer days than Michigan until we get near 24 hrs of daylight in the summer! I can't wait to go into a manic state of sunlight overexposure ha ha. :)

Normally it isn't this cold... we have had a few cold snaps with temps in the negatives, but for the most part winter is fairly "normal" compared to our Michigan winters when I was kid. Granted, it seems like Michigan doesn't really stay in freezing temps anymore, but 20-30s is what we get here and what I remember as a kid. But the sheer amount of snow we have received is definitely far beyond anything I have ever experienced! We got snow on 29 of 31 days in December, and according to the Alyeska Resort website, 393" of snow since October 1, 2011! That's incredible!

We have another blizzard warning tonight, by the way.

Beautiful sunset on the drive down to Seward last week. Yes, I actually saw the sun!

I'm trying not to make every journal entry the length of a novel chapter! Not everybody likes to read as much as I do....but EVERYBODY loves pretty pictures ha ha!