We woke up this morning to a winter wonderland…rather, the kids woke up and then woke us up to a winter wonderland. I grew up in the the desert of southern Utah so I am not very experienced with snowy activities like snowballs and snowmen and snow angels and such, but I did my best since Brett was stuck on the computer working from home.
I bundled up the kids in long sleeved shirts, hats, scarves, gloves, double layered socks, and garden boots (again, I grew up in the desert). Lincoln has never had a real winter coat, because…well…I don’t know why, so I layered him with an third layer under his jacket and out we went. The first thing they did of course was try to be the first one to build and throw a snowball. Luca and Lincoln struggled a bit and begged me…me!…to show them how to build a snowball. As I was pretending to know what I was doing Lincoln got a face full of snow. Anna (the two year old) had figured it out. Lincoln started to cry until I reminded him that he owed her one and he grabbed a handful of snow and tossed it nicely back at her. It separated and fell apart before it got anywhere near her, but he was satisfied.
Our next conquest was a snowman. This is usually Brett’s job so I searched my memory for the two times I have watched Brett build a snowman for the kids and started rolling a snowball. There wasn’t a whole lot of snow and it was very fluffy and dry and didn’t hold together very well so I told the kids, “Let Mommy do this part! It is really hard to get it to stay together and we don’t have very much snow and if we all try to do it there won’t be enough for our snowman. Yep, just stand back and let Mom take care of this. It is really hard to push it around and it would make you really tired….”. As I finished up the base of the snowman I hear a little pipsqueak voice behind me, “Here’s one mom!” Anna again had figured it out and rolled out a piece to the snowman even bigger and better than mine all on her own. (blush)
We never did finish the snowman (which would have only been about two feet high anyways) because the neighbor boy across the street came out and my kids dashed across the street to pelt him with snowballs. I had to remind Lincoln that we don’t stand one foot in front of someone and throw the snowball at their face. Luckily, neighbor boy Aaron is a very kind and forgiving boy. Anna refused to leave her cotton gloves on and I don’t blame her since they were twice the size of her hands, so she kept sticking her fingers in her mouth to warm them up. I kept asking if she wanted to go in the house to warm up and she would just say, “I not cold Mom”. Uh okay, Your hands are the color of a magenta crayola crayon, but you’re not cold.
Then the kids decided to make snow angels. They must have learned this on tv, because they have never seen me lay down in the snow and flail my arms and legs around allowing snow to make its way up my pant legs and shirt sleeves. I have to admit they did look like angels as they giggled and smiled at me as they lay in the snow. By this time my feet were in a lot of pain. My heavy duty wool Timberland socks weren’t giving me enough insulation. They probably weren’t meant to be worn in rain boots though. (the 1998 version of these. Not warm…but cute!) I tried in vain to round up the kids to go in the house, but they weren’t done so I shivered for another fifteen minutes as they ran around chasing and throwing and yelling and laughing. I finally mumbled “hot chocolate” and they raced and tumbled back into the house.
Tonight we got several more inches of snow so I expect another morning spent in the snow tomorrow. Brrrrr!
Whims 