A Snowman for Molly

Ever since Max's snowman melted, he's been asking to make another one. Since we had a bunch of snow this week and it was supposed to warm up over the weekend, I thought Sunday would present a great snowman-making opportunity. So, when M&M got up from their naps, I dragged out all the snow gear, spent about 20 minutes trying to get everyone suited up, and bundled everyone out the door. Of course, no sooner did we get outside than I noticed a rather malodorous smell wafting up from the vicinity of someone's drawers (a quick sniff test suggested that Max was the primary suspect). Given that I was pretty sure that we wouldn't be outside more than 15-20 minutes, I decided to be a Bad Mom and wait to change the poopy diaper until we came back inside.

Max took to cavorting around in the snow immediately – he ran around, tried to make some snowballs, and was generally delighted. Although Molly was hesitant at first, she finally got the hang of things and was soon happily stomping through the snow. She fell over a few times and needed some help getting back on her feet (since she was rather well bundled), but the occasional wipe out didn’t seem to phase her.

Unfortunately, in spite of the warmer temperatures, the snow hadn't quite reached the optimum "packing snow" state. I tried rolling some big snowballs to make the snowman, but after they reached a certain size they just started falling apart. So, we opted to make a very small snowman, which we proudly displayed on the patio table. Although it was a "baby snowman" instead of the "big snowman" Max requested, both kids were delighted with it. They kept coming over to look at it and squeal, "Snowman! Snowman!" Since Molly was asleep when we built the first snowman, I guess this is officially HER first snowman.

As predicted, we didn't last long outside. Once they both managed to get snow down their sleeves and their wrists were getting cold, I dragged them back inside. To my surprise, Max wasn't the one sporting the stinky diaper – it was Molly! A couple of clean diapers and changes of clothes later, we were all nice and warm and dry. Max and Molly spent the rest of the day admiring the baby snowman through the door wall and pointing it out to anyone who walked into the room.