Next Year... Snowboards for Maddie and London

Maddie and London have been on school vacation for the past week, but since Rex and I have been crazy busy with work we were not able to get away to sun and fun in Laguna Beach. Instead, perhaps inspired by the Winter Olympics, the girls have been out in the snow every day, sledding down the hill, building snowmen, and having a blast.

They've been standing up to ride down the hill on their red plastic sled, so I started to look into kids' snowboards. We were over at Modell's to buy softball gloves for London and Maddie's first year of Little League (little known trivia: Roxy was a fast-pitch softball pitcher on the Branchburg Central middle school team in the 7th and 8th grade) and I asked about snowboards... they were sold out! I guess everyone in the Greater Roxiticus Valley had the same idea after watching the half pipe events in Vancouver... though I have to confess, I'm not sure I could watch my kids doing all those crazy snowboard tricks, even if/when they had grown up to be Olympic snowboarding champions.

A few hours later...

Back from the girls' basketball clinic and having done some basic Internet research on kids' snowboarding, I can safely say I'm going to need Roxy (the snowboard and clothing company) to sponsor Roxy (the blogger) with London and Maddie's first set of snowboard equipment. While I thought it would be fun for each of my girls to have one of those Roxy snowboards with the cool graphic designs just to slide down the hill in front of our house, I didn't realize that snowboarding is as complicated and expensive as skiiing... snowboard, bindings, boots, helmet... and with temperatures in the Roxiticus Valley reaching a balmy 43 degrees and toppling our snowman, it feels like Spring is here! While I wait for the snowboard offer to come in from Roxy to Roxy for next season, maybe I can find a couple of those plastic cafeteria trays used for snowboarding back in my days as a college student at Syracuse University.

And as I create a long, rambling post, London and Maddie always bring me back to the simpler things in life... they don't need a trip to California, or lunch at American Girl Place, or $1,000 of snowboarding gear to be happy. They make snow angels. They play in the backyard. I brought two of their friends home with us after basketball and the four girls are in the basement singing pop songs and making up a puppet show. And Rex and I are enjoying another great fire blazing in the living room fireplace...where confidential materials and marked-up non-disclosure agreements burn brighter than ever.