The Key to Holiday Joy part 5

After breakfast while Hannah helped her mother clean up, grandpa Milton asked the kids to put on their coats and help him shovel the snow out off the driveway.  Five minutes hadn't past before Hannah and Rachel heard screaming and running sounds coming from Milton and the kids.  They ran to the front door to see what was happening but they didn't see anyone.  Hannah and Rachel put on their coats and walked out to the porch calling out the kids names.  Unexpectedly they felt an attack of snowballs coming their way. Hannah couldn't stop laughing as she looked at her mother's head completely covered in snow.  Rachel saw her laugh and grabbed some snow and threw it on Hannah's head.  The kids rolled around in the snow laughing "grandma just threw a snowball at mom" yelled Victoria through her giggles.  Is that so? said Milton, "no one hits my daughter with a snowball, she must be hit with three or four!" he began to throw a collection of perfectly round snowballs at Hannah.

Hannah was laughing so hard she couldn't even move out of the way to defend herself.
"oh oh, this is getting serious" said Rachel running inside the house. She then opened the door again and handed Hannah her snow boots, hat and gloves. She knew her daughter too well to know that she would want to get her daddy back. Hannah geared up while Milton and the kids ran to the backyard to hide from her.  Quietly she began to make snowballs.  She armed herself with about twenty snowballs and put them inside an apple barrel she found on the porch.  Rachel motioned to Hannah that the kids and Milton were hiding under the deck.  Off she went with the heavy barrel slipping and sliding through the snow.  Hannah could see her mom laughing so hard that tears were rolling down her face, while looking at her through the window. She could hear the kids giggling.

 "I'm the snowball monster, I must empty out my barrel of snowballs on two kids and a grandpa, does anyone know where they are???"Stomping away, growling and moaning, she made her way towards the deck and began to throw snowballs.... they had no chance, the victory was Hannah's.  

As they entered the house Hannah heard little Daniel say "thanks mom, this was the best day of my life."  She knew what he meant, she had not been in the moment or even "present" with her children for as long as she could remember.  She was physically there, but emotionally and mentally they had lost both parents. Things had to change.

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Hannah and her daughter Victoria; Becky and her daughter Ruby headed out to do some holiday shopping. Little Daniel begged to stay with grandpa to do "man" things.

"You know what you need Hannah? said Becky, you need to get a complete makeover, then find yourself  a hunk of a man and forget about what Daniel did to you. You know, parade your eye candy around for Daniel to see."

 Hannah laughed, "I wish it was that easy, did that work for you?
I guess not, I'm on my third marriage, what do I know.

They both laughed out loud.