We are just SW of Portland and had about another inch of snow this morning, so nothing to delay schools or anything.

However, I-5 from Albany to Cottage Grove was hit hard by the black ice. They ended up closing it down for a while this morning after so many cars went off the road.

FYI mom my first trip to Greece I was in my 20's, my first trip to Ireland in my 30's.. (looks behind me and laughs at her . ) For anyone that hasn't been to Bainbridge island. You should make a trip sometime.Personally,I'd wait until June or July.

Also, "Chatham" and I moved from a resort town with a lot of great places to eat. And menu's to satisfy any taste. Here, we have a few o.k places to eat. But no place that we can go and have a good home cooked style meal. And often for what you get you at some places it's just not worth it.

There are two great pizza places both within walking distance of where we live.

There is a mexican place downtown. I don't care for the food myself. But it's packed every time I go by there.

There is a Subway, I eat there a lot.

Cafe Nola: It's nice but not a place to dine out "every night" ..

Doc's Marina grill: A bar that happens to serve food.

Big star diner: I like the burgers but it's a greasy spoon ..

Pegasus coffee house: Great food here for lunch. ..

Pizza factory :Great pizza

That's a some pizza. Great pizza.

West side pizza. Great pizza

Teriyaki Town:This is the place to load up and forget dinner. .or skip lunch and have a big dinner .

The harbour public house :It's a bar with an English pub theme over 21 only . .

There are several other places to eat here too. Oh and last but not least

Metro market cafe: For lunch right here in our condo.

We've been here 16 years and I think this is the toughest winter yet, but still, when I think about where I grew up--in Cleveland--it's really quite mild. It's just that we're not used to snow and it's hilly and such.

We had 2 Douglas Furrs fall on our house during the Inaguaral Day Storm--put holes in the dining room roof, completely destroyed the solarium, etc. and it took 7 months to get the house back together. However, we now have skylites in the dining room and an even nicer solarium...so when you get lemons, make lemonade, (or limoncello), right? I heard someone talking about the last storm (don't know what they're calling it--I suggested "The Chanuka Storm" 'cause it interupted my Chanuka dinner plans) and they said that it was the "perfect storm" because of the heavy rain beforehand and high winds that if your trees stayed up during this one, you could pretty much figure that they're going to stay up. Now, I'm not so sure about how accurate this is, but I'm hoping she's right. Still, I love living in the woods and guess I'm willing to take my chances (we did sleep downstairs that night though, which wasn't great with one of our German shepherds growling and barking at the wind all night.)

And yes, I think "sun breaks" are imperative. I just got back from S.F. a few weeks ago and am coping with this with planning our trip to Spain in April, but IMO, it has been the toughest winter I recall here. And I love it despite that.

Quite a bit of snow in Grants Pass yesterday and lots of accidents mostly caused by people who had NO clue how to drive.I actually had a snow day with snowman building and the whole bit. I havent had an actual snow day in about 20 years so I feel like a kid today! How did everyone else fair???

Yesterday, Tuesday, my daughter called from Seattle to complain about the weather. She moved to Seattle from New Jersey to go to Grad school at UDub and seriously thought that the winters would be milder, especially milder then NJ. The first words out of her mouth were, OMG it friggin' snowed here last night. LOL Here in New Jersey we've been having one of the mildest winters that I can remember. She is amusingly outraged. But she does love Seattle and says she'll just hunker down and get through it.

I hate to say this, but I am so glad you guys in the NW are getting it and not us here in NJ.

Jersey, I'm sure your daughter knows this isn't normal for Seattle. Perhaps this winter will be remembered as "A taste of the worst."

My niece's car was totaled on Monday on a minor arterial that hadn't been salted or sanded....There just isn't enough equipment here to make the roads safe in these conditions. Her car spun out on the ice as she was going down a slight hill, and came to rest sideways on the road. She breathed a sigh of relief until she saw the minivan barreling down on her....Thank goodness she was okay, other than the expected aches and bruises.

Schools are back open today. So far, the kids have missed 7 days this winter. Given that the school year is supposed to run until June 20, we're all wondering if they are going to take away one of the two one-week breaks coming up, or run late in June and possibly into July, if we get more weird weather.

I, like artlover, am thinking about vacations to sunny spots, cruising the internet....Only problem is, it's hard to beat the northwest summers and it looks like we're not going to be going anywhere until then.

This snow storm sounds like real winter weather, but I think the ice storm of early 1998 might have been tougher to deal with. We had been up in Seattle for the day; I knew the storm was coming so stocked up at a Seattle supermarket before hitting the road...by the time we got to Kelso/Longview it was snowing steadily, and the time we got to the northern edge of Vancouver (WA), it was snowing HARD. We were back home for literally less than one minute before the ice started. A friend managed to drop by shortly afterwards and ended up staying for three days.

SW of Portland we had just over 6 inches of snow yesterday. Most places had around 3 or 4. We sit very high up though. All schools were closed yesterday, all the way down to Albany, and last night the announcement was made that ours (along with quite a few large districts) was closed for today as well.

The kids were in heaven yesterday!!! Sledding down a big hill, which is only about 4 houses from ours, so nice and close. Besides the family from Colorado, we were the only ones with a snow shovel too

BTilke--I was in McMinnville on Sunday and was surprised at how much snow they still had on the ground from last weeks episode. Our grass was still covered, but they still had several inches. Today that area is supposed to be absolutely horrid for black ice.

mms--thanks for the update...I'll have to email my inlaws and see how they're doing. Hope they were well stocked up and didn't have to drive for any reason.

How about this NorthWest snow? !!
I can say that we have enjoyed this very much!
It has been a pleasure to be able to watch the snow from our apt in the Pearl, to be able to walk to Whole Foods with no problem and to slip and slide to the N Park Blocks to let Pup off his leash, he can outrun a car in the snow lol .. We took lots of photos to remember this.
I hope your family is ok BTilke, they probably stocked up knowing it was coming.
Andrew posted great photos of the city in the snow, btw.

Scarlett, I'm not a big fan of it either. Let my car at the top of our hill and am going to hike up so that I can play tennis! I just hope we don't get any more, but there's really no way to predict it. And yes, we should keep things in perspective and be grateful that this is indeed rare.

I'm loving it! Glad it wasn't my car, but it's hard not to laugh at the bumper car videos being shown on KGW. Thought at first those might have been filmed from close to your place, Scarlett.

LOL, yeah, that video was pretty funny! Only because it was NOT me though. Wonder if that person will show it to their insurance company?

Just got a call from DD and asked her how she managed to drive up the hill and I got STUCK! She said, "Oh Mom, you just have to get the momentum going and not let up!" Then she added, "Of course it probably helps that my car is already all dented and I don't care if I get any more dents on it and you don't have any dents on your car yet."

Yes, that probably "helps"

I lived in the Puget Sound area for one year back in the 80's and couldn't deal with it. Went back to the east side of the state (not exactly the banana belt there either).

My daughter is now living on the west side and loves it; to each his own, I guess.

I've only been here since December '98, but that '98-'99 winter was awfully rainy and gloomy. My manager at work stopped by once a week to apologize for how awful the never-ending overcast skies were that year. Being a neophyte and having heard all the horror stories, I thought that's exactly how it was supposed to be. Now that I've seen a few more winters here, that first one was pretty tough by comparison.

Of course, if you're thinking of moving to the Pacific Northwest, I'll tell you that it rains all the time, everyone's depressed about it, and you should stay wherever you are.

You're a quick study, Don. ;-)

My standard advice to anyone contemplating a move to this area is to try to arrange an extended winter visit before making a final decision. A couple of weeks in January or February can be very instructive to prospective residents.

My experience is that anyone who can handle average Seattle February weather for a week or two is candidate Seattle-ite.

Oh, come on, you're not alone. The weather is weird all over this year. Jersey can attest to that. It hasn't rained in Palm Springs once this winter and don't you know the Californians will be borrowing water from anywhere that has an extra drop come summer. If you want to complain about weather, live in Chicago for 22 years like we did. At least there is plenty to do in Seattle. You don't have to get cabin fever. Do you remember the movie trailer for Rob Reiner's "SpinalTap"? "...Another suicide filled Scandanavian night". It was a joke - I think - but Seattle isn't that bad.
Hi, Suze. We've planned our trip to Seattle in May to go apartment hunting. ...somewhere within walking distance of "the Market". See, I got it right that time. I'm still trying to figure out how we ended up in Palm Springs! Booring. The weather is the same all the time. What we wouldn't give for a good rain storm.