How is it possible that a child raised in the Central Valley had not seen snow or touched the ocean until his fourth year of life? Gosh, Dave and I are lowsy parents in some respects. Being only an hour from each environment, we just never got around to visiting either until he was three.
We took Eddie to the snow for the first time at
Leland Snowplay at the beginning of January before Dave went back to work. It was a three hour drive so I packed up the van the night before and we popped a sleeping/PJ-wearing Eddie into the warmed up car at 6:30 am. Even stopping for bagels, once to check the tire pressure, and a final time to install the chains, we made excellent time and arrived at the park at 10:30 am. I'd never installed chains before and it was snap; I don't know why people complain so much about it. I think I'd only driven a car one other time with chains on and I'd forgotten just how loud and bumpy it makes the car, even at 20 MPH.
I dressed us as best I could, without breaking the bank. I didn't know if he/we'd like it so I didn't want to spend much money on supplies or gear. Eddie wore a size 2T snow bib that I bought on clearance last season (it was wayyyy too small) and we all wore rain boots with extra socks. Lucky for us, it was a warmish day so we didn't get too cold. The biggest issues were that Eddie's pants were too short for the leg liner to fit all the way down in his boot so his feet got wet AND it turns out my "snow pants" that I've had for a last several years are most likely just "exercise" pants with a deceptively waterproof-appearing outer layer. My butt got soaked playing in the snow.
Despite our gear, we had a fantastic time! Eddie was too short to get a ticket on the tow-up route, so we stayed on the walk-up "bunny" sledding hill most of the day. Our little boy went down on our laps once or twice and then insisted on going down alone. It. Was. Adorable. He looked like a little bobsledder!
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| Lucky Eddie got hauled up the hill by us. |
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| Ready to go down the hill! |
After a couple of hours sledding, Eddie decided he just wanted to play in the snow instead.
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| Dave and I had to dig a lot of holes in the snow banks for Eddie. He said they were holes for dinosaurs... |
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| Mama and Eddie Pie. |
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| Me and Davie. |
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| Three Bowers. My Aunt Virginia made Eddie's hat, originally for my mom when she had started losing her hair due to chemo treatments. But it was too small for her. Luckily it's perfect for Eddie! |
After a few hours we went to the car and ate a picnic lunch--I'd brought sandwiches, snacks, and water bottles because I wasn't sure we'd like the food sold at the snow park. And boy am I glad we packed our food because the line inside at lunchtime was INSANE. Dave and I bought coffees after lunch to warm up, but they were from a smaller counter at the back that didn't have a line. And then we bought some bags of popcorn to munch on during the 3 hour drive home.
That night in bed, I ordered Eddie and me some new snow pants and him a pair of snow boots. I figured Dave and I would make due with rain boots again or go to Target for some snow boots. But of course, Target only sells snow boots in early fall so they were completely out of stock in-store.
We all enjoyed playing in the snow so much that we went again last weekend. This time I decided on the
Donner Summit Sno Park. It was much cheaper, requiring only a parking pass, which I bought and printed beforehand.
It was even more fun than the proper snow park. We forgot to buy/bring a sled, so we made due with the lid from a Rubbermaid tote in the car (our emergency kit). Eddie also had success sledding in the laundry basket I'd used to pack all our gear into. I'd packed up all the random lid-less pieces of Tupperware kicking around the kitchen so we could use them to make snow bricks to build a castle.
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| Eddie and I making snow angels. |
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| Us in the woods at Donner Summit Snopark. |
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| Eddie Pie in the snow! |
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| Dave working on the snow castle. |
We had another car picnic, but this time it was much better: olives, apple sauce, pesto-and-cream-cheese sandwiches on olive bread, PB & J, cheeses, crackers, tangerines, pretzels, cookies, etc. And a huge thermos of hot coffee.
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| Our car picnic. I love all my little Tupperwares. |
After lunch Eddie wanted to hike through the woods, so we did, for about 2 hours straight. We'd stop on occasion so he could knock snow off tree limbs but he was really interested in what we call "adventuring." That is, just wandering around wherever. Eventually, napless Eddie was not being a "good listener" anymore so I carried him back to the car. We stripped off our snow gear, down to our PJs underneath, and drove home. About 5 minutes into the drive, Eddie was dead asleep.
Since Donner Summit is only about 1.5 hours away from Davis, we had plenty of time to stop by Walmart to buy a replacement batter for the Saturn and then head to Costco for a pizza/polish dog dinner and to buy a few things for us and for Dave's parents. The next morning Eddie went to the zoo with his friend Renee, leaving Dave and I time to go to Big 5 Sporting Goods to buy ourselves proper snow boots and extra gloves. I still need to get Eddie a second set of gloves since they get too wet to want to wear after lunch.
Next time we'll take friends with us to the snow and we're planning on a snowshoeing trip with Auntie and Uncle, too. Yay snow!
2 comments:
SO FUN! I wish we could drive an hour and a half to the snow, but its more like 3+ for us. Tell Dave I like his castle too! If we were there I know Kyle would have jumped in and together they would have built an elaborate structure.
Oooh lookit yer picnic supplies — enviable! How awesome that you all love the snow and devoted the time and energy to going TWICE already. It's too easy to put it off forever; you deserve a big three-cheers for making the trek! (Or "adventure," as Eddie would call it...) xoxoxo
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