We Survived Our First Winter

On 1st September, 3 days from today, winter will be officially over. We have basically survived our first winter. All in all, winter was not as bad as we anticipated. Of course, there were reports of bad weather - floods, landslips, power cuts and of course the cold icy weather. Beside the cold icy weather (-2 degrees at night), we in Palmerston North did not suffer as bad as other parts of NZ where there was a power cut in the South Island for 2 weeks, landslides in Wellington where several houses have to be destroyed, floods in Wanganui, Auckland and Wellington and heavy snowfall in mid Canterbury and Central North Island (Desert Road) making driving very dangerous. On the plus side, we still manage to play outdoor on days it was not raining, do less gardening and weeding as the plants have gone hibernating too and also enjoy the cool fresh air coming from Antartica.