ICE!!

I like ice. I like it in my glass of water. I like it when it keeps me and my husband from having to go to work. I like it when I can skate on it.

Which is what I got to do on Tuesday and Thursday! There is something so freeing about it. Unfortunately, Tuesday night I was sore for hours even though I skated about a half hour. But yesterday I skated longer, and I think I must have worked out a lot of the soreness because once my toes warmed up, I wasn't sore anywhere. I was really tired, but that could have been from the cold that Thomas passed on to me. (We are good at sharing things.)

I love to ice skate. It is fun to go really fast and feel the wind and not worry about how graceful or anything, but just enjoy the freedom of flying. It is fun to turn around and skate backwards, which I still can't do on one foot, but am getting pretty good at doing with both feet. It is fun to weave back and forth like you are skiing. It is fun to sing and skate with siblings, and skate in circles around one another. Keith was in the center skating tiny circles, then I went around him in the opposite direction, Kate went around my circles in the same direction as Keith and another friend went the same direction as me beyond her. So we had four layers of concentric circles and tried to keep up with one another but the further out, the faster you had to skate. Then we ran into each other.

The big challenge this year was to do the thing Daddy does. He starts skating frontward with his foot back a little. Then he pivots and continues in the same direction as before, but now with his foot in front of him. It looks really cool, but I haven't quite figured out how to do it. That and I can't skate backwards on one foot. I can't jump either, which is one of my dreams to learn how to do. On ice I feel that I am flying; but when I try to jump, I feel as heavy as lead. Maybe someday. I am still afraid to fall, probably from bruising my tail-bone too many times.

Thomas hasn't skated yet this year, but don't let him fool you. He really does enjoy it, when he doesn't fall and crack his head, but that only happened once and it was because his skates were really dull. But now he does like it, really! He just forgets sometimes. (grins at Babe) Right?