Of Snow {and lots of it} and Mud {and lots of it}

10 inches of snow

+ 4 more inches of snow

+ single digit and negative temps

= crazy, cooped up kids

+ nearly a week of above freezing temps

= MUD!!!

But when you live in a place where you cannot send your kids out without some sort of warm cover until after Memorial Day, you take advantage of the "warm" weather and endure the mud.

It was above 55* yesterday, so of course the kids were going out. Who in their right mind would not send the kids outside?

I put them in snowpants and snow boots. It wasn't that there was a lot of snow. Nor was it cold. But it was wet and muddy. The last thing I wanted was to have them covered in wet, sticky mud without the ability to peel it all off.

And covered they did get. Every square inch from the chest down... covered in wet, gooey mud.

I really should have taken a picture of them or at least their outer layers of clothing before I started eliminating the mud. I had them strip off their mittens, snowpants, jackets, and boots before they came into the house.

So after they were all in bed last night, I had a very dirty job waiting for me. That was way too much mud to put down our drains, so I hung them over the fence to hose them off.

When I turned on the water at the house, nothing came out of the hose. No problem, I thought. Just need to unkink the hose. Not too sure that was a good idea.

There I was in the dark, in my short sleeves, enjoying the balmy weather, wrestling a cold, muddy, stiff octopus. I'm not sure if you've ever tangled with a stiff hose before, but it's pretty much impossible to get the kinks out. Every time I opened one, it would crack. I was doing a better job of creating a soaker hose than getting water to come out the proper end.

I finally gave up altogether and decided to fill up a trash can with warm water from the shower and haul it outside. I thought I could dunk the snowpants into the trash can and rinse them off enough to put them in the washer.

I dunked the first pair. It immediately turned the water as dark as coffee and thick as chowder. There was no way it would do me any good to dunk in another pair. In fact, it would only make it more muddy.

I hauled out 6 cans full of water before I decided I'd had enough.

Surely there had to be some improvement. Maybe?

I finally thought of taking a picture after I loaded them into the washer. The water was void of all transparency.

Oh, did I mention I was wearing my new white tank top during all of this? It was the under layer, but was exposed enough to be freckled with mud. Nice.