My England Adventure: Part Four

On Tuesday morning we got up and it had snowed.  It was just a sprinkling, the delightful kind that makes you want to sing Christmas carols and drink hot chocolate.  Cori and Scott walked the boys to school and I stayed home, then visited a little bit that morning and helped Cori with a project for Christmas for the boys, then I took a spectacular nap on the couch.  But by mid-afternoon it had dumped a significant amount and the village was at a standstill.  They don’t get much snow around those parts, so there are no snow ploughs, and the trains and buses had stopped running.

Caid reading

That night, we were able to still get fish and chips from the Chippy, even though the weather at this point was causing friends who work in London to have to WALK home (several miles.  In 10 inches of snow.) and Scott was having to re-think his travel plans to Berlin.  This was a good thing because fish and chips was another thing on my bucket list to do while in England.  If you haven't had village fish and chips, then you haven't lived.  These aren't the American "fish sticks" grossness.  This is a whole fish, caught VERY recently, battered and fried to perfection, with a mound of fat fries on top, then smothered with malt vinegar.  Spectacular.

Bridger reading (he even does the voices)

Next day, it kept snowing.  We played some major games of Skip-bo junior, Apples to apples, and Uno.  I got to have both boys read to me.

I truly felt that I couldn’t have planned it better.  I didn’t go to London to sight-see.  I went to get to hang with my fam, and so this way I got to see way more of the boys, which was really fun.  The things I really wanted to do I had already done at the beginning of the week, so this was just great!

By Thursday, though, cabin fever had set in.  I woke up to Bridger asking me, “Wanna play a game?  I thought, “Oh my goodness, I’m not sure how many games of Skip-bo junior I can play.” 

That afternoon, a sledding party was formed with “the gang,” as the Anderbergs have affectionately dubbed their group.

I feel a bit silly to admit this, but here it is:  I think I may be a wuss about the cold.

I'm so cold I can barely smile.

I was asked by three different people if I thought I’d be warm enough.  Here’s the deal.  If I didn’t think I’d be warm enough there’s not a lot I could have done.  I didn’t bring snow clothes to London with me (it SUPPOSEDLY) doesn’t snow there.  So I had on capilene under jeans, wellies, two different capilene weights on top, and a warm coat.  Plus gloves, scarf, and hat.  I thought I would be warm enough in Colorado.  That was what I said.  I’m used to cold weather.  It’s cold where I come from.

My butt was numb in about 10 minutes.  This is what’s so weird.  I usually can count on the fact that if I’m moving I stay warmer, but I started feeling like I was getting too cold while we were still walking to the sledding hill.  So admitting I was cold made me feel pretty silly.

Cori and Asher

Also, I grew up sledding in Montana and Colorado.  I know me some sledding.  I’ve done it since I was big enough to walk.  I love to sled.  It’s about the only reason I feel that snow is tolerable.  I have never felt like such an amateur.  Has it been too long since I’ve done it?  Were my limbs too frozen to work properly?  At any rate, I did try twice, once with Caid and once with Lou.  I made it about a quarter of the way down both times, with a push.  Lame.  Outta practice.

After sledding we had pumpkin cake and mulled wine.  I got the princess treatment, because I literally could not get warm.  I changed my clothes (which were all soaked, BTW, down to my underwear), then I sat on the couch with a hot water bottle behind me, and then after about 45 minutes of that I finally had some feeling in my hiney again.  Yikes!

Friday was looking like it would be more of the same, but I begged Cori to stay back from sledding so that we could just visit.  The one thing I was slightly bummed about, was that we were supposed to have every day with the boys at school and just some good quality “her and me” time, and that didn’t get to happen.

So we had some great quality time, the boys got to sled and everyone was happy! 

That’s pretty much it for the snow days.