The Snow Cave

It started out innocent enough. I came outside around 7:30 to see what the kids were doing with Dad. Or rather, what dad was doing to the kids. At first I didn't question the giant mound, or the long 2x4 he was holding, or the look of a deer caught in headlights. I just went along with it, snapping pictures of the pretty snow and my cute babies.

Here's one now. Ain't she cute?

And then I noticed it. The giant hole beneath the giant mound that he had begun to dig. (Or is it "began" to dig? Mr. Drake, where are you when I need you?)

Is this some sort of...physically mutilated snowman? I mean, Brett's pretty creative, I wouldn't have been surprised.

What's that board for? Why are you putting that board through that hole, Brett? My stomach began to lurch as the female-mother intuition kicked in. Oh Crap. The infamous "Snow Cave". He always said he was going to do it...I just thought...I just thought I'd talked him down.

At this point I hear him say, "Okay Cohen, go in." The look on my poor first-borns face does not accurately reflect the feelings that were coursing through his-rather our-bodies. Go. In. An unstable snow cave? Built by you? Hmmm...moms offer of hot chocolate is sounding purrretty good right about now.

But Brett persists. And because he's a first born, the apple of his fathers crazy eyes, he obliges. What a sweet, obliging son. Terrified, sweet, obliging son.

At this point, Brett hands him a flash light. "Just watch the canary son, you'll be fine." But it's all good. Cohen's having a good time. It's in his blood. Craziness to crawl under unstable snow caves is passed along the Y chromosome.

"Hey, while you're already in there risking your lift son, why don't you go ahead and even out those walls for your old man? Atta boy!"

And of course, no snow cave is complete with out an exit. And incredibly small, increasingly dangerous, exit.

"It's okay mom. I didn't really want to grow up anyway. All that hype. No, I'd much rather be smothered by pounds of snow in my pointless attempt to crawl out an exit only meant for small mice...what's wrong with the canary?"

The moral of the story, my fellow blog readers and parents: Never leave your husband unattended with a shovel, four feet of snow and two elf slaves.

(Brett later closed up the holes, since our back yard is not fully enclosed. I just kept having nightmares of neighborhood children going "Hey cool, a snow cave!" Crawling beneath it, and then it comes crashing down, with a $300,000 law suit along with it. So, no worries.)

(Oh, and no canary's were harmed in the making of this snow cave. It just had a little cold.)