Snow Report: Let the Kids Make Snow Shakes

Snow Report: Falling Snow Shakes.

Here's today's snow report: We've got dandruff from heaven. Non stop. So of course, that's the day I'm supposed to get a flu shot. Me, who never gets sick, but am apparently in the high risk geezer category now. So despite the snow report, I give in and go to the doctor this morning. I slip slide in the driveway (No of course I didn't use a snow shovel! In Tinyville we pay big bucks for men in trucks to shovel snow....eventually.) Anyway, when I'm at the doc's, the nice little nurse tries to keep up a running chat to distract me from that big ol' needle, talking about snow reports (5 more inches coming!) and snow shovels (Big no no for elderly -- hey I'm not so eld!) and asking if I'm going to go home and make a Snow Shake. "A show snake?" I ask. "No, a Snow Shake," she says. "What's that?" I ask, keeping up the brilliant repartee. She says, "You never made Snow Shakes when you were a kid?" "No," I say. "We were too poor to have snow." She ignores that.

Snow Report: 10 Inches High Snow Shake

Nursey proceeds to explain that I should just go outside and pack a big plastic cup full of fresh fallen snow. Fresh. Not the packed down, tire tracked, footprinted kind. And not the yellow kind. That would be a pee shake.

Bring your 10 inch cuppa snow inside, she goes on, add some milk (maybe ¼ cup), sugar (a tablespoon? You decide) and vanilla extract (a teaspoon), and drink your Snow Shake through a straw. That's it. You don't have to be Rachel Ray to do this. I'm not, so I do. I use a lot of snow and really pack it down, and it's more like a slushee. So I add chocolate syrup and eat it with a spoon. It's so good. And it's a perfect kid thing. I realize immediately I need to borrow some kids. So could you bring yours over right away?

Snow Report: Make Every Snow Day a Snow Shake Day

Boy, I wish I had known about this long ago when my kids got to skip school for Snow Days, which they spent diving into snowbanks, throwing snowballs, preferably straight into each other's eyes, building forts right in the driveway so Daddy couldn't get to the garage, lovingly helping little brother build a snowman and then knocking it over so he would cry. Snow Shakes would have been a perfect way to keep 'em busy, keep 'em happy, keep 'em grateful for their nice warm happy home, while tracking snow into the kitchen and using up all the vanilla extract I need for my smoothie.

Step by Step Snow Shake Instructions.

Well, you're probably not going to be bringing your kids over, so you'll have to teach them how to make Snow Shakes all by yourself. Let me go over those complicated directions for you:

1. Bundle up those kids.
2. Give each a big plastic soda cup.
3. Tell them to go pack their cups with snow and come back.
4. Supply milk, sugar and vanilla extract. (Optional: Chocolate syrup.)
5. Let them measure out ingredients and slop them in their cups.
6. Give them straws and tell them to have at it. Or, spoons, if they used lots of snow.

Hey, if you get enough kids scooping snow to make Snow Shakes, you won't even need a snow shovel!