the long winter, for real

during my prep to move to minnesota, i heard story after story about the long and terrible winters, as if cold could scare me out of love! year after year i found myself almost disappointed, hoping i would wake up one morning with snow up to the top of the door frame, just like in the Long Winter. i began to wonder if minnesotan's talk about their winter like seattlites talk about rain; mere attempts to keep the masses from moving to a glorious place on earth. after six years living in the frozen tundra, this is the first winter that has really lived up to the reputation i heard of minnesota.
we've had about 36 inches of snowfall with very little melt. our backyard looks like this right now:

for the first time in 9 years, the city is restricting parking on the even numbered sides of the streets, get this, FOR THE REST OF WINTER!! i can't believe there are so many who still bike around town, but our neighbor has given that up and now his bike looks like this:
little ones can only spend so many minutes outdoors when the temperatures are hovering above zero, so we get creative indoors. lots of fort building, crafting, book reading, letter writing (more on that later), and going on adventures.
last winter almost did me in, so this year we have tried to take advantage of the ways that our city celebrates winter. anything that keeps us distracted long enough outdoors to catch a little bit of natural vitamin d. this has been much easier for jackson than it has for claire, who still has a hard time moving enough to keep herself warm and doesn't believe mittens really have her best intentions in mind. many of the city parks have lakes or flood a portion of the field to make a little skating rink. some even offer free skates to borrow while you play!


we went to a kite festival at Lake Harriet, bought our first kite and flew it splendidly in the frigid winds on the frozen lake. we tried ice fishing, made a beautiful painting using a rubber form of a fish as a stamp, and watched the D&R quickly respond to a little girl who stepped into an ice fishing hole.
the following weekend we toured the Art Shanties on Medicine Lake, little ice houses, each decked out to a different theme; tiny shanty (everything was miniature so it felt like walking into alice in wonderland), dance shanty, Dice shanty (filled with games), art swap shanty jackson spent his saved birthday and christmas money on his first pair of skis! he was thrilled (and we were so glad he chose skis and not a noisy toy) we went to the Loppet as a family and he skied the entire evening while the rest of us went on foot. next year we all hope to do it. i know, we've said that every year since we discovered the magical luminary event. but seriously, next year we'll all be on skis!
of course there is the ever-dripping nose
and the hard work building snow chairs, snow caves, snow forts, and paths thru the snow
it is so fun to see the kids work together!
hot drinks are enhanced by sipping them from beautiful mugs. super cosy mittens (these i found in the free box at a thrift store and i LOVE them!)
and maple snow. it doesn't get much better than fresh snow with a little maple syrup and raw milk poured over. D-lightful! just like the Ingalls girls did back in the Big Woods
jackson completely embraced winter this year. he wants to be the one to shovel snow, he plays outside, alone, building tunnels in the snow. his favorite part of yesterday was working with grandpy to break up the ice. i'm trying to pay attention and learn to love it more than endure it, but this time of year it is hard to forget the February i grew up with; first blooms of the year brilliantly shining out of bright green grass.
sigh.
we wont' see that for another month or two.