SNOW!!

When I was little, younger than 8, I remember having a huge snowfall here. So much snow, in fact, that we used 10 gallon buckets to make bricks for the igloo we built. An igloo big enough where we could crawl in it and play. I think once since then our city has had a decent snow perhaps once, but I was away at college. Our pitiful snowfalls have been mostly a dusting since I've graduated college, which has been at least 8 years.

Until this past weekend.

When I heard the forecast, I'll be honest. I scoffed, laughed, rolled my eyes, and maybe even mocked...but inside, secretly hoped. Wow...what would a great snow be like? Waking up to a blanket of white?

It was everything I'd hoped for!

Here's Charis's expression when I opened the blinds for her to look at our overnight blessing.

Though the snow wasn't really wet enough to manage a good snowman, I couldn't complain.

We scraped one together, made snow angels, we all tasted snow cream for the first time, and Charis...she happily sat and ate snow.

And ate, and ate, and ate. She loved it so much that in the evening, I put out a blanket, filled some bowls, and brought some snow inside for the girls to play with (and eat).

Atalie, sadly, did not care for the snow.

Perhaps it was the way I bundled her with stockings, socks, pants, legwarmers, plastic bags, onesies, turtlenecks, gloves, a hat, and her snowsuit. :) I'm not exaggerating. Or maybe it was that every time she finally managed to stand, she'd walk a step or two and do a face plant in the freshly fallen fluff. She's only been walking for a few weeks now, so her skills are in the fine tuning stage still. As soon as she got out of the wind and sat on the front steps, she was happy again.

That is, until decided to try to mosey her way over to Charis, anxious to join in her fun. That resulted in another face plant. And tears. Her second trip out in the snow was a little more successful. Take off a few layers, add in a laundry basket for good measure (and balance).

Okay, so she doesn't look like she was having a great time. But it was an improvement!

Even Major had a good time. He caught snowballs, and he and Charis enjoyed a nice little snow feast together.

Mmm. Snow pizza!

After 3 days of snow on the ground, I'm still a little sad to see it melting. I'm still hoping...winter's not over yet!

Tree Decorating and Our First "Snow"

As you can see I'm frantically trying to play catch up with our Christmas pictures.

Here's Charis decorating her silver tree in her bedroom. She chose glittery blue and silver ornaments to put on the tree.

Decorating the tree was a little more challenging this year. I forget how much stuff we unpack with all the boxes, the ornament hooks, the tissue paper, and sooooo many tree needles calling "eat me!" to Atalie. Charis was 6 months old on her first Christmas and had no interest in the tree. At 18 months she listened well enough that the tree wasn't an issue. Atalie is the perfect age to be completely intrigued AND conveniently selective in her hearing when given instructions. (Did she not hear me or is the wooing of the tree and it's glistening ornaments too much for her?)

I caught a random hug...one with Charis gently snuggling her sister and Atalie not screaming about possible strangulation.

And here's the first snow of the year. Mostly ice. Perhaps our only snow as tomorrow it's going to be near 60 degrees. *sigh* Sometimes I wish for the snows we used to have. I remember using 10 gallon buckets to build igloos in the backyard, my feet sinking shin deep in snow as I cried in the middle of the yard because I was cold but didn't want to go inside. I was younger than 10 last time that happened.
Here's our piddly snow this year. No matter how grumpy I was to wake up and see the "Storm of the Year" amounting to the frost on the veggies in my freezer, Charis was delighted. Yes, she's still in her pajamas. I had to rush her out there...it was melting that fast.

She was so happy. Thankfully it doesn't take much. Maybe I need to be a little (or a lot) more like that.