Ravelin

Sorry, just jinxed winter as I've ordered new tyres to be fitted on Thursday, so it's almost certain it'll not snow now. Had to take a run into ARI in Aberdeen for a routine appointment this morning. On the way in the car was showing 1C around 10:30 , backed up by the slightly sleety rain rattling off the windscreen. Strangely it was dry from around Westhill on, and stayed so until after Dyce on the way back as I detoured via shops in Inverurie. Pelting it down in Inverurie between approx 1pm and 2pm, but sky cleared from the SW as I got back to Alford, so subsequent dog walk was thankfully dry, but chilly. Max of 3.5C around 3pm, dropped to around 0C now so likely icy in the morning. Edit: Just in time for most schools starting thier prelims @lorenzo, wonderful timing to cause maximum chaos, if it happens.

It's a chart of the temperate of the air higher up above Scotland according to forecasts from the GFS model. What it shows is that after around the 14th Jan the upper air temp drops markedly for at least a week, cold enough for snow. It's still only a forecast, but despite half of the posters on the MOD thread having the wobbles this morning it's still looking likely that we'll be going markedly colder after next weekend. Edit: As illustrated by the end of the latest ECM run...

Been keeping an eye on this too and I think it's about time I finally pull the trigger and get a new set of all seasons on the car. The current ones are sitting around 3mm front, 4mm back, so easily legal for a while yet, but likely not as effective in deep snow as they will have been the last 2 winters. Pretty benign day here today, temp between 3.8 and 5.2C, dry, reasonably bright at times, not too windy.

Drove back from my folks in the central belt early afternoon. It was miserable pretty much all of the way, but the stretch from just north of Dundee all the way back to Alford was horrible. Not quite flooded, except for a few big puddles, but loads of surface water, misty and rain of various intensities. Looking at the fields either side of the A90 and A947 we really, really need a decent period of dry weather, and/or anything falling from above to at least be of the frozen variety. It'll be interesting if the forecasts come to fruition, if so there are going to be a lot of natural ice rinks around.

I've pretty much stopping watching the TV news as its just so depressing and infuriating. The inaction from one country in particular in relation to Gaza, who by just condemning BOTH sides could probably reduce the number of innocent deaths massively, is galling. I also work with a couple of Ukrainian refugee kids at school, who are lovely, but who knows what and who they have left behind in the search for safety. Anyway, weather, yes I'm sure we could all do with some dry weather. It's been so wet overall in recent weeks that now even moderate rainfall is causing flooding problems, as there is zero capacity left for the ground to cope. In the absence of snow I'll take cool/cold and sunny please. Models seem to be showing high pressure situated over or around the UK next week, but a lot of variation on where exactly it is positioned. Finally, Happy New Year to everyone. Hope you all have a great year. This will be the year we get the last of the three kids out of school. There might be other big changes coming along too, but more on that later if it happens.

Straight to cold rain here, 2.5C and rattling off the windows. On to the next search, second week of Jan perhaps for something decent maybe? Just in time for the schools going back, and prelims starting soon after for many.

Not started to snow/rain here so far today,but got out with the dog in advance just in case. Don't mind walking in snow, but rain or sleet, no thanks. Picture is from the 'middle' route of my normal dog walks up the hill from the house, 350m asl or thereabouts. Still plenty of crunchy, refrozen snow along the track, icy in places. It was quite dull and misty.

0.7C here, calm and very grey. Just been outside and I can't tell if it's snowing very lightly, raining very lightly, or just a touch of mist in the air. Last night's dusting still lying, but will it be added to before it gets washed away? Forecasts suggest straight to rain as warming up before front gets here.

A rather unremarkable couple of days here Thu and Fri, hence no comments from me. There was still quite a bit of snow at the top of the hill on Thu when I walked the dog, but icy where it'd been compacted and soggy where it hadn't been. Avoided going anywhere near it today, opting to walk along a just slightly icy quiet road instead. Got a surprise 10mins ago when I threw the dog out for the last time before bed, there's a slight covering of snow lying that wasn't there ealier. Must have caught an isolated shower as nothing was forecast. Temperature has been sat around 2C most of the day I suppose, currently 0.7C Wife got to her parents safely on Thu but said the drive was far too wet and windy to be enjoyable. We're meeting up again at my folks in the central belt on Hogmanay, guess what day we were planning on coming back north again from the latest GFS forecast....

It's been 'stuck' on that picture from early afternoon yesterday, currently still timestamped 27th 13:22 on website. I'm sure the ones from the ski centre are outdated too, as are most for Glenshee. Likely connectivity or power issues. We'll yesterday's snow turned back to rainin the afternoon and there's little evidence left of it around the house this morning. Wife left earlier for the trip to NW England. Glad she postponed it, and well done to those who managed to make journeys yesterday through that weather. Still stunned that it wasn't an Amber warning for at least some of the country.

I take that back, beginning to stick to the grass and driveway now. Out of interest MetO forecast for now says 2C and rain, XC Weather says 0C and snow, Yr.No 1C and a sleety mix. Weather station up the road says 0.5C and window says snow.

Can't see out of any of the front windows now. Proper snow now but struggling to settle. So what do you do when your off work and weather is like this... pot of turkey broth is on the go, along with fresh bread.

Longe window currently... VID_20231227_102703348.mp4 Totally obscured half way up now.

Temperature creeping down, now 1.2C, with wind strength going up. Now wet snow battering off the front windows of the house. If only it'd been a degree or two colder then this would have been a truely awesome blizzard.

Way too dark to tell for certain but it sounds very rainlike rattling off the bedroom window in the strong wind. Local weather station said 2.4C around 6:30am but has dropped off to 1.6C currently. Doubt I'll be going anywhere today, the dog will have to content herself indoors. We'll see tomorrow if its stayed snow further up the hill.

Similar here, blue skies today with a covering of snow at the house. A lot more snow just a bit higher up the hill where we walked the dog early afternoon, but a keen wind at times. Unfortunately didn't take any photos. Currently -1.7C outside and who knows quite what tomorrow will bring. Wife was going to head to her folks in NW England tomorrow for a few days but has delayed the drive until Thursday. Wood beside the stove has been restocked ready for us just to hunker down and stay cosy for the day.

Earlier snow turned to rain for a bit, so I took the dog for a walk up the hill and just 100m or so higher it was proper snowing, with a decent cover. It has turned back to snow at the house too at some point late afternoon as there's a dusting here too now. Next question, will Wednesday's forecast heavy precipitation be rain or snow, probably rain by the looks of the 850s unfortunately.

Heavier now, wet looking though. VID_20231225_130301637.mp4

It was very light and brief, wouldn't have shown on a picture. Maybe later when it's supposed to be heavier, if it's snow, and if it isn't too dark.

Well that makes it an official white Xmas here, it's snowing lightly.

So impressive even aliens in flying saucers came to see it.

Very impressive display this evening.... Seen them before, but not anything like this impressive. Photos don't really do them justice either. Oh, very windy outside too.

Temperature rose rapidly from around 9pm yesterday evening to hit a high of 9.1C overnight, but has now dropped off a bit to 7.5C. Most of yesterday's snow has now gone as expected , but surprisingly some small remnants remain. Very little cloud around so far this morning, but pretty windy. I think some of us will manage a 'technical' white Xmas tomorrow , with some falling snow. Not likely to be much settles though. Edit: Nacreous clouds visible here too, but can't get decent photo due to position of the sun in relation to them. Edit 2: Managed it...

Temperature here is still only 0.5C, which means there's still a fair bit of snow lying despite it having turned to rain for most of the daylight hours. Real soggy mess though, would rather it just went, and last thing I'd want would be for it to freeze up.

@TillyS Sadly even the Lecht scenes are likely to turn browner again as that front pushes further East, such are the vagaries of the Scottish weather. Hopefully after Xmas the temp will stay cold enough that even if we don't get low level snow, the ski resorts can get, and keep, some. Can't remember the exact winter, but not that long ago we had one where it was frequent cold rain at low levels but the hills got plastered. At Glenshee they had to dig out some of the pomma lines, it was that deep. Only time I can remember being towed uphill through a virtually head height channel of dug out snow.