So, you’re going to have a Polar Vortex?

In my part of Minnesota, as I write this post, it is currently -20, with windchill, it is -41. What the what? But we live up here, and not in California, so we learn to cope, and even made it to a friends wedding this weekend! (Yes it was obviously indoors!)

Here’s a “Top 10 List” of How to survive

1.) Start your car at least 3 hours before you plan to go anywhere!

Ok, that is a “little” bit exaggerated, but I cope by starting my car around 20 minutes before I am going anywhere. That makes climbing in your car bearable. Environment be damned, I’m starting my car and letting it warm up to 65-70.

2.) Dress in layers

No, not because you may actually get warmer. You need layers to actually stay warm. I suggest multiple infinity scarfs and wrist warmers as well! Bless my dear friend for making these for me and sending them to me in time!

3.) Meal plan ahead

The last thing you want to do with dangerously low temps and wind chills is to go grocery shopping and spending the 5-10 minutes or whatever out in the cold loading and unloading your car. So glad my husband shot a deer, and we butcher our own chickens as we have food for months! Plus if you plan ahead for meals that can be baked in the oven you have an instant additional heat source! (Just don’t forget to turn it off before you go to bed!)

4.) Light a fire

Does this even need an explanation? Despite our thermostat being set for 71 degrees, without our fire going the boiler can’t keep it above 65, with the fire 69!  Plus isn’t this just what people do in the winter? If you’ve got one, use it! (p.s. doesn’t it look like eyes in the fire? Weird right?)

update: I miss my fireplace!

5.) Keep the kidletts inside

Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton closed down all schools in the state of Minnesota to keep them safe and hopefully warm. So add another day to the already 16 days the’ve been out of school. I know my daughter is excited.

6.) Keep a car kit

An extra backpack/box whatever of gloves, hat, scarf, blanket, emergency blanket, jumper cables, flares, here’s a list I found online. Point is… you should have one too!

7.) Keep the pets safe

This isn’t the time to accidentally leave fido out in the backyard! Their skin can freeze in as little as five minutes too! My Sadie baby is always cold, so I can’t imagine leaving her outside in these temps.

8.) Grab a good book, a hot tub, and a glass of wine for good measure

When you just can’t stay warm, grab a good book, perhaps about the tropics, fill the tub up with steaming hot water, and maybe throw in a glass of wine for good measure. At least if its going to be this cold I’m going to be happy! (I don’t recommend going to an “outdoor hot tub” on days like this, but then again I don’t have one… so….)

9.) Complain wildly on social media sites! 

If you have any friends from the south where “cold” is 45 degrees F then post pictures of your temps reaching down in the minus digits and you’ll instantly get lots of people sympathizing for you. Some of my friends can’t even believe I’m going to work in these temps, but I refer to point #1…..Unless of course your friends live in Alaska. Then they’ll just tell you to “suck it up”….

10.) Say a prayer

If you have a home, warm clothes, and a car! Heck, even if you just have shelter, say a prayer. On days like today my heart breaks for all of the homeless people out there. All of the folks on the news have been telling us with temps like these, you can get frostbite in as little as five minutes. I thank God for providing my husband and I with skills to have jobs that support our house, heat, warm clothes and car. I secondly pray for all of the men, women and children out there who don’t have the right necessities and who are literally freezing to death not that far away from me.

And that’s it! I’m sure there are tons more tips, but you can google that! If I don’t post for a week you can assume I did not survive the polar vortex!

As one friend on Facebook pointed out…”Today is the day you get to prove how Minnesotan you are!”