Snowday--Day 212/Day 10

Today was a good day. The kids stayed home from school and we spent much of the afternoon in the snow. It started off as a snowball fight with the neighbors, and then something made me want to check the hill behind our house. I'd never thought of it before. I wanted to see if there was a clearing big enough to go sledding. It didn't take long to find one. I called the kids over and asked if they wanted to try it. They said they would, so I got busy cutting several tiny trees that were growing on the hill and clearing out all the thorny bushes. The biggest tree was only a few inches around but even hitting any stump could cause catastrophe so I cut them all as close to the ground as possible and pulling them up if I could. Tim got to try it first since he had his sled with him. He went down fine and loved it, but I had to ask he not go down face first. The space we cleared was pretty big, but at both sides were trees that aren't coming out with anything less than an axe, and we didn't need any facial injuries. Later on, when Tim finally hit the tree after running up to his sled and jumping on it, he tumbled down the rest of the hill with no injuries.


They went over a friends house to slide down his driveway (??). When the nachos were done I called them all in and we pretty much cleared out the dish between Emily, Allison, Colton, Gabrielle and I. We were famished. When we'd had our fill, it was time to head off to Awanas. Garrett got dropped off and we were on our way. We picked Jiselle on the way and began our usually boisterous trip to the church. Many times we'll go over funny lines from several movies. A recent favorite is Elf ("There's no singing in the North Pole." "Yes there is. We do it all the time." "No there isn't" "Yes there is." etc.) I brought up one of my favorite characters from Pixar's movies, Dory (voiced very well by Ellen Degeneres). Garrett did a great impression of her as she talked to the whale from inside it's mouth ("That was a tough one. I couldn't tell if he said "I'm going to get you out" or "I want a rootbeer float""). Everyone else chimed in with "No eating here tonight, No eating here tonight. You on a diet!"

We got there and headed to the sanctuary. Emily sang the Star Spangled Banner, and I attempted to tape it. The kids who had brought toys for the Oxford Fish took them to the front and had their pictures taken. A representative talked for a bit and we all stood and applauded her work.

We were a little short on people, but it was hardly noticeable. We got through the verses and headed to counsel time. Angela continued her story of Samuel, Saul and David and then played a game asking questions of the story. We played Zonk where you got to pick cards out of a bag until you picked out a zonk card or you wanted to stop. In an unusual turn of events, Team A didn't get any zonks and team B got one ever time leaving me with 21,000 points for team A and three zeroes on the B side. I made a snowman with team B's three zeroes on the board and you would've thought team A thought it was the funniest thing they had ever seen. That's what a great about kids. They don't hold back. When they laugh, it just funny to see them laugh.

Then it was game time. One of the girls didn't want to play so you sat on a counter. She probably asked someone to have one of the several candy canes on the counter and her and another girl had one. Once that first game was over, she asked that all the kids that had sat out the first game to come and play the second game. It was then Mary realized the girls were eating candy canes. There were several there, but only two that were big enough for her game. We ended up playing with the little canes. So we had kindergartners, 1st graders and second graders trying to pass tiny candy canes to each other using only pencils without using their hands. It ended up being slightly easier than we had thought and the game went well.

When we got back to our room, the leaders were not quite done with the room, so the kids sat outside. I asked if they wanted to sing a song and we decided on the edited version of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. I thought that was pretty cool. When they were done, we entered the room and gave out awards. Gabrielle finished her first book and was awarded another jewel and another book. I'm very proud of her.

On the way home, Colton asked if we could stop by the market on the corner down the road. All seven of us went into the store and I was the last one in. The kids had stopped at the door and we knocking on it since they couldn't get it open. I looked at my watch and didn't think they could be closed before 9. After 30 seconds of wondering what was going on, Emily pushed the other side of the door and it opened. It was pretty funny. We got a drink or other type of sugar and left.

Noah was still up when I got home after dropping Garrett off. The kids were ready for bed, so we said prayers and the day ended.