It snowed last night. And by “snowed,” I mean “barely dusted a damn thing,” but my 5 year old looked out the window and saw a winter wonderland ripe for the sledding. And good God she would not stop begging me to get out our highlighter-ugly plastic sled and pull her around in it! haha! So I finally said I would.

We went outside, I dragged her across our grass for a few minutes and then promptly declared I was freezing and that I would gladly play, but it would have to be INdoors. Now, she’s an outdoor girl, so she took her snow-booted self, all wrapped up in coat and mittens and trapsed from house to house, finding nary a single friend either home at all or who wanted to play in the freezing cold.

Her older sister and I sat at the front door and spied. We watched her hopefulness wane down to sadness as her head drooped a little lower after walking away from each house. So, really, we had no choice but to go play with her. She was THRILLED, obviously, especially at the fact that her SISTER was coming to play, too. The sister whose auto-responder to any incoming message is NO.

My little one ran inside, grabbed her teddy bear and took him “sledding” while the big one and I got all bundled up. When we walked around to the front of the house, there was Holland and Teddy (who is a girl, btw) - Teddy in the sled and Holland happily jumping in snow-speckled grass and doing her best to make snow angels, but only succeeding in flattening said grass.

So, what does a mom do? TAKE PHOTOS! YES! LOTS OF PICTURES OF THEM PLAYING IN THE SNOW! While I don’t take EVERY opportunity to turn our normal activities into a photoshoot, I obviously have a love with lifestyle shots, and it was a fun way to get some photos of our new house, too. it was delightful to see them playing together, to see my oldest (8) laughing and smiling and enjoying herself with her little sister. It turned out to be a fantastic morning for all three of us.