First Snow Experience in Connecticut

We got a surprise the next morning with the arrival of the white flurry snow. Excited like a little kid, the 3 of us grab our cameras trying to capture this very precious moment.

The grounds wasn’t covered in a thick blanket of snow, but nevertheless, we were giggling like small children!

We were decked out in our snow gear (for our first time!) and we were so amazed by those tiny white specks of ice flying down from the skies; since it was our very first time encountering snow.

The roofs of the nearby houses started to look like they were dusted with icing sugar.

Although it wasn’t the huge knee-deep snow we had hope to see, but I was grateful that the Heavens above decided to shower us with this special gift because it was already Spring and spotting snow was hugely depended on lady luck!

We spent our first morning at our cousin’s house; two streets away from Aunt Nancy’s place. She made us apple pie for breakfast, which was OH-SO-DELICIOUS!

Spending time with family is extremely precious to me, Sarina and Angeline. At cousin Melanie’s place, it was extremely special.

It was just like experiencing how television shows portraying American family would spend time together.

The sights and sounds, and with a live experience, it smells exactly the same. (Okie, I’m slightly exaggerating here, but I know you get the picture!)

The sun shines in from that bright window in the kitchen, the oven is baking something amazing that the smell permeates the entire house, slight snowing outside with the grassy patch outside dusted with fine snow. It really does feel very good!

And then, it got even better.

I could never forget that morning when we were going on our one-week trip to New York and Aunt Nancy went out early in the morning.

Then the phone rang, and as usual, we don’t pick up the phone.

The phone went into voice message and like a scene out of an American movie, you can hear that usual:
“Hi, I’m not home right now, do leave me a message after the beep.”

Then my heart scream when I heard my aunt leaving a voice message:
“Girls, WAKE UP! It’s snowing outside!”

Immediately, the three of us jumped out from our beds and pull open the curtains to see outside and were greeted by this scene of white.

I remembered it was 5:30ish in the morning and our ride would pick us up at 7a.m. That means we have some time to play in the snow before we are set to leave.

Remembered that picture on the luggage trolley I had photographed earlier at Changi Airport?

Well, we quickly set out to do our mission.

Do we all look the same with the photo on the trolley? You bet we all felt the same electric excitement that came from just this pose!

Trying to eat snow…

Yes, we’ve done tasting the frozen rainwater! CHECK.

The snowfall was much harder compared to the day before.
One more thing we realised:- We actually could get all wet and soaked from the cold melting snow!

“Surprise~”

We totally forgot that snow = frozen rain and body temperature melts snow to water!

I was grateful my NatGeo GoreTex jacket was waterproof. Just not my head though. I was lucky that I didn’t catch a cold from the weather.

We were actually jumping up and down in the snow, 6a.m. in the morning, smashing snowballs at each other.

We did what we remembered from shows and I even took the chance to write my name in the snow.. (You know? Write you name in the sand principle? Yeah, I did.)

The next surprise came when I spotted a huge piece of snow on my jacket sleeve and when I took a closer look at it, I shouted to Sarina and Angeline to take a picture of it.

Why?
Because it’s a snowflake!

With the shape intact, no less!

I always assumed that the shape of the snowflake crystal was actually too microscopic to see with a human eye, but this proves everything wrong. The snow actually melts and the structure breaks up. So the bigger pieces are the ones with the complete structure.

We were in awe!

The last thing we decided to do was to build a snowman.
Aunt Nancy had given us a carrot for his nose and a knitted cap for his head.

But the funny thing was that, why was our snowman so small??

And no matter how we tried to pile it, we could never do what we saw on TVs.

It was a few days later that I posted this above photo on Facebook and a friend replied:
“Add hot water”.

Then it suddenly made sense to us. The sandcastle building technique!!
Water compact the sand tightly together. But for snow, it melts and changes the snow to ice!

Ya, thanks?!?! The snow was over!!

However, that made us more determined to try coming back to the States in the future during winter.

I want a huge snowman!

Last but not least, a group photo!
You can see our minuscule snowman at the front.