Snow!

Last Thursday we were treated to a snow day in North Carolina. This is a rare occurrence, so we did what we could to embrace it. Our neighbors from New York were joking about it being an "almost snow day" since schools were closed before a flake had even fallen, and we got maybe 2 inches, not a speck of which stuck to the roads. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted. And perhaps this is the part of winter weather in NC that I like the most:

1. Snow falls
2. Everything looks pretty and magical that day
3. By the next day the snow is gone

We don't have to shovel our sidewalks. We don't have to shovel our driveway. We don't have to watch the snow get ugly and dirty as we wait and wait and wait for it to finally melt. And from what I've heard from NC natives, this is the norm. Sure, there are the very rare instances when we'll get up to 8 inches in one storm (like every 10 years or so), and the snow will hang around for several days, but for the most part, it will be gone the following day. I know that some folks would not enjoy this, but this is the way I like snow!

We bundled up the kids and I took the girls outside. The snow was a nice wet snow, great for snowballs and snowmen. Ryan and his friend Brandon worked on building a snow fort to stage an epic snowball fight. Katy, Olivia and I built a snowman.

After I took some pictures of the snowman and fort, I took my camera inside because the snow was starting to change over to sleet. When I came back out, the snowman was on his side, with Olivia grinning next to him. I asked her what had happened:

O: "I knocked him over, Mommy."
M: "Why did you knock him over?"
O: "Because I did not like him anymore."

Well. Not much to say to that one, eh? Fortunately she waited until after I had a picture before deciding that she didn't like him! We trooped over to Brandon and Sydney's house for some sledding in their back yard. The track was fast, and we had fun with that for about 20 minutes, and then the sleet turned to rain.

Ryan went in to Brandon's to warm up and play, the girls walked home with me for hot cocoa with marshmallows and graham crackers. We turned on the fireplace and got toasty and enjoyed our brief foray into winter weather. The weather people had warned of up to 1/2 an inch of ice, but this never came to fruition. And by Friday we were back to school with nothing left from our snow day except pictures and good memories.