Our First Winter Hike (And a Bunch of Other Stuff)

Mom's been hogging the computer, working on the annual calendar (I know that sounds kinda redundant, but Mom does this every year so that all of our family members can have pictures of me year-round... I know the bloggie sort of serves that same purpose, but you don't exactly hang the bloggie on the wall, now do you?) and tapping away at stuff that doesn't involve me (Can you believe it? I can't either, actually...). Anyway, since Mom's been a computer hog, I haven't been able to make the rounds for a while - it might take me a bit, but I'll try to catch up with everyone.

At least when Mom hasn't been on the computer, she's been taking us out to play in the snow (and trying to figure out her camera and how to get the best snow shots...be patient - she'll figure it out eventually!).


It actually was so cold a couple of days ago (we had a high of 10 degrees - Fahrenheit - which is like -130 Celsius or something like that... ) that I didn't want to go outside in the morning. Which was a bit of a problem, as I had been in all night, and well, you know... I went out (it was still in the negative numbers) and stood around looking pitiful, holding up one foot at a time, hoping I could levitate out of the snow because my feet were SO COLD!!!

Because I rarely pull the 'pathetic card' Mom knew I was pretty miserable. So, she hustled us back inside and broke out the booties. If you recall, we had tried out our booties once before, so Mom got us both in our booties so we could go out... I will admit that I wasn't totally sold on the idea (again).


However, after tossing (and losing) a couple of tennis balls around I was a much happier camper. And once I discovered that with these things on my feet, my feet weren't going to fall off from the cold, I was back to my old self in the snow.

MUCH BETTER!

The storm that brought us the super-cold temperatures didn't bring us enough snow, but it made it so that our snow should now stay until spring. Which makes us all happy! (And keeps the dryer busy as Mom keeps drying towels; see, we collect snow in our hair, so we've got giant snowballs on us when we come inside, and when we come inside, we (of course!) want to get up on the bed and say hi to Dad, so Mom puts down towels so that when we melt, we don't soak the bed clothes. It kind of works. Kind of. But it's better than mud, right?)

It has warmed up a wee bit, so we've been able to get in lots of bitey-face time.

And we've been doing lots of snow zoomies...


Somehow, Mom thought that we might want to 'fetch' things in the snow (well, actually, it came about because while I LOVE chasing snowballs, Abby tends to get a little frustrated because she can't 'find' the snowball in all the snow...). As I mentioned with the booties, Mom had tossed some tennis balls around, but they were very quickly buried. Duh. They get covered in snow and look like, well, the rest of the backyard.

So, Mom though we might be interested in Frisbees. We don't like the hard plastic kind, although that may have as much to do with Mom's throwing ability (or lack thereof... note to self: DO NOT EVER enter Mom in a Frisbee golf tournament; she'll never make it past the first flag... eesh...) as anything. However, Mom figured that if we didn't like the soft Frisbees, at least they wouldn't get lost in the snow. Abby could find them easily enough (Mom got two as we, um, sometimes don't like to share so much...)

And they are entertaining...


For the record, the Chuck-it 'buoyant' frisbee is really tough. Actually, the other one is, too. So far...

But I was going to talk about our hike, right? You know how we've been going on hikes all spring/summer/fall, right? Well, today was our first trek on the trail when it was covered in snow. We put on our booties (the original reason for the purchase, BTW), and off we went.

It's a multi-use trail, so there were a bunch of people cross-country skiing (although no one skijoring!) other people walking doggies, and even a crazy guy on a bicycle. Mom and Dad have declared the park (where we stop and chase tennis balls) to be 'done' for the season (something about tennis balls being elusive in the snow...) but the hike was still lots of fun, and I'm getting more used to the booties.

We may not be sled dogs, but we had fun!

And now we get cookies, right, Mom?!?

Happy snow times!!!

*kissey face*
-Fiona and Abby the Hippobottomus