Happy Birthday in the Snow

To celebrate my husband's birthday this year, we had a small family celebration on Friday evening. Then on Saturday morning, we headed up to our family's cabin for a weekend in the snow with our good friends. Usually our families go camping together in the summer, but since they're moving to Colorado in May, we decided that we needed to have a winter adventure instead this year.

It was quite an adventure, indeed! We arrived on a sunny, clear Saturday afternoon and left on Monday in the middle of a snowstorm! The cabin is only accessible by snowmobile in the winter (as the roads aren't cleared), so we made part of our return journey on snowmobiles, then got into our cars that had 8 inches of snow on them. Our hubbies had the chains ready to go and we slowly made our way down the mountain. Seriously these guys earned their stripes today. We drove through snow, hail, sleet, rain, fog, and even thunder and lightning on our way home. And this is only a 65 mile journey! Unfortunately our car didn't fare so well. We lost the driver's side windshield wiper (very inconvenient) and one of our tire cables as well. But my husband is such a calm and collected person, he handled it with so much grace & strength.

Besides the challenging journey home, the time we spent up at the cabin was so relaxing and fun! The kids all loved being in the snow. Saturday, of course, was a beautiful day to play out in the snow. On Sunday, we trekked out in our snowshoes and made our own sled runs. The older kids in particular really enjoyed the sledding while the two youngest ones were mostly preoccupied with eating the snow. Riding the snowmobiles was also a highlight for the kids (and adults!).

The best part for me was coming in from being wet and cold to a nice warm cabin, and getting into comfy clothes to eat a warm meal and have a cup of tea! I really enjoyed the time we had to just relax, visit and play games together (especially after the kids were all in bed!).

Here are some photos from our snow weekend:

This is what the deck looked like when we left this morning.

My son face-plants into the snow for a snack.

Wee! Sledding with Papa is fun!

Getting the hang of the snowshoes...

We made it! King of the mountain!

Happy Birthday to my wonderful husband and an amazing father.