"It's Raining Snowballs!"

Friday, March 10, 2006

Lindsay's been wishing for snow for so long now. Last night at dinner she was nearly in tears as she exclaimed, "It's never going to snow!" I felt so bad for her. I wished there was something I could do to somehow will the fluffy white stuff to fall from the sky. Her knowledge that it is a rare occurance around here wasn't much of a consolation.

This morning I awoke. I crawled out of bed and peeked out the window as usual. I could scarcely believe my eyes! The ground, the branches of the trees, the bushes, the driveway was.. white! I whispered to Lindsay to wake up. She rubbed her eyes sleepily as I pointed out the window. One quick glance was all it took. She fairly bubbled,as she scrambled out of bed. She looked and sounded like she was being tickled from her heart, deep inside, and all the way out. As she began to exit the room I asked her if we should tell Nathan. "Oh Yes!" She rushed to her brothers bed and whispered in his ear. Christmas morning is the only time I remember him leaping from his bed so quickly!

It didn't take my children long to get dressed this morning. They were outside and playing in a flash. They had fun scraping the white stuff from the top of the car, piling it to the center of blocks of wood. After a bit Lindsay came in. She was less than thrilled, saying it had begun to rain. Her frown was short lived. I pointed outside at her brother who was dancing, waving his arms, looking skyward, and excitedly shouting to his sister, "Lindsay! It's not rain! It's snow! It's snowing!"

Lindsay raced back out. It didn't take long for enough to accumilate that they could start forming snow balls, actually more like slush balls, but around here it's all the same thing :) They were both giggling when they came inside and whispered to me that they each had 9 snowballs waiting outside. I chuckled, knowing full well what their intentions were.

A few minutes later they raced outside. They were rushing to make it out prior to their father who was on his way out to gather some wood for the fire. I watched and listened, laughing out loud as I saw my husband being pelted with balls of slush. He managed to get a few handfuls off in their direction as they all laughed and giggled, dodging the cold, wet ammunition. When he returned with his armful of wood he was covered in wet splotches of white.

It stopped snowing. The kids came in, and warmed their hands by the fire. It began snowing again, big wet, white flakes. My children raced out once again as Nathan gleefully exclaimed, "It's raining snow balls!" An ominous statement for their Father who needed to make yet another trip outside to replenish the fire...