To Live And Diaper: Snow, Glorious Snow.

Living in San Diego has its advantages, and its disadvantages too. For the most part there is nothing to complain about, though I do find a way to squeeze my gripes from time to time. However, one of the things I love about living here (especially for the boys) is the diversity in weather conditions from place to place. During a winter rainstorm, the local mountains (only an hour drive from the house) often receive snow as they are about 4000' elevation. And if you know me, which you may or may not, then you may or may not know that I LOVE the snow. More than that, I love the cold weather. Which begs the question, why in the hell do you live in San Diego? Long story...well not really...either way it's inconsequential and boring. I live here, that's all.

Now the Mrs confuses my love of cold weather and snow for liking to be cold. No one likes to be cold no more than they like to be hot. What I like about the cold is if you do heat up, the weather offers you the ability to cool down quickly. As where in the heat if you are too hot, there is nothing natural about the weather that will cool you down - you just continue to sweat and I sweat a lot, as in buckets even in cooler weather (genetics sometimes suck).

Alas, though we do get snow near San Diego, it never falls in San Diego, so no parking lot donuts for this guy. So with a recent weekend downpour of rain, the local mountains in Cleveland National Forest got a solid dump of 2' of fresh powder. Though the Mrs was not terribly happy about bringing the Little Guy along or even if the Big Guy would fair well, I was insistent that as my kids (and frankly kids in general) that they would find the snow to be utterly amazing.

So off we went. After setting up a sledding playdate, we headed out of the house. But to go sledding you need at least one very important item...a sled. The other thing about moving to San Diego was that we got rid of just about everything Wintery in our wardrobes and otherwise (minus my snowboard et al.). We don't have ice scrapers or wool sweaters, and we also didn't have sleds. I made a last minute call to the local sporting goods store and thankfully they had an assortment. We rushed over and bought two sleds (a long sled for all of us and a classic disc sled. Note: they don't make sleds like they used to. I wanted the simple bucket toboggan styled sled and the best I could do was a nerf-like substance covered sled with a hard plastic bottom to the tune of $40. Even the disc was $15. Insanity, but now we have sleds...I digress).

The Big Guy hasn't seen snow in two years. And as he is only 2 1/2, he surely doesn't remember the last time he was in it. One thing he took to just as quickly as he did two years ago was eating the snow. As soon as we pulled up to the default sledding hill and he got out of the car, he picked up some snow and shoved it in his mouth. However, as I had not yet educated him on what to eat and what not to eat when in winter wonderlands, when he showed me what he was eating I realized that he had grabbed a piece of gravel filled ice from under the tire. Lovely.

The Big Guy showing me Dad approved eating snow.

After a quick lesson on safe snow eating habits I got him all suited up, got the Little Guy Ergo'd in and we trudged into the snow. After a few missteps, the Big Guy fell down and I guess he figured if he was already down there he might as well sample the goods. About three handfuls of snow later, he was ready to continue on our trek. He was amazed by the snowmen, that until now he had only heard about in the books we read to him.

After we caught up with some friends, I thought sledding would be in order. The Big Guy had no desire at all. I was flabbergasted. How could you not want to go sledding? Here we are, up in the mountains and there are tons of other kids and families sledding - does peer pressure mean nothing to you? Apparently not, as he preferred (you guessed it) to sit and eat more snow.

The Big Guy about to take a tumble.

On about mouthful #10 here; hydration is important.

Thanks to Betadad for getting the rare picture of me and the boys (the Little Guy is Ergo'd)

After a few rides with the Little Guy, and one ride where I managed to completely snow in my camera (not one of my brighter moments) and have an internal panic attack until I cleaned it all out, the Big Guy suddenly had some desire to take a ride...just not with me. Apparently he liked the idea of riding with his friends and their dad more...thanks buddy. But he finally had a great time and wanted to go again and again and again.

Dad got shook for the cool Dad, sled and the twins...

...I can't blame him though, it does look like fun.

The whole experience made me realize that next winter could be our first family ski vacation, and for that I am ecstatic. I love going to the mountains. It is often akin to a religious experience for me (and I'm agnostic, so I don't really have those). So the chance to share that with my family is very exciting. I hope that they take to it like flys to sh...maybe that's not the best analogy here...like fish to water (much better). If I can just get the boys on board with cold weather and snow, maybe we can turn the Mrs, but I'm not getting my hopes up.