winter in Seattle - and Bad Puns

Today's Science vocab:
Deposition - straight from gaseous to solid form.
And if it goes on all day - the crystals just keep growing!
The are the opposite of icicles, they grow up!
(and there is no melting involved)

For the most part winter in Seattle is a lower-case "w" affair.  Soggy, grey and 38˚F is tough on the vitamin D stores and makes me want to sleep 12 hours a day, but it is by no means anything like the capital "W" Winters I've lived through elsewhere.

And when the frosty crystals disappear
without melting:
Sublimation
(dry-ice is the BEST example)

All the same, sometimes the sky clears, the temperature drops to the 20's (OK, 26, but come ON!  We're trying to have winter just for a day like the big kids) and all that extra moisture hangin' out in our air does some cool things.

My herbs are ALWAYS hardened off.  Because I believe in tough love for plants?  Not so much.  More that I'm lazy, and always thinking of 2 or so things at once.  So I get:  

Winter Parsley
(the leaves are likely toast, but the roots are fine for the spring)
Update: they're fine today too!

Winter Sage
(not bothered at all)

Winter Rosemary
(OK this year - but as you can see by the plant tag -
have to replace occasionally.  Maybe I should mulch)

and Winter Thyme!
(Oh that was bad.  But the thyme survives incredibly
callous treatment and seems not to mind the cold)

This is the incredible thing.  My cilantro reseeded again -
and looked just like the other plants in the photos above yesterday.
I was sure it was going to be compost today.
Surprise!  This cilantro I've been accidentally breeding on my porch through repotting
and neglect is coming out QUITE hardy.
When it grows legs and demands to come in, I'm gonna have an issue.