RUMFORD — Christmas arrived Wednesday for Beatrice Richards of Mexico in the form of the first major snowstorm of the season.

Richards, who works at the Rumford House of Pizza, said she loves snow, and was getting worried that she wouldn’t have a white Christmas.

“Now, it’s Christmas,” she said at 2:30 p.m. while sweeping half a foot snow off of her truck with a broom.

“I hate the cold wind, but I love the snow,” she said. “You’ve got to have a white Christmas. Christmas ain’t Christmas without it.”

Six inches of accumulated snow was the norm for several Western Maine towns by 2:30 p.m., National Weather Service meteorologist Dan St. Jean said in Gray.

St. Jean said snow was falling at a rate of 2 inches per hour early in the storm.

At 2:37 p.m., North Sebago had the most snow, with 9 inches. Auburn and Durham hit the 9-inch mark an hour later, according to the National Weather Service Web site.

St. Jean said he believes Western Maine will receive around 10 inches of snow, unless another heavy band of snow forms and spreads over the region before temperatures rise.

Snow is expected to continue into Thursday in the mountains.

The low combined with northwest winds is “just going to keep producing that up-slope, kind of light stuff that just keeps going and going, so (the western mountains) could pick up another 3 to 8 inches of snow depending on how long this thing keeps going during the day tomorrow,” St. Jean said.

At Sunday River Ski Resort in Newry, which has been open since Oct. 14, the storm and low temperatures for snow-making will allow them to open 35 trails on five peaks by the weekend, spokeswoman Darcy Liberty said.

“It’s literally like one giant snow globe here,” she said at mid-afternoon, after more than 6 inches had fallen.

Colder air isn’t expected to move in until Thursday, with lows in the single digits forecast for the weekend, St. Jean said.

 “There will be single-digit lows for the weekend, but not highs,” he said. “We’re not into the icebox yet.”

Traffic in the River Valley area was minimal, with only a few cars sliding off the road early on in the storm.

“There’s not a whole lot of traffic out there today,” Rumford police Detective Sgt. James Bernard said.

That was good news for 59 plow truck operators, who were eager to get on the roughly 1,400 lane miles in the region, Norman Haggan, Maine Department of Transportation regional manager in Dixfield, said Wednesday afternoon.

Haggan said the snow started falling at 9 a.m.

The Dixfield public works crew began plowing and sanding the town’s 40 miles of roads during the mid-morning, said Dixfield Town Manager Eugene Skibitsky as he was arriving home in mid-afternoon.

Skibitsky said that the town office and Ludden Memorial Library closed at 1 p.m. as precautionary safety measures for employees. He brought work home with him.

In addition to the town office and library, schools were closed throughout the River Valley and Bethel area, and many banks and other businesses shut their doors as well.

In neighboring Mexico, Town Manager John Madigan said the pubic works crew set to work early and will be on the 29 miles of town roads for the duration. The town is also responsible for plowing parts of Route 2 and Route 17 for the state.

“So far, it’s been a pretty nice little storm, but it is going to get nastier tonight,” Haggan, of the Maine DOT, said of a predicted changeover to sleet and freezing rain. But, “We’re prepared for it.”

With his face partially obscured by falling snow from the first major snowstorm of the season, Andy Korhonen of Rumford grits his teeth and heads into the wind while shoveling snow on Wednesday afternoon in front of the Rumford Post Office. Behind him, an American Red Cross blood drive was going on at the American Legion despite the storm that caused many River Valley area town offices — including Rumford — to close early.

Andy Korhonen of Rumford clears snow on Wednesday afternoon in front of the Rumford Post Office on Congress Street during Maine’s first major snowstorm of the season.

During Wednesday’s snowstorm, Beatrice Richards of Mexico uses a push broom to remove snow from her pickup truck on Congress Street in Rumford after working the morning shift at the Rumford House of Pizza.