Oh, Snow...We've Missed You!

Our first winter in North Carolina four years ago was quite a shock to us. We kept waiting for it to get cold--it never did. As November turned into December I kept waiting for those little white flakes to fall. I know you will all hate me for this, but by January I realized that I missed the snow! In fact, one late, late, night in January there was a hint of snow, and I got so excited that I woke little two year old Morgan up to see it...the specks were so tiny that she couldn't see them flying through the air. As winter one rolled into number two and still no snow came I gave in and got rid of my ice scraper (it had just been sitting in the back of the car for two years). We hit year three in stride with still no sight of snow-not even a little sleet. We had our occasional fix when traveling to Iowa for Christmas and even went sledding, but never had that North Carolina snow experience. Well, it finally happened and I thought that I would let you share in our joy! It happened during the inauguration so we actually didn't see it fall, but this is what we came home to! (Not our car, but it is our building!)

We didn't know what to do first! Luckily I had cleaned out a closet when moving two years ago and knew where I had placed old snow pants. We of course had hats and mittens for use, but we were a little lost on the winter boots. We ended up putting on an extra pair of socks and just wearing our rain boots--as you can imagine, we get a lot of use out of those!

First on the list was to make some snow-angels. We had to search for some good snow since the college kids had had a lot of fun the day before...seriously look it up on U-Tube. There were even some arrests after the police who had come to break up the 500 people plus snowball fight got in the way of a few stray fliers. But we finally had success by the wall of our building.

Here are the girls trying to find the best snow...not quite knowing what to do.

Morgan finally figured it out!

Next Daddy came out which led to our first snowball fight in North Carolina.

They were pretty accurate...notice that I am behind the camera...especially for the double team!

Just look what he was up against--wow what form, huh Grandpa Sam?

Finally it was back to more snow-angels...Abbie got the hang of it this time.

Notice the grass showing wherever we stepped or brushed away the snow, but hey, we were happy.

Last but not least came the hot chocolate with tons of marshmallows!

I thought that I would share a few things that might make you northerners chuckle...the town shut completely down for two and a half days after this "snowstorm". NOTHING opened and it was strongly cautioned for everyone to stay home. In fact, our inauguration trip was stopped on the Virginia border because none of our drivers had ever driven in snow before.

Another chuckle for you that I had to call and share with my sister in Minnesota. Yesterday both the girls were unable to go outside for recess. The school called off recess of because of the weather; it had gotten so cold that they kept the kids inside...it was 30 degrees!