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Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Snow Day=Snow Outing=Train Wreck

Yay! SNOW DAY!!

I prayed it here. I am quite certain. All me. My prayers. You're welcome.

The excitement in my house this morning was fever pitch. Every Slaughter kid was chomping at the bit to go outside. I knew it was a bad idea. I knew the outing would maybe last two, possibly three minutes. They are their mother's children. We don't do cold.

But Daddy came to their rescue, even with my warnings that, "This will not end well."

We bundled them up, a process that took approximately 35 minutes, opened the door, and out they went. Three steps later, two of them lay crying flat on their backs, having fallen on the ice. They recovered without much drama and ran into the yard.

Estella Dru got the brilliant idea to slide down the slide that was covered in snow and a little ice. I knew it wasn't wise, but before I could protest, she was being catapulted into the middle of the yard. It sort of reminded me of an old cartoon. Unbelievable, but happening before my very eyes. Though she was in tears, apparently it looked like so much fun that Jeb wanted to try. I barely caught him before he plunged to his death off an icy rung of the ladder leading up to the slide.

At this point, I called for Matt and told him this was his disaster. I was going in. I couldn't watch.

Less than a minute later, Jeb had a melt down. (No pun intended.) He was screaming and shaking and, for all intents and purposes, dying of pain. When I ran in to see what happened, bracing myself to see blood or a broken bone, Matt informed me he had taken off his gloves and touched the snow. Yes, I'm serious. Snow-touching took him down. Jeb was holding his little red hand out to me, screaming, "Mama, help! Pwease!"

Train. Wreck.

Matt rushes (yes, rushes) him into the tub to get warm when Estella Dru comes to the door crying. She was cold, too, and still reeling from her slide ordeal. I sent her to the tub. Belle wasn't far behind. 35 minutes of getting ready for maybe four minutes of unadulterated outside fun.

I let Matt deal with the snow drama, and went to gather up some snow of my own for snow ice cream. I'm sure there is some crazy delicious, sophisticated way to make snow ice cream, but around here we do it the was Grandma did it. Milk, sugar, and vanilla. No measuring. Just pouring until it looks right. And that's how I'll always do it.


Even with all the craziness, I love having them home with me for a 'surprise' snow day. Oh, and by the way, Jeb has recovered nicely and learned his lesson about the snow. When I handed him his snow ice cream, he told me, "I use spoon, Mama. Don't touch dat snow. It hurt."

Brilliant, Son. Yeah, use the spoon.

3 comments:

Superchikk said...

How is it that men don't understand that when we say they'll spend approximately 37 seconds outside, they don't believe us? Caedmon was DYING to go out this morning and I didn't want to. But being a good Mom, I sacrificed my pregnant self and got us both ready to go out. We were outside about 10 minutes before we were BOTH done and cranky about the whole thing. He told me all morning (before he went off to work) that it really wasn't that big a deal and I should just have fun with it. Really? Next time, it's his turn.

Oh, and Caedmon's the opposite of Jeb on this one. I can't keep him from eating snow. nasty, disgusting snow straight off the ground that might have even been walked on a time or two. I honestly threatened to spank him this morning if he put more snow in his mouth. Seriously. Snow days are more trouble than they're worth.

And yes, I realize my 8 year-old-self would hate me for saying that.

Karey Turnipseed said...

I guess this is where our boys differ. The whole time we are out in the snow, Nash is throwing snowballs or knocking over the snowmen. He loved it and did not want to come in. I need to ask you about your beach trips...Do you go to Destin or somewhere else? Also, do you have a favorite place to stay? We are trying to plan a trip. Thanks.

Tire Swing Mom said...

Too funny! We made it a little longer in the snow yesterday but I wasn't able to do snow cream (bummer). I just didn't think we had enough of it in the yard. I have to have a good, solid 3 inches to make it and we came up short this time.