After the snow...

And after the snow came freezing rain:










The birch tree out back was bending over practically in half. No surprise when two hours after I took this picture, two of the sections cracked off and crashed to the ground!


The Rhody out back was flopped over to about 1/3 of the height it normally is, and branches off the maple tree which I can usually walk under were bent so far they were touching the ground.


Dan told me to offer the kids the opportunity to bundle up, wear a helmet, and knock ice off some of the plants (nothing we could do about the tall fir tree and whatnot, but we could attempt to rescue the decorative maples, the fruit trees, and the Rhodies!). Emily volunteered, though was NOT happy about the helmet (or how hard I laughed when I saw her!!). Better safe that sorry, though, there were some LARGE chunks of ice coming down on us as we were banging at the branches!

Sledding Fun

As soon as we could manage to get eat our breakfast, layer on the winter clothes, and gather up the sleds, we were outside and sledding down the hill in the alley behind our house to enjoy the SNOW!!










The kids spent hours sledding, and I spent hours doctoring up the sled run... LOL Patching up thin areas, building up a sturdier "wall" along the one side of the sled run (keeping kids out of the ditch and away from the tree they seemed magnetically drawn to!)

Let there be snow!

Well, my last blog post showed a wimpy scattering of snow from earlier in the week, but we woke up he following day to real SNOW!

Another inch fell throughout the day, but I forgot to take another photo


This picture doesn't show it very well, but the snow was nearly as high as the top of Charlie's back! You can see the snow all over his chin as he was (unhappily) trying to get through the snow to get to me so I could rescue him


Longer pet fur and snow aren't a good mix. Less than one minute in the snow and he'd already formed snowballs on his legs! hahaha!


It's hard work trying to get three kids and two pets somewhat nicely into the same picture


Emily was far more cooperative!

Snow!

We got a little taste of snow this week, and while it wasn't deep, and was awfully slushy, the kids made the most of it and enjoyed it while it lasted!





Em hooked up with some kids from the neighborhood

Snowman wanna-be

The kids and I tried to make a snowman yesterday, but the snow just was NOT rolling and packing into anything snowman-like. Jared was extremely disappointed, having been really excited to use the snowman kit we were given (floppy hat, "coal", fake carrot, corncob pipe, scarf, buttons). I came up with a quick solution and had him lay down on the ground and buried most of him with snow and then used the snowman kit on HIM. I think it actually turned out pretty cute and Jared was THRILLED. Dan says it looks like a creepy pic a serial killer would take after having posed the dead body. SHEESH!

FUN IN THE SNOW!

Okay, so the snow didn't start out being all that great for snowballs or making snowmen yesterday, but it was GREAT for sledding!! We have a somewhat long, but gently sloped hill in our yard, and the kids were getting enough speed down the hill to continue into the flat stretch. They had a BLAST!




After about a half hour, we walked out our backyard and down the back alley to the hill (shorter in length than the hill in our yard, but much steeper). One of the neighbor girls and her dad joined us for awhile.


Emily and I got an especially long run at one point (we started out by that blue speck (a sledding disk) up at the top of the picture)


Little fingers and toes were starting to get cold, so we headed inside for lunch and naps, and never made it back out again because it got dark before we were quite ready. Dan had been gone all day, but wanted to have some fun in the snow with the kids before the rain comes through, so we all bundled back up and headed out for some night sledding! It's amazing how the snow really does lighten up the night. We've been down that alley at night before and needed flashlights, but there was plenty of light!

The flash makes it seem UBER dark in the background, but it wasn't like that at all...




Emily and Jared wanted to make snow angels once we got back to our own house afterwards. There wasn't enough light to be able to see in the viewing screen of the camera very well, so forgive the mis-aligned photos!! LOL




Dan had the kids stand under one of our smaller trees and then shook it really hard to make all the snow fall down on them








We had a great day in the snow!

Ask and ye shall receive!

We got SNOW yesterday afternoon and into the midnight hours. The last time my yard got this much snow, Emily was 19.5 months old (that was FIVE years ago, people!).


Then the clouds opened up and God said, "I hate you, Alfalfa!" (Alfalfa, Little Rascals, 1994 version) Because what came down in the midnight hours was teeny little ice balls (I guess that's what they call freezing rain?), which turned the first few inches of nice powdery FUN snow, into HEAVY SLUDGY yucky snow. In trying to make a snowball, you discover you're only able to make an ice ball.

We have yet to bundle up and test out sledding and snowman making, but we WILL. We just need to eat some breakfast first. To say I'm a little disappointed is an understatement, but I guess at least we got some snow... I just wish it had stayed the nice powdery kind the kids could have really enjoyed much better!

I'll either update this post later with more pictures, or I'll start a new post tomorrow with pictures (depending on how busy the day gets)