Snow Weekend

My Grandma's husband passed away last week, so we made a trip to visit my family and attend the funeral.  This is not the first funeral that my kids have attended, but they always have more questions about death, heaven and dying when faced with these situations.  I try to answer as openly and honestly as possible, but this is sometimes a tough situation for young kids. 

 

Unfortunately, we had a snow storm start the night before the viewing for Tom, making the trip to the funeral home and back a bit more dangerous.  The kids did not mind the snow at all though - it was perfect packing snow for building snowmen.  And since church was cancelled due to the weather, there was time for playing before having to leave for the viewing.  However, we did not pack snow clothes to go to Grandma and Grandpa's house:(

 So we improvised and brought the snow inside to build snowmen!  My dad thought we were crazy, but a couple of towels contained most of the excess water, so no real big mess.  Of course, Blaine had to start by eating some of the snow first - this kid loves to eat snow! 

 The kids had a blast building snowmen and we found some legos, pony beads, party toothpicks, fabric scraps, etc to add all the embellishments to the creations. 

 We ended up with a few other snow creations as well before the snow started getting too wet to work with.  The snowman family found their new home outside the back door to stay cold.  Not our conventional snowman building, but a lot of fun and no bundling up with lots of snow clothes:)

For the funeral the next day, it was still pretty snowy and Ava's school was cancelled.  So rather than going back home with John, she got to stay on Monday.  I did not take the kids to the funeral, but left them at Grandma Bert and Grandpa Milt's house.  Ava had her e-learning assignments prepped for her and my cousin Mady (who also did not have school) helped her complete them.  It was really nice - I did not have to help her get all those assignments done myself!  But I think Mady confirmed that she would stick with her original college plans and not major in elementary education!  I love the fact that my kids know and can have relationships with some great-grandparents.  Not only did they get to play and spend the day with them, but Blaine got to help Grandpa plow snow (I think they were both excited about that), and they also learned that Grandpa Milt ate chicken poop as a kid thinking it was chewing gum and that Grandma Bert learned that turds float when she pooped in a lake and watched the turds pop up beside her!  Can't beat the relationships and experiences with family:)