December 1, 2010

We woke up this morning to 5 inches of snow. It was all the girls could do to wait until after breakfast and chores to go outside and play with it. When I finally was able to round up enough snow gear for them to go out, they still resembled puzzles with pieces missing. We had snow pants that fit Lilly, 2 pairs that fit Carson, both size 12 months, and none that fit Rachel. So I put the Lilly size on Rachel, and one of the Carson size on Lilly (huge stretch). They all had coats and hats, but only Lilly had gloves. I put socks on Rachel's hands and covered them with saran wrap and duct tape (don't judge me). That lasted about 1 minute before Rachel decided she could not make a proper snowball with all that stuff on her hands, so she ended up going out with just socks covering her hands. Carson just went without. I had two pairs of snow boots for Carson, and none for the girls, so I smushed Lilly's feet into the biggest pair of the two and put the other pair on Carson. I put zip lock bags on Rachel's feet over her tennis shoes. Despite the missing gear, the girls were not deterred at all. Carson lasted 10 minutes and insisted on being held the whole time. To his credit, this is the first real snow he has ever seen, and it came up to his knees. Once I put him down for a nap, the girls and I had a grand old time making snowmen and throwing snowballs. Our snowman had a carrot nose of course, and jar rings for eyes (glasses) and a straw for a mouth. Rachel would have stayed out all day, but Lilly and I were done after an hour. I have not played out in the stow like that since I was a kid. I have distinct memories of my dad teaching me the ins and outs of snowman and snowball making. Today I passed down that knowledge. 

Rachel has decided that she wants to do karate after all, because she wants to "get big and strong". We braved the snow and made it safely to karate. But with no food in the house, and me using pregnancy as an excuse to take it easy, we decided to go to dinner with the kids tonight after karate. The girls are getting better and better at behaving correctly at restaurants. They order for themselves, they are polite to the waitress, and we leave a much smaller mess than we used to. I am so proud.