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Monday, January 31, 2011

January Thaw

Ruth Ridnour - Age 17

A January thaw usually lasts around five days and occurs sometime after mid-January. The temperatures rise at least 10 degrees above average - sometimes higher - into the 50's or 60's. Family members may remember the gorgeous weather at Aunt Lois's funeral in January two years ago.

Quite often during a January thaw, all the accumulated snow melts. That didn't happen this year. We did have a couple nice days with temperatures in the 30's. There was some melting of snow, but the ground remained white.

I had always associated the January thaw with my Mom's birthday which was January 25. Until today, I thought that was just happenstance. But according to one website, the January thaw is a weather singularity which does occur on a regular basis around January 25.

I couldn't find a baby picture of Mom to illustrate this blog, so I'm using one of her holding Ron when he was a baby in 1940. The reason I wanted a baby picture was because of something I saw while watching the weather Saturday night - the record high temperature for January 29 was set in 1919 when it got to 62 degrees. Mom was four days old.
Mom's birthday was always easy to remember - one month after Christmas - and right around the time for a January thaw.

1 comment:

  1. I love January thaw, although like you I had no idea it had a date! Gorgeous photos.

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