You Don't Have to Shovel Sunshine.

Alas, the last of our exciting Georgia snow melted from a shady spot on my patio a few days ago. Pictured above is my young friend, Raiford Crews playing in the brief 2010 Georgia snow.

One of my favorite Web Logs is a lady, who, among her many other talents is her professional looking photography. Her post sometimes carries pictures of SNOW from her kitchen window “all fresh and new and very, very white!” She writes from Michigan, the land of snow.

I have been a widow for since 1986. For several years, I went out with a man who had retired and with his wife had moved from Michigan to Georgia. His wife had been dead a couple of years when I met him at a church conference. He had a great sense of humor. He told me they moved to Georgia because in Georgia he "did not have to shovel sunshine."

At this point in my life, I am glad to not have to shovel snow or try to walk on ice or snow. But so many of our best family memories (and pictures) with our children are tied up with the few snow storms here in the “land of sunshine and cotton.”

My husband was always as excited as the children when we had a rare snow. He would gather up the children and some hastily makeshift sleds and hurry to Shorter Hill or some other special place. If there was only a little snow, we all pitched in to make a snow man.

My job was often to stay home, put out a clean sheet to catch fresh snow for snow ice cream, dry out wet gloves, serve hot soup and keep the home fires burning.

So, school children and teachers, while you are watching the Georgia skies and wishing for a snow day, remember, " you do not have to shovel sunshine!"