Riddles and Poems: snow

President's day weekend is always a trip to Tahoe to play in the snow. This year we went up right after a big storm. We had a smooth trip most of the way. About a mile from the house we hit some ice and fish tailed back and forth, finally do a 360 turn. Our back end hit the snow bank. There was no damage and no one was hurt (thank goodness!). The kids actually enjoyed our little spin on the freeway yelling, "Let's do it again!" Literally right after we hit, a jeep pulls up and this crazy Aussie jumps out of the car like we have just done the coolest thing ever. "Awesome! Let's get you guys out!"

O-K

He pulls out these huge cables like he has been driving around just looking for someone to help and walks right into traffic like it's no big deal. With his cables and a little big of digging, we were out in about 15 minutes. BLESSING! Before we could even turn around the guy said, "have a great time!" and was off in his jeep to help someone else.

After our little adventure, we decided to pull into Safeway and put the chains on to get up the very steep hill. When we arrived at the house, the driveway was covered in about 3 1/2 feet of snow. Brent was able to walk up and unlock the door. Then he carried the kids in one by one. The Hatches had followed us up and Anson, Brent, and I started to snow blow and shovel the driveway, while Lora and Jen got pizza's in the oven for the kids. We got the driveway cleared in about an hour and a half and started to unload. The kids were so excited they carried everything upstairs for us. A little while later our friends the Noskas arrived too and we could finally start our weekend!

Saturday morning the kids (who all slept in our room) were up at 4:30 am. We held them off until about 6:30 and then let them go downstairs. After breakfast we decided to head to our favorite snow hill. Although it is a great hill, it is about 50 feet from the parking lot across a soccer field. After snowing for 3 days the powder was very soft and it took us 30 minutes to make our way across the field. Brent paved the way, making a trail that we could all sort of follow, while I carried Bree on my back. Once there we had to make a path so that the sleds would go down. The kids thought it would be fun to jump down the hill and ALL of them got stuck. Owen Noska (6) even lost his boot! Poor thing had to be carried back to the car before the sledding had even begun. Bree was not enjoying herself and eventually I ended up taking Camden, Bree, Ben, and Danielle back to the car. We did get a few fun pictures while we were there.

After our romp in the snow we stayed at the house the rest of the afternoon. Having three teenagers, the adults went out to an early dinner at Hard Rock Cafe. We came back to all the kids fed, bathed, and ready for bed (my kind of night out!).

Sunday we decided to stay a little closer to home. Brent built a snow fort and sled run out back with the help of the men, and the girls were lazy in the house while cooking homemade chicken soup.