So I did my best to squeeze everything I could out of winter this year. On the personal activity side, I did a little ice-skating, cross country skiing, snowshoeing, downhill skiing, and of course, curling. On the spectator side, I checked out the pros at the Silvermine Ski Jumping tournament, spent a night watching little kids doing the same at the Flying Eagles hill near Shawtown, and watched each week at Winter After Hours as local artists built some seriously amazing snow sculptures. Thankfully the area had enough snow this year to make all this stuff work. All in all I’d say I had a pretty successful winter. But according to the hopes and dreams of EC’s Parks and Rec department, coming winters could be even better – they hope to build a bona fide winter recreation park complete with a tube run, a snowboarding terrain park, ski trails, and more. Read about it on page 26. But now, as we all brace for the sloppy freeze-thaw-freeze-thaw month of March, I’ll be happy to get back to warmer weather and greener pastures of a Wisconsin spring and summer.