Top Ten of Growing Up in Minnesota

My family in front of a Minnesotan winter tradition--
A part of the Winter Festival in Saint Paul, every few years they would construct a palace entirely of ice.
I believe this was 1987 and apparently I was way too cool to smash my big hair with a hat.

10- I can tell my kids 100% true stories about how every day I walked almost a mile to and from elementary school in waist deep snow. 

9- I can calmly laugh at people who are in the throes of full blown panic when they experience the sensation of their nose hairs freezing together for the first time.

8- While other people groan, I am always rooting for a good snowstorm. 

7- I am not ashamed to dress in lots of layers. 

6- I can brag about how I was raised in one of the weirdest political states in America and came out relatively unjaded. (Why is it such a weird state?  Well,  not only was Minnesota the one and only state in the union to carry Walter Mondale for president in 1984, but they also elected Jesse Ventura, of WWWF fame, as their governor in 1999.)

5-  We shopped at Target before Target was the hip discount place to shop.  In fact I didn't even know Walmart existed until I was like 20 years old.

4-  I can tell people from what they call cold weather states (like Utah or Colorado) that they have no idea what real cold feels like.  And when they happen to visit Minnesota on a -30 degree day, they agree with me.  (True story)

3- I can blow people away with the little known piece of trivia that Minnesota, with its 10,000+ lakes,  has more shoreline that California, Florida, and Hawaii...combined!

2-  I can brag to my kids that our school superintendent worked on the twelfth floor of a skyscraper and wouldn't even consider canceling school until the snow was up to his office window.

1-  ...and then I can laugh (and enjoy the opportunity to sleep in) when our schools are delayed after receiving one measly inch of powdery snow.