Live Blogging the Blizzard: Epilogue

We spent 2 1/2 hours outside in the snow today.

First, we fed the birds, filling all 3 of our feeders to the brim as well as spreading seed all over the ground for our mourning doves (who can't/won't eat from the feeders).

Then, we headed to the backyard and worked on our snow fairy house, which the kids started yesterday with Mama. Today, we added a porch and gate to the pine-tree branch roofed-structure. Then they continued to make it snow, while the windchimes sang in the wind.

A nature walk in the neighborhood was next. The stream near our house was surprisingly unfrozen. So they threw more snow in.

And then they spotted a huge snow bank, the kind only plows can make. They crawled up it, walked across it, slid down it, playing king and queen of the hill for quite awhile. At one point, Bud lost his boot, which got stuck in a hole that turned out to be right above the opening to the drainage hole. We're lucky we didn't lose the whole boot down the sewer.

Then a neighbor boy came out and Sis and Bud headed across the street to play in the snow bank in front of his house. Until his sister and another neighbor brought out sleds! SLEDS! They headed to a hill down the street, with Sis and Bud running behind them, "wait for us!" And so all the neighborhood kids sledded down the "hill," a high-sloped yard down the street. And the older girls took turns taking Bud and Sis down the hill. I wasn't even that nervous; the older kids had obviously done it a lot--there was a shiny, prepped track down the slope (in fact the owners of the house came by and were obviously pleased that the kids were out there playing)--and they were safe and careful. Oh, what fun the kiddos had, smiling and laughing and squealing all the way. I've never sledded before, ever, so all I could do was stand at the bottom of the slope, in the street, and watch for cars. Funny to be the lone adult in charge of an activity I know nothing about. Soon, though, another neighbor mom came out and we had fun chatting while the kids kept sledding. Bud and Sis got into it, even helping haul the sleds back up the hill, and were extra sad when it all ended. All the way home, they begged for their own sleds so they can sled more.

But they were content today with yet more hot chocolate and another round of "hot chocolate popcorn balls." And are enthusiastic about making gift bags of chocolate pretzel candy to take to the neighbors as a thank you.

They probably just want another chance to sled again!