Somehow Emily learned about snowballs on her own. She played out with Robby as he shoveled the driveway. Her play included taking a soda to Daddy carefully (only dropped it once), throwing snowballs at Daddy, and exploring in the snow for tracks. The next day when she, Julia, and Mommy were outside together she continued the snowball game by placing snowballs on Julia and throwing them at Mommy. Her placement of the snowballs was not to Julia’s liking so we had to make a rule to only share them with Mommy. We did give a snowball to Julia to play with.

The girls enjoyed sitting together in the sled taking rides around the yard and up and down the street. Julia would sit stiffly and look around while Emily giggled and held Julia steady (most of the time). The best ride was on the road, but required a lot of parent effort to make it happen. Emily was also very interested in taking Julia for a ride in the sled. Luckily the sled never took off with Julia.

We built a snowgirl together with starter pieces from the snow left from the plow. The snow packed really well for snowmen. We asked Emily if the snowman was a girl or boy and she decided girl. Then we asked what the snowgirl should be named and she decided Frosty. Emily helped place the heart, nose, and mouth. Emily has enjoyed checking on her from the windows and visiting her when we have been outside.

We had a wonderful snow storm come and leave us approximately six inches of snow this past weekend. The snow arrived mid-day Friday and snowed through the night and then off and on Saturday. Because it came on the weekend and it was a forecasted snow we were prepared and didn’t need to go anywhere. We had several opportunities to play outside together in the snow and enjoy the wonderful white.
 
Emily knows a lot about snow from books, TV shows, and movies but hasn’t had much opportunity to experience it first hand. She told us that she wanted to throw snowballs at Daddy before we even went out to play. Neither girl was impressed with the number of layers that Mommy put on them to go out and play. Over the consecutive trips back out the number of layers was moderated to maximize warmth, but allow for more movement in play. I think Julia was most appreciative.

Emily never tired of playing in the snow, but did get pretty wet every trip out. Julia was frustrated with not being able to move well. She couldn’t figure out how to get up once she had fallen down because she didn’t like putting her hands in the snow. She did enjoy the sled and it’s freedom.

Beautiful snowy days!

A Silly Pool Face!

Emily celebrated her birthday with her friends at a pool playdate. We had to move the playdate twice because of sickness, but finally everyone was well and we got to go. Julia, Elena, Maeve, Aiden, and New Fish all came for the play time. The pool water seemed a little colder this week, but Emily had a good time anyway. She played a funny game – she will swim to the middle of the pool with her floaties on and cry, “help, help me Mommy”. I would walk out to her and pull her back to the shallow section. She never was in trouble and in need of help, she just wanted her Mommy to play with her and figured this way would work.

After swimming, we all went to Chick-fil-a for lunch and a cookie cake. Emily loves her chicken and fries (with catsup of course). The kids all had a good time. To cap off the good playtime, Emily played in the playarea and successfully climbed up to the top of the playground toy by herself.