winter fun

being whimsical and spontaneous brings me great joy

i love the days when i am able to wake up one morning with no plans only to find something fun to do either that day or the next.

and the last couple days have been a prime example of such spontaneity

thursday at lunch i was sitting and eating when friends when the decision was made to go snowshoeing the next afternoon.

which 5 of us did. and it was fantastical and fun.

this was a first for me as i never put on snowshoes in my life. we walked around the trails for a couple hours, over the rivers (literally over small streams and a lake) and through the woods (literally). we went off-roading for the additional challenge to walk up and down hills through thorny bramble and over logs. we even took turns side-stepping our way out on fallen trees over the frozen streams.

potential for falling and hurting myself: yup.
exhilarating: yup.
succumbing to peer pressure because i never, ever thought i would do such an activity: yup.

friday evening, i checked my facebook to find a message from a couple friends with an invitation to go the the winter carnival.

for those of you who don't know, the end of january/beginning of february is a celebration of the winter season here in st paul. this celebration includes a ice sculpture contest, chairs made of ice (i sat in one and have a picture to prove it), snowplow competition (college students program little bots to run using gps navigation) and several other events.

one highlight is the fact that wells fargo hosts an open air ice skating rink during this carnival where you could rent the skates there (free for those of us who have wells fargo accounts). so we (m, j and i) decided to try it out. and i must confess that i'm horrible at skating. i'm pretty sure this was my second attempt ever and it was not pretty. but it was fun. and i'm glad to be able to say that i skated in public. i just hope there were no cameras rolling...

potential for falling and hurting myself: yup.

exhilarating: yup.

succumbing to peer pressure because i never, ever thought i would do such an activity: yup.

after the winter carnival we went out to eat at a burger bar and then found our way to bread and chocolate, where i bought a delicious fudge-oatmeal bar.

i have no idea what winter festivities i should plan for the coming days/weeks