I wish I had something other than SNOW to write about

But I don't. Snow, snow, snow. It has consumed us these past 30 days. And to think that on Christmas morning, while my kids opened up snow tubes (from Nana and Grandpa) Trent and I both wondered aloud "maybe this year we won't have snow???"

If we were a ski resort -- we'd be open.
If we were an airport-- we'd be closed.

I have kept loose count of the inches -- we were 56 inches 2 days ago. Yesterday morning we got 6 more and then last night we got 18 inches.

That is a grand total of 80 inches in 30 days.

There is simply no where else to put the snow. We had to fill a wheel barrow and take the snow to other places along the driveway as the piles are so high that it is difficult to throw the snow that high in order to clear the driveway. But the kids have been big helpers. Trent and the girls were outside cleaning up by 7:30 this morning. The snow plow came around 6:30 am (funny thing -- the kids sure struggle to get up and going on school days -- but on snow days they are bounding with energy!)
















and here is a video -- my first uploaded HD video

The Snowy Day -- January 27, 2011 from Jamie Handy on Vimeo.

Another fun filled snowy day

The kids headed off to school this morning with the BIG storm looming. It was supposed to start around 4:00 this afternoon. Imagine all of our surprise when it started snowing heavily around 9 am. I abandoned hope of making it to the gym and headed down to the basement for some quality treadmill time. By the time I got back upstairs (exactly 42 minutes later -- which is the length of one episode of 24 that I watch on my iphone's netflix app while on the treadmill) it was apparent that the snow was not going to stop for a while. The phone quickly range informing me of an early dismissal day. I don't mind delayed starts or early dismissals because those don't eat away my summer days.

The boys and I hung out at home. Owen was so cute. He was so smiley and happy that I just had to take his picture. Adam thought he was so cute too and would lean in to kiss him. As soon as Adam got a little close to Owen, Owen would start to cry. It was so cute. Adam tends to be a little "in your face" with Owen. We are working on helping Adam understand boundaries a little better.







The girls got home and we just hung out. I saw the mailman drive by so I sent them out to get the mail. It was already starting to get dark so I sent both Julianne and Catherine. They quickly brought me the mail and then went right back outside. They had decided to surprise their dad by doing all the shoveling. Madelyn was not about to miss out on the shoveling fun. All 3 girls shoveled for nearly 2 hours. Trent was so happy for all their help. He got home around 7:30 and the girls were so excited for him to see all their work.













Of course by 7:00, the "big" storm had finally arrived. All their shoveling efforts have now been sufficiently undone by mother nature.

The only question that remains . . . will we have school in the morning?

Not another snow day

Weather truly is UNPREDICTABLE. Last night we watched the 11:00 news. The weather was all about the "big" storm that is coming Wednesday afternoon and Thursday. There was absolutely NO talk about snow the very next morning. So I was really surprised to get the automated phone call from the schools announcing a 90 min school delay. I sat up in bed and looked out the window and it was snowing very heavily. We had already gotten 3 inches of it. It proceeded to snow until about noon. Julianne rode to school with a neighbor and so was spared walking in the snowstorm to the end of the driveway, but Catherine and Madelyn were not so lucky. Here they are all bundled.



This is point where Catherine asked, "Can't you come out with us????" To which I replied that I would be watching from the window because I couldn't leave Adam and Owen all alone and I couldn't possibly bundle them both up either.



Aren't they cute girls? Even in a hundred layers.



It is nice that I can watch them walk all the way to the end of the driveway. The bus was about 15 minutes late, but they seemed to be having fun standing in the snow!

Respectable Snow people

We had our first "respectable" snow. By that I mean it was the first snowfall all year where it was the perfect consistency to roll and make a "respectable" snowman. Even though we have had lots and lots of other snows -- they have been near impossible to make snowmen from. My kids loved rolling the balls to be huge and then telling me to pick them up -- Ha! They were so heavy! My kids were quite dissastified with my strength and lamented that as their limiting factor in their snowmen production! ("If only Mom were stronger, we would have awesome snowmen!")

The first Snowman

Snow day -- Friday Dec 18

We woke up on Friday just like any other morning. Got up, made lunches, ate breakfast, checked my email, and headed out to walk the kids to the bus. It was a regular day, with nothing too out of the ordinary. The bus seemed late though. And after waiting for 10 minutes or so, our neighbor popped her head out the front door and yelled -- "There's no school today - it is a SNOW DAY!" Are you kidding? Doesn't there have to be snow to have a snow day? I walked straight home and took this picture -- as you can all clearly see -- NO SNOW. I called my mother-in-law who was on her way to school where she is a teacher. In Utah they had gotten 12 inches the day before and were currently getting about 6 more and they still had school!

However here is a picture of our house taken at 12:30. As you can see the snow did in fact arrive. We got 9 inches on Friday and then another 9 on Sunday!

The neighborhood kids all got together to play in it around 2.

The first play in snow day

On Dec 7, it snowed enough for the kids to want to play in it! (a scant 1/2 inch). They were more than eager to try on all the snow gear (it only took 45 minutes to dress them all). They had a great time!