winter weather.

First of all, I'd like to wish my mom and step-dad a very happy anniversary. I think we're up to year 11 now. When you guys got married, the temps were in the 50s and it was beautiful and today I can't feel my toes.

On that note, I'm going to talk about weather today, and weather memories, and holiday weather, because really, they all go hand in hand. I've spent the time between Christmas and New Year's outside of Minnesota twice - once in Florida, and once in Arizona. I'll say this, and probably only once, but I missed the snow. The holidays are not the same without having a "White Christmas" or being able to sing "Let It Snow" at the top of your lungs from November to February (or March, April, or May, depending on how Minnesota is feeling).

One of my earliest memories of snow, is following my dad by stepping into the tracks he made. I was five or six at the time, and without his shoe marks, I would have sank, we had so much snow that year.

My childhood is filled with snow memories; sledding in my backyard, snowball fights and igloo building with the other neighborhood kids. Praying for snow days, two hour late starts, or early outs. My childhood led into high school, where we would fit as many people into one car as possible and go to someone's house, or when my friends who lived in the country couldn't get home so they stayed with me. There was a time or two when we were stuck at school, because they wouldn't let people leave unless their parents picked them up. More than one time we had to shovel out cars, or wave apologetically as we slid through stop signs.

In college, snow days weren't as common, and I was forced to trek through high winds and subzero temperatures to get to class (this last week anyone?). I'd get pictures from home where the snow drifts were taller than my sister, and phone calls that my family got to miss school and work until someone could plow them out. Christmas Eve's were spent snowmobiling, making hot cocoa while everyone else went snowmobiling, and Christmas mornings were spent looking outside for reindeer prints in fresh snow. I can't imagine the holidays without cold weather and fluffy white flakes.

Hope you're all enjoying the holidays. What are your snow memories?