SNOW!!!!!

Early this week, rumors of white stuff came filtering over from the west side of Washington. On Wednesday it finally arrived in our part of the state: SNOW! Lots of snow! Hoorah! We had a great time out in the wintry weather. Snow + kids = picturama!

Ok, first adventure: on Wednesday afternoon, a nice amount of snow had piled up outside. Jay, Rose, and I decided to go play in it with Steph at the Whites’ house, which is half a mile away. Jeff had the car. The stroller seemed like the wrong vehicle. So we bundled up and walked.  I thought “half a mile is SO short.” HA. Half a mile on a clean sidewalk with the stroller is short. Half a mile through 6 inches of snow with a well-bundled (aka extra-clumsy) 2 year old  and a baby turned out to be quite long. And strenuous.

Did I mention that I decided to bring a bag of laundry too? So I had Rose on my back in the basket, I was pulling the heavy laundry bag in our makeshift box-with-a-rope-tied-to-it sled, and Jay was walking. It was more like trudging.

Jay kept sitting down every few feet and playing in/chowing down on the snow. After about half a block, I realized that we’d NEVER get there if I didn’t speed things up a bit.

So I had Jay sit in the “sled,” and I carried the bag of laundry (it was heavy, rank cloth diaper laundry by the way). Rose stayed on my back. In fact, she had fallen asleep by this time. She was all crunched up in the bottom of the basket, snoozing away. I could hear her little snuffly snores every now and then.

We cut across Euclid park’s field. That was exhausting—the snow was soft and deep, and I was pulling 30 pounds in a box by a thin sharp rope with one hand, and lugging a smelly bag of diaper laundry with the other hand. I was sweating like crazy and kind of trembly by the time we were half way across the field (that’s our long deep trail stretching away in the picture). Jay just reclined in the box and tried to catch snowflakes in his mouth. It really was a hilarious situation. I kept handicapping my strength even more by laughing hard every few minutes.

Well, when we were just a few blocks from the Whites’ house, an angel named Steph appeared and pulled Jay in the rest of the way. Rose woke up briefly when I took her out of the basket and laid her down for a nap. Then I started a load of laundry and went out to PLAY!

Jay loves making snow creatures together. This snow was pretty powdery, so I managed a snow pile for the body. Since I couldn’t get a snowball big enough for a head, I made a snow monster instead with big eyeballs and four arms.

He was double-sided: eyeballs on both sides.

We had hot chocolate and lunch with Steph and then she gave us a ride home. That was snow adventure #1.

Snow is FUN.