What does not go with snow, ice and boots? Baby Bunching, that’s for sure.
My first nine months in Sweden....were also my first nine months as a Baby Bunching mom. We didn’t see ground from Christmas Day until mid April. (And I am totally not exaggerating.) Stockholm was hit with one of the hardest winters that year—lucky for me—and while I was adjusting to life as a Baby Buncher I was adjusting to at least a foot of snow. Nothing beats juggling two under two in icy conditions.
What prompted this post was an article I just finished reading in Wondertime magazine: “Out cold” by KJ Dell’Antonia. The first thing that had me reminiscing about our snow days was this quote from her article “For the potty trained kid, we save everyone a lot of grief with two rules: Pee first and wear a Pull up. (An accident in a snowsuit is a total day ender).” Amen to that! Besides the regular dealings of getting kids dressed in coats, hats and mittens just to go to the store or pushing a double stroller through slush, snow and ice, the worst is when a fun snow outing goes bad due to a potty accident. Only for our house, donning a snowsuit was a sure way to fill a diaper. Seriously. I would see Alex hiding in a snow pile, quietly eating the snow (Swedish snow was fresh daily that year so I let him do it) only he’d emerge from the pile with his own pile. Super fun. Because nothing is more fun than dragging everyone back in for a diaper change five or ten minutes after you just came outside.
But even simple tasks like getting a jacket on an 18-month year old can get tedious, especially when you’re also having to dress a newborn for the cold. Luckily, my baby never protested much. But with my son, every time the jacket appeared there was a fight and for weeks we went through this fight. Nevermind that it was below zero out, he persisted anyway.
And the stroller, thank God my stroller had all-terrain wheels on it because it was damn near impossible to push those kids through snow in my handy dandy lightweight stroller.
The one thing I did learn is that just because it's cold and snowy doesn't mean you have to be confined to the house all the time. Although, I will say it is harder to get out and enjoy it when it takes so long to get everyone ready for it.
For those of you who deal with the snow as Baby Bunchers, my fleece hat is off to you. Check out the article if you can. But I would love to know how you deal with the day-to-day of snow/cold and Baby Bunching. Our family ended up leaving Sweden by the next winter so I never had the chance to use what I had learned the first time—except for the five days of snow we had here in Northern Virginia.
Put on a puffy jacket and RUN! RUN to wherever you're going! RUNNN!
That's how we deal. :)
Posted by: JessPond | Jan 20, 2009 at 05:57 PM
Honestly, I avoid taking them out as much as possible. Most of the time they won't even keep their clothes on when we are at home inside .... so going out means two sets of clothes, 2 coats, 4 mittens, 2 hats, 4 shoes/boots ... and at least four buckles in and out of car seats .... it makes me tired just typing it .....
Posted by: Susan Smock | Jan 21, 2009 at 12:09 AM
Up here in AK, no ground from Xmas to April is a warm year! Strollers are pretty useless up here for around six months. Kids pretty much learn to deal with the coats, hats, boots and gloves of winter, because it is just part of their life.
Two pieces of advice: One piece of equiptment that has really been a lifesaver has been the Burley with ski attachment -- you can then take the kids out on the snow trails pretty easily (and get a bit of exercise yourself). The second is definitely get the mittens with the string to both -- very few things are as bad as losing a mitten on a subzero day.
Definitely get out during the winter, though, it's worth it for everyone's sanity!
Posted by: Lori | Jan 21, 2009 at 04:53 PM