The Sunday before Christmas, we had tons of beautiful snow. There was white everywhere you looked. Like this.
So we decided to go take a walk in it. Naturally, the kids didn't think that sounded very inviting. Something about it being freezing cold, and having lots of fun playing Playmobil together. So I pulled out my old standby and promised them root beer floats after the walk. They were ready in no time flat. We took a different route this time, rather than turning right at the top of the hill, we turned left. It's really fun in the summer, because there is a little stream that runs along the right side of the path. But today, of course, that was all frozen solid.
The kids were concerned that we were going "too far" and might get lost if we didn't turn back soon. But having jogged or biked this path before, we both knew it would eventually loop around and take us right back home again. As we got closer to the forest, we started to see some animal tracks in the snow. One of the kids' favorite books is called "Tracks in the Snow", so they all started guessing which animal it came from and made a game of following the same set of tracks for as long as they could. They forgot all about the cold, or the length of time we were outside and just enjoyed the beauty of the wilderness. Ah, that's a good parenting moment.
When we eventually made it back to the house, hot chocolate seemed more appropriate, but they still all wanted root beer floats. So that is what they had. They definitely hit the spot for these little snow children!
