Almost Happy Winter, and a gift offer

Tomorrow, when the sun shines directly over the tropic of Capricorn which will take place at 1:08 a.m. EST, winter will officially take place. It doesn't feel much like winter here in North Texas right now. Yesterday I was hauling wood to the wood shed and stacking it with no jacket on, short sleeves too. My New England blood tells me that winter needs snow this time of the year, not BBQ weather.

I am hopeful that some time this winter snow will fall here and I will get to play in it. Yes, I actually do play in it. I don't need children home to still play. I will make a snow man, fall down in the snow carefully and make a 53 year old snow angel. I will wear two pairs of socks. I will have mittens that need to be placed near the stove to dry out, have snow in my boots, rosy cheeks, laugh at myself and be careful to walk back in the footprints I made on the way out, so as to not spoil too much snow.

I will run and fall, laugh about how falling is not as easy as it once was. Come in the house and have hot chocolate with a lot of marshmallow fluff in it. And when I am all warmed up, then I will head out again to explore.

I think adults fuss so much about the snow because they gave up playing in it. They have become afraid of it. Did you know that when you get older, you tend to watch where you walk more than just walk and soon you find yourself depending more on sight than balance so your balance gets unused and lazy. I practice walking down stairs and not watching them. Its so hard at first. I can't remember the moment that I became like an old person walking down the stairs, watching each step, but I am not liking it, its fun to have your eyes to see from way up on the top step. You can re-train your brain to be young again, but it takes some work.

Re-train your thinking about snow. If you can look out the window, see snow and see NO snowman on your front lawn or back yard. GO MAKE ONE and then send me a picture. Better yet, see if you can have one taken of you making your snow man. I will send a little gift to the first 10 of you that sends me a picture of you making a big snow man .

Embrace your childlike wonder of the world and go with it. I promise that first snow we have here in Texas that is more than a dusting, I will take pictures of me playing in the snow. In 2000 when my sister Jan and my best friend Debbie were here for Christmas it snowed heavy and I made them all get dressed warm and we all went outside with my girls and had a proper snow ball fight and made a great snowman. What was really fun is that no one was older than us to tell us to come in when it got dark !

Annike never did like the snow

The next pictures are from last years snow fall here