Snow

Snow that sticks around for more than a few hours is such a rare thing around here, that on Tuesday, as soon as we saw that the flurries were coming down harder and STICKING, we abandoned our Greek History and started putting on our layers.

I smiled remembering how when I was a kid, we often wouldn't even own a pair of gloves or mittens.  We had to cover our hands with socks to keep them warm.  We enjoyed a snowy walk around the neighborhood before the cold drove us back home.

After checking out the frozen, muddy creek, I fixed hot chocolate for the kids.  It was Ella's first time to try a hot drink, and she made it through a few drinks before declaring it was too hard to drink slowly.  She mostly enjoyed dipping plus-sized marshmallows in the chocolate.

The snow was coming down so hard I kept my camera covered with a kitchen towel in between shots; I need a waterproof case for such times as these. 

It wasn't until we came in from our walk that we heard from KJ about what an icy mess was starting on the roads.  It made the fun we had bittersweet thinking of all the horrible things happening out there.  I was so thankful when KJ was able to make it home.  If he had stayed at work as he intended, he would have been stuck away from us, and that would have made these days far less pleasurable.

After we'd warmed up for awhile, Ella discovered that Kit was missing her hat.  I was sure that it had just been misplaced in all the abandoned articles of clothing at the door, but just to make sure we bundled up again and walked back out in the still-falling snow.  I'm glad we did, because we found her hat at the end of the road half-frozen.  We also ran into our neighborhood friends, and they enjoyed throwing snowballs together.

But my favorite pictures were definitely ones like this:

Oh, my heart...

Of course, when Daddy came home, the real fun started happening.

I love how James has his hands up, begging for mercy.  James was actually a really good sport about snowball-throwing.  He would tell you exactly where you got him each time.  Like this:

 Pow!

 "You hit me right here on my head."

There are still so many feeling the horrible effects of icy roads in our state.  We are praying for them and may venture out ourselves today.  The cupboards are getting bare.