A Foreign Concept...

I was reading Annika's veckobrev from school - the letter from her teacher every Friday describing what they have done and what they will be doing over the next week. The teacher (Anna, by the way, not Mrs. X), wrote that with the snow, many of the children were bringing their cross-country skis to school to use during recess. Wow - for a Texan, that was a foreign concept...

Skiing to me is loading up the car with masses of equipment, driving 8 hours to the nearest slope, arriving late at night, and getting up early for a hearty breakfast. After parking a mile away and waiting for a shuttle bus to get to the mountain base, waiting in line with a pushy crowd to buy a lift ticket... well, then you're there for the duration - until the last lift closes.

Admittedly, cross-country skiing was not really part of my vocabulary until I was 25, and I had never tried it until a trip to Norway where a friend and I gave it a shot and were passed by old and young. Which, by the way, is true humiliation - puffing along, struggling on your skis while a 3-year-old whizzes past you, singing songs as she goes - and then her 80-year-old great grandma leaves you in a wake of powder... and on the only downhill part of the trek, you trip over your skis and get a fat lip from face-planting in the snow... but I digress...

Anyway, how wonderful that skiing could be something like basketball, that you just "pick up" for a 30-minute break!

So inpired were we that we rushed out today and bought (waxless) cross-country skis for the threesome, and wax for the skis that David and I bought ourselves two Christmasses ago and have never used. I am full of visions of how it will be - picking the kids up early from dagis, heading for the local golf course (with prepared trails - not ready to go it in the rough) and schussing along in peace and joyful appreciation of the winter landscape. Tune in next week...

Angels and Dreams

(on his 18th time out of bed)

Benjamin: Mom, I want to be a kid when I'm an angel.

Me: Well, Benjamin, I'm sure that would be fine. I suppose you can be anything you want when you're an angel.

Benjamin (with excitement): Really? Can I be a cow?


And Annika, who told me about her nice dream, when she got to play games with Morfar again, like when she was 4... so glad she remembers.