Snow Days

Over the weekend, we jumped from about half an inch of snow tops to a good six inches. As soon as we opened the living room blinds Saturday morning, Little Bear was bouncing with excitement. "Snow! Yay! Little Bear outside, okay? Mama outside, Dada outside, play snow, okay!"

We talked him into waiting until after breakfast, but as soon as he finished he was running back over to the door. "Hat, okay. Mittens, okay. Boots, okay!" Because we now have actual-winter snow, he also got to learn about wearing his puffy, warm, water-resistant coat and snowpants instead of the heavy knit snowsuit he'd been in.

Matt worked on re-splitting the wood in the rack by the house (more on that in a minute) while Little Bear and I ran around in the snow—three wet, sticky inches at that point—and took advantage of the fact that it was right around 32 degrees to pack snowballs and build a snowman and a fort. We can't do that most of the winter; even by today, the snow was too dry and powdery.

Once he figured out how to pack snowballs, Little Bear had fun hiding behind the snow wall (or more often, trying to jump over it) and throwing snowballs. I was hoping to make the wall bigger, because it'll eventually form the foundation of a cave/fort later this winter, but nap time came before we were ready. Our snowman fell over before we remembered to take a photo, but it was as tall as I am!

In the afternoon, we enjoyed the snowy weather from indoors: Matt built a fire in the fireplace, and it stayed lit for hours! The fireplace problem seems to have stemmed from both a) the logs being too big, and b) these fireplaces being temperamental and wanting fires to be built using a certain technique. We're fortunate that my parents have the same model and have figured out its' secrets over the years!

Matt's looking on the bright side of having to re-split three cords of wood: he has to keep splitting kindling throughout the winter anyway, so he'll just split a load of logs every time he has to refill the deck wood rack, and it'll make for good exercise all winter.

By this morning we had reached six inches. According to our landlord, what we pay for with our rent includes having someone come plow the (loooong) driveway. And I'm sure that whoever plows our place has a whole long list of people they plow for, and I should just be patient and wait for them to show up. But I don't know if it'll be hours or days, and I really don't want all six inches pressed down into hardpack before the plow shows up, because then the hardpack will sit there all winter and melt and run straight down into our garage in the spring. So Little Bear and I went out and shoveled for a while, until he got too whiny for "Mama pick you up? Please? Pleeeeaaaase?" We will go back out after nap. I'm not crazy enough to attempt to shovel the whole driveway; it's at least an eighth of a mile, all together. But I do want to at least clear the part that slopes toward the garage door.