Winter Wonderland

On Friday it snowed in Florence. Record breaking snow - the most the city had seen in 50 years. It snowed about 10 inches in just a few hours! The whole city shut down, roads were closed, public transportation (buses, trains, airports, etc) all stopped working, and people were stranded for hours and hours. It was crazy!

We couldn't believe all the snow since, well, we had heard that it rarely snows in Florence. And last year the same thing happened - snow the day before we were supposed to leave for a Christmas trip with friends. What are the odds of that happening two years in a row??? When it rarely even snows once/year???

This is our street as the snow was just beginning to fall...

Here's a little look at how backed up traffic was. This picture was taken at 1:30pm and when we looked out at this same street at 11:30pm it was just as bad, if not worse. (Look at how all the roads feeding into the round-about are at a stand still!)

This is Porta Romana, near our house. It looked so pretty with snow falling all around it.

Out street at 2pm...

Our back yard around 4pm - at least 5 inches of snow out there by then!

When Colton had gone down for his nap, there was no snow at all! When he woke up, he saw this. He was so amazed and excited. He kept exclaiming, "Snow! Car! Cool!"

Unfortunately, we did have to cancel our trip with friends. Not because of the snow, though. Instead, out of nowhere both Ross and I got sick with a stomach bug that night! We are still recovering. We were bummed to miss the trip and even more bummed that we couldn't take Colton out to play in the snow on Saturday, a beautiful and sunny day. God was gracious, though. The snow stuck around through Sunday, it was sunny again, and we both felt good enough to take Colton out to play in the back yard for a little while. He LOVED the snow!

One of his first looks at the snow from this side of the house...

"Hey! Where are my feet?"

Colton was so excited to play! Isn't he cute all bundled up?

He loved it when Ross threw snowballs at him. Yup, he's all boy. :)

It took him awhile to figure out how to walk in all that snow, but once he did he had fun walking up the steps to our yard and jumping down them. He also loved throwing himself down into the soft, fluffy snow. It was too cute and funny!

Ross tried to show C how to make a snow angel...

...and with a little help, he did it!

Finally, I stepped out from behind the camera and got a good picture with Colton.

It was so much fun to experience playing in the snow through Colton's eyes! We are thankful that we were able to enjoy this special "first" with him. If only the rain wasn't setting in and all the beautiful snow wasn't melting...