winter wonderland

All winter so far I've been hoping for snow, imagining how much the children will love it. I've had this vision of us all out in the cold, building snowmen, throwing snowballs for Dog and generally being rosy cheeked and wholesome.
Then, on Friday night it snowed, hurrah. How exciting!
Take a look outside, I said to the children on Saturday morning at about 6am.
And that was the start of it.
Son immediately wanted to rush outside, but I said best to get dressed first and have breakfast. Nobody wanted to eat breakfast because of the big snow excitement thing, and I started to mutter darkly about waste and breakfast being the most important meal of the day, etc (my parents would have been proud of me).
Finally got a bit of toast down them, only by smothering it in chocolate spread, and threatening no snow play unless some of it got eaten.
Son and Twin 1 then managed to get themselves dressed and in wellies in about a nanosecond.
Twin 2, however, decided she really didn't want to get dressed at all, that she would rather take off her nappy, wee on Son's bedroom carpet and then scuttle away, screaming.
So Son and Twin 1 were already outside, scraping snow (and probably a few chunks of rusted bodywork) of Hubby's car. I was trying to simultaneously get myself dressed, capture Twin 2 and win an epic battle of wills to get some clothes on, meanwhile yelling at Son and Twin 1 to get off the road and leave Daddy's car alone. And for God's sake shut the front door, all the cold air is coming in (I was thinking of the look on Hubby's face when he gets back from the war zone to a trashed car and an enormous fuel bill: it will be his angry seagull expression - one of my least favourite and just above his Captain-Mainwaring-and-the-tuxedo-disaster face).
Finally I made it outside with Twin 2, ready for the wholesome winter fun thing to begin, only for Son to sidle up, saying, Mummy it's really cold in the snow so I'm going in to watch some telly.
I think that was the moment when my icy wonderland dream finally shattered.
No, I said, you bloody well wanted to be outside in the snow and that's what we are going to do. And I huffed off down the street, carrying the still-screeching Twin 2 and with Son and Twin 1 trailing along behind, sniffing and complaining self-pityingly about cold knees.
Dog did a sort of cowering shamble at a distance, not really wanting to come out with Evil Mum and whingeing kids, but knowing that it may well be his only walk of the weekend.
I think in his secret Doggy heart he wants to be adopted.
And sometimes in my secret doggy heart I do too...