Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow....

If I had to describe my perfect weekend, it would look an awful lot like this one.  Starting with Thursday night, when we went out for dinner, Marc and I and the five kids, plus the in-laws, to celebrate Jessica turning ten.  Dinner was lovely, as only dinner with a zillion kids can be.  We went to the Chinese buffet (because if you're taking a ton of kids, it's best to do it at a huge restaurant where the waitstaff LOVES babies).  Afterwards, Marc went to run half the kids home (the perils of a stepfamily) and then came back to pick up the rest of us.  Because I had the two little ones (Sam, 6, and Julie, 2), it made sense for him to leave first and come back to get us.  It was frigid freezing cold, but I bundled them up, with hats and gloves and scarfs and we spent ten minutes or so outside, with the two of them racing along the wide sidewalk and making up games.  Of all the kids, I think those two PLAY the best - not that the rest of them don't get along, but those two are the most likely to make up grand adventures and act them out.

We kept my stepdaughter overnight on Thursday.  Friday and Saturday, thus far, have blended together into this easy, peaceful sort of time together.  We've shoveled, we've played in the snow (and by "we", you understand that I hate all things cold and wet, and was more than happy to stay inside and keep cocoa on standby), we've napped, we've watched movies.  I've baked.  A lot.  Cakes, chocolate and vanilla for Sam's boy scout banquet on Sunday, and a yummy apple cake I made earlier.  I baked bread and cookies.  It's been... just lovely.  There have been a few minor squabbles, but nothing that took a lot of energy or lasted very long.  Lots of arts projects, I've got two kids currently drawing on the couch, a boy watching Inspector Gadget II on the floor, and a toddler and husband napping.  The roads are still too bad to drive on, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.  We live on a giant hill, so it gets bad earlier and stays that way longer - and I'm really happy about it today.  We've got errands to run, things we could be doing - but when I look at the snow covered road out front, I'm just as happy to pretend that the driving ban wasn't lifted.  I've got a pot roast bubbling, hot coffee perking and a bag full of library books just waiting for me.

I love the blizzard of 2013.  I missed the one in '78, I had just turned four, so I remember none of it.  But this one, this one I'll remember for a long time.