From Georgia to the Land of Ice and Snow

Since Brianna and Hunter moved to Georgia four years

ago, they've only seen snow one time.  So when they arrived

at our house on Friday they were delighted to find at least

some remnants of Moore County's latest mini-blizzard.

Here's a quick summary of some of our fun.

First order of business: snowball fight! Everybody's a winner!

Even though all of our grandkids have had trampolines of their
own, the simple allure of this old mattress was a throwback.

Here's a series of short videos showing Bri and Hunter
doing forward rolls, "Donkey Kicks", and "taking a spin."

There was a lot more fun of that wacky sort.

Let's move on with more snapshots of fun.

Bri is now the Mistress of Slime. She loves creating the stuff
in a variety of colors and with special additives like glitter.

She may have gotten her love of gross stuff from her mother.
Not her parents.

Bri and Hunter collected snow from every conceivable nook and
cranny of our yard. 

Hunter checks the hardness of the ice in this birdbath. This was
the morning the temp was in the low 20's.

Creative people can cook without water.  Didn't you know that?
Dishes requiring liquefied ice had to wait until that afternoon.

After a little melting, Hunter was able to remove this ice from
another birdbath intact.



Note: I know the above makes it sound like Hunter was melting,
not the ice, but I intentionally left it in for people like myself to enjoy.

The Kirby grandkids joined us for the afternoon.
Somehow, I got all five grandkids in the same photo.

The dogwood tree is a good jumping off point, especially now
that we have the mattress.

We started a fire in the chiminea to take the chill out of the air.
Ryan helped supervise it for a while, but later it was left to just
me and Judy.  The kids had too many other options for play.

These "sassy" girls have just collected a porcelain bowl with
just about the last of the snow.  They packed it down so Bri
could show it to Amanda the next day (which she did).
I didn't know it at the time, but the girls are role-playing here.
Explanation below.

Judy is playing the role of customer in the girls' restaurant here.
Claire and Bri pretended to be sisters, and were intentionally being
"unhelpful" and even "rude". Now that took a lot of acting!

The time flew by all too quickly.  Here are some of the

many things Bri and Hunter also did, which I didn't

get to document with photos:

Got doughnuts at Duncan and Granny's Doughnuts

Found bargains at the Sandhills Coalition and Episcopal

Thrift Shop

Played baseball (Hunter's just been chosen for a team)

Played Foxtail Baseball (they invented it)

Played Haunted Mansion I Spy on an old laptop program

Played Payday (a high finance board game)

Played Sleeping Queens (a clever card game)

A Unicorn game (can't remember the actual name)

Bubble Talk (a $2 "steal" for a $40 game)

*Note about Bubble Talk.  It's a game where players

submit funny captions for random photos.  A "judge,"

one of the players, choosiest the funniest or cleverest.

After a wild round of that game, I showed Bri and Hunter

photos on my blog from their early years, where I delighted

in submitting my own funny captions. You can look at just

about any blog in my archives to see some samples.

Click here for a sample from 2009

We also spent a great quantity of time enjoying

meals and snacks lovingly prepared by Judy.

All those activities require energy, you know!

Great weekends like this leave me and Judy eager for

more time with this lovable bunch. ANY time is good for us!

Every Kid's Dream: A Mattress You Can Jump On!

Judy and I gave ourselves a new mattress for Christmas. 

Rather than immediately get rid of the old one, I set it

out under our dogwood tree with a tire swing and rings.

In no time, Evan had found a way to employ tree, swing,

and rings to catapult himself onto the nice bouncy mattress.

Best part?  No grown-up saying "NO BOUNCING!"

Here's his first feat.

Claire and Ryan found the mattress useful as a

launching pad for the tire swing, too.

Claire shows her usual exuberance over discovering

something new and fun.

It also makes a large, safe surface for tumbling stunts.

It wasn't long before Ryan determined to try the jump

from the dogwood. He sat a while with his eyes closed.

I asked him, "Are you concentrating or praying."

"Praying," he answered.

His prayers were answered.  Not only was he not hurt,

he bounced up ready to go again.

This week, Brianna and Hunter may get to try the

mattress (if the snow's not too deep).

So maybe I won't be getting rid of the old mattress

as soon as I thought!