Dog days of winter

Yesterday was Hank's first real snow day – he's seen snow before, but never accumulation – so we took the opportunity and swapped most of his designated walking time for play time. We ran around like crazy puppies, attacking each other, gamboling and rolling in the snow, bounding and sliding across the deck, and sprinting around every corner. He tasted it (black dog with a snowy nose is a picture I wish I'd taken for you), and re-cataloged all his favorite smells – even made his first yellow snow with some prompting.

By his evening walk, when it was cold enough to freeze my beard, he still had the strength of 10 lab/beagle-mixes (Google tells me this is equivalent to 2 great danes or 32.7 chihuahuas) and even managed to pull loose a couple times when I was off my guard. When we finally called it a night, he curled up on the couch in a way that suggested ski lodge, hot chocolate, warm fire...