I woke up this morning to the coldest day of the year; they’re talking about a chance of snow on Friday. Ouch, can it really be winter on Long Island? Well, I guess it’s about time…

Like most adults, I’m not looking forward to shoveling out my driveway, or sliding on my butt when I go out to get the mail, my son on the other hand can’t wait for that first decent sized snowstorm. At five, he’s still too young to really understand the extra work that comes along with a big snowfall; he just sees the fun in it.

Last year we did have a lot of fun in the snow. I took him sled riding on the same hill that I rode down when I was a kid. I remember telling him the old joke about how my older brother (his Uncle Rick) and I had to share one sled, and how “I had it on the way up and Uncle Ricky got to use it on the way down” —he really didn’t get it, so I had to explain it to him.

We also had fun working together constructing a snow fort that wound up being just tall enough for him to hide behind during our snowball fights. I also taught him the correct technique for shaping gobs of wet snow into snowballs —although his hands were too small to create anything that was even remotely effective. When we finally started our snowball fight – his aim and his range also proved to be pretty ineffective —mostly I just pretended to let him sneak up on me before blasting me with handfuls of snow. Afterwards, we’d head inside and warm up with mugs hot cocoa while watching Spongebob…

You know, maybe I’m looking forward to that first big snowfall also!