Snowy's Special Secret

Today was beautiful... FINALLY! It's been a long and cold winter and while I don't dare encroach anywhere near complaining (lest I be brow beaten with the statement of "I told you so" or "see, you didn't know what you were getting yourself into" or "I wondered how long it would be until you wanted your old life back") it's been an especially isolating time being at home. Again, I wouldn't dare complain about having a year off to hang out with my son because I know how fortunate I am to be afforded this luxury BUT as a single parent, it's a shift. I don't miss 99 OK more like 95% of the "stuff" but boy, when it's cold out and I've been house bound all day and the witching hour of feeding, bathing, story time and tucking in starts at 5:30 closely followed by lockdown after that, it starts to make a single girl feel a little like an island. So with that said, the sun finally broke through in all its blue skied glory and gave us a couple of days of mud puddles, melting snow and glorious, glorious fresh air. I still haven't figured out the trick to throwing the dogs ball in the snow (I've lost more than a few) but just going outside without 9million layers for 15 minutes felt like spring might soon be in the air. Kudos to the SAHM's who enjoy years at home with their children but I'm not one of them... I've been a "working girl" for too long to give up the independence and fun of being a professional outside of the home. I am so looking forward to having the nanny arrive so that I might remember the luxury of running into the post office without playing car seat scramble and 100 questions or what it's like to enjoy a drink with some friends without the mad race for home to relieve some friend who has stepped up to babysit or the sitter who should be at home in her own bed by now. But I digress. We've been waiting for the right snow conditions to make a snowman and today was the day. Corbin guarded the carrots like they were a prized possession and when I asked which one he wanted for our snowmans nose he told me, "No Mama, not one snowman, a snowman family!" We talked about it and decided we would make our family - a Mama, a Corbin and of course a Lyric dog. He has really started talking a lot about families lately. He puts his trucks into families (all the tractors or all the cars) and makes sure his stuffed toys have their families with them at night. He seems very proud of our family and told me one day at preschool pick up, "Our family doesn't have a daddy... but we have a Lyric and a Mama". So today, as we made huge snowballs for our snow family I smiled. Tonight at bedtime I brought out some new books that I dug out from the basement shelf (the upside to having so long to prepare for him coming home is the stashes of "things" that I bought along the way that I stumble upon). There were 4 books and I had him choose which 2 he wanted to read. One was, "Snowy's Special Secret". I vaguely remembered buying the book in that it was a story about a polar bear cub and his Mother and something special that the boy does for his Mom. To my surprise, the special secret that Snowy (the cub) makes for his Mother is a snowman family - him and his Mom... Corbin was delighted and with eyes as big as saucers said, "JUST LIKE US MAMA!!! HE MADE A SNOWMAN FAMILY JUST LIKE US!". What a nice way to end my day... snowman family on our lawn and a boy dreaming of carrots and stone noses in the other room. A good day - and finally some snowmen that we can be proud of :)