I'm Dreaming of a - Wet Christmas?

If it ever looked like a white Christmas was immanent, this was the year for it!

And wa-la! It rained.

It was the craziest thing. Suddenly, you could walk outside in a t-shirt (well, compared to the sub-zero temps of most of this month and a good part of last). It was literally raining on the snow! After Dec. 21, the first official day of winter, I might add!

YUCK! What a mess! Slushy, muddy, puddles, and dirty, mushy "snow." But, at least by Christmas Day, the snow was all but gone, the grass was green (very well-watered at this point), and all the slippery ice had melted away.

The local children have all been grumbling about "no white Christmas, no sledding, no fun" etc. However, as I watched out my front window today I saw a group of children who had NOT given up. They obviously had recieved snow "vehicles" from Santa and were determined to use them. Their house located on the other side of the church parking lot that is across the street from us, an easy view from my living room window. What was left of the snow was piled at the end of the lot, just across from their house. They dragged a new sled, a snowboard, and a bright red saucer to the top of the mound and slid down, one by one. HMMPH. Very short ride. But fun!

They huddled and apparently made a plan. They went home and brought back two snow shovels. As one kid dragged pieces of the smaller snow mound to the larger one (to make it bigger, of course) another spread snow out from the bottom of the hill to make the ride longer. The third packed snow on top of the hill. Now, you must understand that this was very hard work. The snow is "old snow," crusty on the top from freezing, thawing, and refreezing. And being rained on and frozen again, it was more like, well, ice. But work hard they did, all in the name of FUN!

Finally, as I watched, the work was deemed complete. The children now, one at a time (there was only ROOM for one at a time) dragged their snow toys up the mound, which still didn't quite qualify as a "hill," and down they went, and it worked pretty well until they hit the hard asphalt at the end of the melting run. A very abrupt stop. But, with just a little imagination, they could have been the children in the picture above. Right?

By now, I went off to do something, probably the dishes. Two or three hours later I took my dog out for his walk (noticing that my face didn't hurt from the cold as it did the last few weeks) and as we walked around the block and passed the snow mounds, there was almost nothing left but slush. Across the street, the sled and the snowboard and the saucer were strewn across the lawn, but broken-in somewhat. Just as they should be on the day after Christmas.