Your guide to activities and fun things to do with your preschoolers, toddlers and kids in Vancouver, CN

The streets of Vancouver have been terrible for a while now. The city seems to think that the weather will always fix the streets of snow and that there is no need to actually do any real kind of ploughing. This has meant that since the 13^th of December there has been a lot of snow on all the side streets.

This snow non-removal policy of the city of Vancouver has caused me a lot of stress when driving this past week. On Monday I got stuck about 20 feet away from my parking garage with both my almost 4 year old and 2 month old in the car with me. Rocking the car didn't work and I had to get a shovel (with both the boys in tow) get them back in the car and try shovelling. I eventually got the car out with some help. On Tuesday I almost made it to my son's preschool when I discovered that the road that runs by the community centre was closed to traffic. We had to try to turn around and he didn't make it to preschool.

All of this angst has brought out some of the more colourful language in my vocabulary. I try really hard to find alternative swear words but sometimes in the moment they are not the ones that fly out of my mouth. All I know is that while trying to keep calm for the two boys in the car the deep breaths I am taking are not working.

How do you keep calm in situations that are dangerous? How can you get your talkative preschooler to stop talking so you can concentrate on the matter at hand? I am not sure of these questions myself, but in the last week I have tried many things. One is to tell my son the truth, that this is stressful for Mommy and I need him to be a little quiet so I can concentrate. Sometimes this works, but not often. So gentle readers, how do you do it? I need some advice.