Adulthood cancelled: Mommy's taking a snow day

There are things from my childhood that will forever be ingrained in my memory.

• Kindergarten graduation and getting picked on for wearing a gingham check print dress (I loved that dress).
• Holding Greg's hand under the table (also in kindergarten) because he was picked on by the same kids.
• Making myself feverish and ill every day I had Physical Education until my dad went to school and fixed the problem - again, with the picking on!
• The sixth grade spelling bee ... and almost winning. I will never forget how to spell pennant. Ever.
• Summers by the pool.
• Winters sledding down Dates' Hill, shoveling the driveway and staying outside until I couldn't feel my toes.

No, not all my memories of growing up in that small town include getting picked on for one thing or another. After all, kids are mean and I'm an adult now. I can look past that. What I can't look past is the fun I had, sometimes with the very children who made fun of that cute little dress and that cute little boy.
So let's talk about what fun I had in that tiny little town I spent my childhood and adolescence and early adulthood trying to escape, and now wish I could go back to. I figure after my last entry, we could use a lighter subject.

Winters in Lyndonville were serene. The snow would fall by the foot some winters and blanket the farmer's fields, the only disruption to a sea of white being hoof prints from deer or a herd of cattle. For me, it was closest I was going to get to a Thomas Kinkade illusion of beauty. Mother Nature truly had some awesome moments in my youth.

Our home was old - and drafty. My bedroom was colder depending on which direction the wind was blowing.

But if you looked out and it was snowing, it was magical. And it meant time to find your gloves, your hat, pull up your boots and wiggle your way into snowpants and a jacket that would make you look more like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man than a developing young lady.

This beauty won't last for long once I get out there...

Last year when I tried to get Josie into a pair of handed down snowpants so she could go outside and play, she panicked, threw a fit and refused to even leave regular pants on. I think it was out of fear that wearing pants meant I would make her go outside in the snow. This year she seems a little more responsive to the idea of snow in general, so when I woke up to this type of scenery, I was pretty sure it was the Financial Gods shining down on me, giving me the OK to head to the store and find the perfect pair of Stay Puftiest pants available for my kids.

And that's what I plan to do today.

All too often I forget they are children and that just because I'm freezing sitting in the kitchen as I write this, it doesn't mean they should miss out on the fun of building snow forts. Even though I experienced my childhood, it doesn't mean I can't experience it again through them.

We're going to go and spend some money I normally would be tight-fisted with because my kid just told me she wants, "A snow shirt, snow socks, snow jeans and snow pants."

And my other younger kid added boots to her sister's demands and a big fat, "I wanna play in the snow!"

So I guess that settles that. Today, we're going to act our ages - the ages we choose to act, anyway. Today's the day I get to be 7 years old again, the age so long ago I deemed as "the perfect age" and my kids are going to not see their mom as someone who worries about the messes, but the playmate they yearn for on the days I beg for a clean house.

Today, Mommy's taking a snow day.