Sledding

Emily did not go sledding her first winter.  That would have been very bad parenting.  She was born in January, so she was only a couple months old when the winter was over.  Plus, there was no hill to go sledding on, and we didn't have a sled.  But still, probably bad parenting to take your 3 month old sledding.

This is the view from our front porch.  They hadn't finished working on the house across the street when we moved.

So, Emily's first winter for sledding was when we were living in our house in Indianapolis, in the old part of town, which was pretty run down, but we never had any one try to mug us.  And the library was right across the street (you could see it from our back porch), which was really nice for the months we didn't have internet.  The house also had a small hill in the front yard.  And one very windy, snowy day, I bundled up myself and Emily, and we went sledding on our very small hill in our very small front yard.  After about ten minutes I decided that a) it was probably to cold to stay out longer, especially because b) Emily mostly wanted to stick her mitten in the snow, and then possibly eat it.

The next winter, we had moved up to Michigan.  Phil and Vickie have a nice sized hill in their back yard, and when the snow came, we bundled up and took Emily out into it.

I didn't have a picture of sledding, so you get Emily and her snowman.

Last year, it snowed three times.  Total.  At least, three times with enough snow to do anything with.  And we went sledding, and made snowmen, and I taught Emily about snow angels.

About to go down the hill with Daddy

This year, we got tons of snow a couple weeks ago.  Lots of snow.  Lovely packing snow, great for making snowmen.  In fact, the first day of snow, Emily tried to make a snowman while we were on our way somewhere.  I cajoled her into the car, promising that we would make a snowman "later".  About a week later, the weather was forecasted to get warmer, and I knew we couldn't put it off anymore.

Pulling the sled herself

So we bundled up and went sledding.  Emily went down a few times, before she decided to let Dan and I enjoy sledding while she watched.  She really wanted to make a snowman, but unfortunately, the snow had turned from packing snow to ice crystals pretending to be snow, and we got about a foot of snow packed together, with a scarf wrapped around the bottom and a carrot and some rocks making the face.  I did push her into the snow so she would make a snow angel (I had already done one).  Does this make me "fun" or "mean"?  She did like making the snow angel once she started; she just didn't want to get down in the snow.

Running away.

Not that I blame her.  Snow is cold.

Mommy goes by herself.

Next year, William should be old enough to start enjoying the snow.  Or maybe, if the snow hangs on long enough this year, he'll get to go sledding before Spring.  We'll have to see what mother nature brings.