Marshmallow World

We woke up to snow on the mountains and rain in the valley the other day. Every time it snows on the mountain, Nicco wants to go sledding. He misses snow so much. He wants to make snowballs and snow men and snow angels and sled and slide and have an icy good time.

We missed a trip to the mountains the last time it snowed. You have to time it just right in Tucson. You don't want to go up when it is actually snowing, but if you wait too long, there isn't enough snow to play in. Even at 8000 feet. It worked out nicely this time...snow on the weekend! We put on our layers, packed a dry set of spare clothes, grabbed our sled and headed up to Mount Lemmon.

On the way up, Nicco was convinced that our quest for snow would be unsuccessful. People were out riding bikes, for heaven's sake! It wasn't until we reached 7000 feet just about an hour after we left the house that we first saw signs of winter. Nicco got more and more excited as we climbed up and up and when we got to Ski Valley, he giggled and squealed and ran to the nearest snow drift to make a snow angel. I pulled out the camera to snap a picture. I made sure to charge up the battery, but I neglected to replace the memory card. What a dummy. We had to use Patrice's phone. Which was fine, except that I didn't get a picture of the snow angel.

Nicco slid down a steep drift then we hiked to the top of a road for him to sled down. He had a blast, as expected.

 

The road we sledded on was not that steep, so after some fun (and climbing Mt. Everest)

we set off to find another hill. We drove on a couple of narrow, rocky roads and had an "officially freaked out boy." I told him he could trust his dad, but I confess...there were moments when I was nearly officially freaked out too.

With the wetness of his clothes settling in when he was no longer playing in the sunshine, Nicco got frostbite. Frostbite is when everything inside freezes, even your blood. "My heart is not even beating anymore!" my son exclaimed in near panic. We asked if he wanted to find another hill or change into his dry clothes and head home. He said he just wanted to be warm. But play in the snow. Sorry buddy, but you can't have both. We changed and hit the road. We were ready to eat by the time we got back to town, so we stopped at Five Guys. "Good stuff," said Nicco. "I'm tellin' ya, there's nothing better on a winter day."