‘Tis the season...

... for daffodils, crocuses and snow days!

Such is English weather that Albs has so far only experienced snow three times in his life before. From sitting in the pushchair as I cleared my pregnant neighbours driveway in Yorkshire to being pulled in his sleigh to French nursery last time we went skiing to making and then smashing a pitiful, grass filled snowman three years ago.  Smalley never

None of Alb's previous memories have stuck but I think the fun that has come with the dramatically named “Beast from the East” have been substantial enough to stay this time round. From feeling thoroughly spoilt the week before last as we made the most of being housebound for 3 days, we’ve been able to do it all over again today. We’ve stomped through the snow, made snowmen and have fine tuned the dog walk to include to sledging stops and space for Percy to embrace his inner snow dog and go tucky-bum running, twisty pounce crazy in the snow. (So much fun had by our short, stumpy snow dog today that after chasing snowballs he then proceeded to show off his most manly behaviour by throwing up his breakfast. What a dog!)

Smalley has decided that travelling by sledge is by far the superior way to travel. His whole face lights up when he sees the sledge and he shouts “woo hoo” with great delight for the first ten minutes of the journey. I confess I’m equally thrilled with this mode of transport and am  feeling very smug with my decision to pack and unpack the then unused sledge for the past 3 house moves rather than listening to my inner anti-hoarder shouting "throw it out, you'l never need it."
It took Albs all of 20 minutes to ace sledging.  In true Albug fashion he seeks out the biggest, bumpiest route, gives a running commentary on his way up, an official announcement and countdown before he slides off and then cheers the whole way down.  As he tumbles out at the bottom shouts of "That was amazing!! Did you see how epic that was?! That was the coolest" fill the air - disturbing otherwise peaceful, snow filled mornings.

Snowman building the other week was a triumph. On day one the we only managed a snow mountain as the snow was too dry to do much else with. 24 hours later however we had perfect sticky snow and were quickly the proud owners of four ridiculous looking snowmen. (Having later admired the castles, igloos and snow dragon sculptures being posted on Facebook by my peers I once again note that my arts and craft skills remain at primary school level but thankfully I’m teamed up with a six year old and he was delighted!)
As it turns out Percy was actually the winner of the snowman building.  Having finished our snow figures we headed back in and Mark spent 5 minutes looking out the window laughing at the silliness of his dog busily eating snow.  Percy chomped away happily for a good amount of time and came in looking very satisfied with himself.  It was only when Mark went out 4 hours later to bring the carrots back in that we learnt Percy wasn't chomping on the snow.  He had eaten three whole, cold, crunchy carrots.  Organic carrots at that.  Smug git.