Our brief un-Christmassy weather seems to be over now. With the arrival of the New Year, temperatures have dropped back to the 20s (and teens) and snow is gently falling outside.
It’s pretty. I just wish it wouldn’t fall on the roads…
With the first month of the year more than half over already, I have decided that we still have about three more months of winter left.
Sounds like I am complaining, doesn’t it? Oh, I know, we didn’t even get any snow to speak of until just after Christmas, and it was pretty bare all through fall, and even mild for a week or so, but now my feet are cold!
I’ve had to break out the new winter coat I bought myself last year and stored because it was ‘too warm?’ Anyway, it is out of the back of the closet now and it does keep me warm on my very occasional foray out into the cold…
I do have a warm puffy coat out in storage in the garage, but after my granddaughters told me it made me look like a marshmallow man, well, every time I put it on I felt huge, so, it didn’t become ‘my favorite.’
If that sounds like vanity, you are right. My new coat looks pretty nice and does a great job of keeping me warm, and in a beautiful color too!
Hopefully we will get a chance to head south for a vacation this winter, I can’t think of anything better than that!
I am just really not much of a winter person – these days, if it didn’t look silly, I would probably wear that old huge puffy coat and snow pants (if I had any) to go outside.
Loads of people are loving the cold and snow.
Skiers and snowmobilers and even ice skaters love this winter weather we are having.
And of course, kids love winter. A few years back, our North Carolina grandchildren could hardly wait to get up here for the holidays and see some snow! They and their Michigan cousins went sledding several times and were outside in it every chance they got.
Big kids love it too. This morning, Jack’s brother-in-law Brent called just to say he checked out the thickness of the ice on Gun Lake and since it was well over 4 inches, he rode his 4×4 out on the lake and had a great time. That made me remember many years ago taking him for a ride on our old Evinrude snowmobile and flipping him right off the back into the snow. That was back when we were younger and much more adventurous.
Seems like I liked winter a lot more too when I was a kid. I remember I had hand-me-down skis, ice skates, a couple of sleds and even snowshoes to experiment with. I never could quite get the hang of using those things though.
When I was pretty little, I remember snow about knee deep with a crust thick enough for me to walk on top. What an adventure that was.
I remember lots of snow up around Roscommon, so deep some years that my Dad would shovel paths for me and cover them with scrap lumber to make a really neat snow fort.
It seemed like there was always lots of fun to be had. I would stay outside playing and making snow angels until my cheeks were red as apples, and when I would finally have to come in, my hands would be so cold I could hardly feel them.
I was always covered in snow. I remember Mom would have to use an old broom to sweep me down before I finally came back in the house.
Saturdays, when Mom had to work, I would almost always ride into town with her and spend the day at the town skating rink.
Downhill skiing was a blast! My brother introduced me to skiing at around five years old. As a teenager, I even worked at a private club with its own ski hill. What fun that was!
And, at least once every winter, our church youth group would go tobogganing down the biggest hill I’ve ever seen, winding up a long day of fun drinking hot chocolate and eating sandwiches in someone’s kitchen with the snow melting off our clothes and boots and making puddles on their floor.
I don’t remember counting the days until spring.
Maybe the winters were more fun back then – or maybe we just made more fun out of the winters…
