My Snowman's Name is "Blue" and He Wants Me to Calm Down in Momville

Here he is folks!  "Blue".  I'm tellin' ya... Lily is obsessed with blue.  Even though there isn't a blessed blue thing on that guy, his name was a decisive "Blue!"  And Blue is a great example of how I'm not as Christmas-Zen as I may have led you to believe the other day!

Let me tell you what else... I do NOT remember building a snowman to be so much work!  And he isn't even that big! But then again, I've never built a snowman with a two and three year old.  It was... interesting.  Mostly, it was cold and wet and the snow wasn't as great for packing as I'd hoped.  But I was determined to give them this "first snowman" experience because you never know when you'll get another good snow.  And as frustrating as it was, I'm glad we got out there that day... cause it's been rainy and nasty ever since!

I learned an important lesson in the 45 minutes it took us to build Blue... to calm the heckity-heck down!  And I learned this lesson right after I heard myself barking "DON'T TOUCH THE SNOWMAN" to the very children I was trying so hard to give this fantastic winter wonderland experience of snowman-building to.  But because I was doing all the work of making him and because my back was hurting and because my fingers were freezing and because my kids are kids... I was afraid someone was going to bump him and ruin all my hard work.  So I yelled at them not to touch what was supposed to be their snowman.  

That's when it kind of hit me... "Jessica, you are making this all about you!"  Isn't it funny how quickly things can flip from "I want the girls to experience the joy of building a snowman" to "I want the perfect picture of the perfect snowman experience?"  Or does that only happen to me?  

So I took a deep breath and tried to relax.  I still didn't let the girls destroy all the hard work, but I did try to be more patient with their clumsy and cute preschool "helping."  And when Blue was complete, Lily was SO EXCITED.  We've been reading a lot of snowman books and singing lots of Frosty... so it was definitely fun for her to build her own watch Momma build one for her.

And I purposefully built him right outside the kitchen door so they could see him for as long as he lasted.  But then it was kind of creepy cause Blue haunted me for a few days.  It was like every time I saw him out of the corner of my eye I heard him say "Stop being a control-freak Jessica..."  I'm trying Blue!  Cut me some slack!  

It's Lily that really helps me remember what all these little experiences are all about... it's about connecting with my kid.  She was so excited about her snowman.  And then she came into the house and immediately went to the tree to point out to me that "it's just like outside snowman Mom!" (the ornament St. Nik brought her on Dec. 6) so that was cute... so see her making all these fun snowman connections!

She monitored his "melting progress" very closely and was so sad for him when the weather got all rainy and we watched him shrink into nothingness.  "Poor guy!" she said.  And then of course it was "we build nuther snowman Momma?" right away.  Yes Baby.  We'll build another one as soon as we get more snow.  And who knows, maybe Momma will actually let you have a more active role this time?

RIP Blue.  Thanks for the reminder to let my kids be kids.  And to worry less about the "perfect experience" and more about just enjoying the experience!

I wish you all a white Christmas!  Filled with many happy snowman experiences!  Or cookies by the fire, if you're getting a lot of rain like us!  Merry Christmas!!!