Winter Wonderland

Yes Essie, we really do have plastic toboggans to get stuff up and down our driveway in the winter! Three to be exact. Orange, purple and tourquoise. Purchased a long, time ago. Back when it was just the three of us: The Other Mother, Buckshot and me.

Back then, Buckshot wasn't even Buckshot; he hadn't yet earned his teen nickname. I think he was still Little Bear or Zunder Bear or some foolish, lovey, little boy name....SIGH...They grow up way too fast.

Anyhow - The cool thing is, on a snowy morning you can let them down the driveway ahead of you on their yellow polypro rope leash and it will squish down the snow like a little path to walk in. If the toboggans have enough backpacks, bookbags, and stuff on them going down, it packs the snow. Going up - It is much easier to drag grocieries, a gallon of milk and your back-pack. The driveway is steep enough in places you dont want to wear a backpack to tilt you in the wrong direction. We just use the toboggans when it is too snowy to get up and down our driveway.

In the winter, we carefully listen to the weather reports and leave or vehicles in a parking area at the bottom of the driveway if snow is expected. Our plow guy quit two years ago because our driveway was too steep and uneven in places. So now we do it by hand in the steep spots and with a snow blower in the flat spots. Even so, it needs to be clear to the pavement to get up the steep spots.

When there is a storm, we all go outside and shovel together. There is something zen like and strangely relaxing in spending an hour moving a ton of snow by hand. It's interesting to see what psychological gymnastics happen to your brain when you are out sweating in the snow and freezing your feet off at the same time. We've been told that shoveling our driveway doesn't just build character, it reveals character. And we are certainly a bunch of characters....