Field Trip: Snow at Mt. Rainier

Caitlyn loves snow. That's a horribly brief and to the point sentence that doesn't convey the degree to which Caitlyn loves snow.

Of course, we live in a place that gets only occasional snow. When it snows here, it's pretty and it's fun, (usually) not enough to seriously snarl things up, although to an eight year old, I think the snarling is part of the fun. I've explained how more snow in Seattle wouldn't be a good thing, but I guess I've not been terribly convincing. I've made some effort to explain how months of snow might not be fun, but that's flopped as well.

I don't think our recent outing to the snow at Mt. Rainier has done anything for Caitlyn except reinforce her notion that Snow = Fun.

Yeah, she looks like she's having a terrible time.

Actually, the weekend was a fine lesson in perseverance. We'd gone with friends (6 adults, 3 kids - perhaps the most ideal ratio possible) to do some cross country skiing, something most of us hadn't done in years, if at all. Our first time out, Caitlyn fell frequently. (I fell too, within 5 minutes of putting the skis on, and lightly sprained my wrist. I had taken a quilt for binding in the evenings and then couldn't hold a needle.) There were tears and so much frustration; at one point, she looked at Ian and me and demanded, "Is this supposed to be fun?" She'd fall, she'd struggle to get up, she'd fall again.

But by the end of the weekend, she was getting back on her feet more easily and doing better at keeping up with the other kids.

She invented silly names for all the different ways she could fall down, then demonstrated them all. She preferred skiing in the tracks of others but didn't balk much at the idea of forging her own path when it might get her somewhere interesting.

We had a wonderful time. It snowed while we were there, so we had fresh snow and the magic of falling snow. Our outings were short enough to be fun without being exhausting. We had good food, good company. It was quiet (except for the vuvuzela) and scenic and altogether lovely.

We probably haven't done anything to convince Caitlyn that snow is anything but a fantastic playground. She's been praying for snow in Seattle since we got home.