Snow snow snow

Another big snow storm last night. Between the few inches that fell yesterday and what hit last night we ended up with a little under 15". Average snowfall for New Jersey is about 24" for the season, which we've surpassed in the first month (still almost two more months to go). Apparently this very snowy winter is caused by the North Atlantic Oscillation - a phenomenon that is an " interaction of subtropical highs and polar lows that control the flow of air along the East Coast" (I pulled this from a quote in the Star-Ledger - I'm not THAT knowledgeable about weather patterns). The colder air turns precipitation that would normally fall as rain into snow.

So another snow day from school for us. We are luckier than other towns in the tri-state area - many have already used up their snow days and will be soon eating into Spring break or Summer break. We have at least one more day left (luckily the first bad snow storm hit during Christmas break).


Our snowy street. Wonderful neighbors on either side used the snowblower to clear the sidewalks AND our driveway. We don't mind shoveling, but when it's this deep that blower sure can make short work of it.


My buried trash cans. My problem I have now is figuring where to put the snow I shovel (you can see the enormous pile next to the house already.


The kids venture into the backyard, checking out the trench dug for Lucy's benefit this morning.


You can see the amount of snow from this storm on the roof (and light) of the garage. It's hard to gauge snowfall when it doesn't all melt away between storms.


Alex shows how deep the snow is. This is the cut made by the snowblower. Isn't the bare driveway under Alex's feet lovely?!


Jim found the perfect spot for a snow fort for the kids. Big pile of snow in front from shoveling over the past few weeks. And support in the back from the section of fence.


Lots of sibling fun making the "rooms" in the fort.


Grace peeks over the side with a tiny snowman standing guard. She is probably sitting on her knees here.


Poor Lucy whimpering because she wants to be part of the snow fort too.

Quite a good cut

Grace had her very first visit to an actual hair salon (versus a place that caters to kid haircuts). She and best friend Annie both needed haircuts, and I found my hairdresser on recommendation from Annie's mom, so we figured why not take both girls together.


Here is Grace getting her hair shampooed for the first time. Apparently Annie puts up a big fuss about this, so her mom was glad to be able to point out how calmly Grace took it.


There it goes. Lots of hair being taken off, so it will be a big surprise for her classmates when she goes back to school on Tuesday.


The new hairdo. And the new jacket - North Face like everyone else in creation wears up here. She was allowed to get it if she paid for half the cost.


Now for the real meaning of the title above - Grace was able to cut 8" off, which is the minimum amount to donate to Pantene's Beautiful Lengths program, which makes wigs for cancer patients. Here is her hair which I need to package up and mail off on Tuesday. I'm very proud of her because she ended up having to cut a little bit more than she originally wanted to be able to donate.

She LOVES her new haircut, mainly because she discovered how few tangles end up in hair that only goes to a little below your chin.

Feel-Good Blog

Have you seen the blog 1000 Awesome Things? Simply put, the author is listing each day some everyday thing/item/event that when you really think about it is "awesome." Things like #345 (When the Christmas tree give the only light in the room) and #759 (Dropping a glass and then sticking your foot out so it hits your foot and doesn't break on the ground) and #919 (Hitting a bunch of green lights in a row.

The author is a wonderful writer, so even better than just reading through the list is actually reading what he wrote on each blog entry. I dare you to read these entries and not smile or nod your head in agreement.

Plus you may actually learn something - Jim and I never knew about #998 (The gas arrow).

If you like the blog and want to see more of the author, check out his TED talk here.

Big ol' blizzard

Time for some snow pictures. We got a blizzard the day after Christmas, which apparently isn't real common here in New Jersey. A "perfect storm" (if you will) of conditions that included very cold weather (making the snow very light), crazy strong winds, and a dumping of almost 2 feet of snow in many areas caused a lot of headaches for a lot of people. We managed to run out to Target the morning before it started to spend Christmas gift cards and pick up some last minute bread and milk, then we hunkered down to watch the snow fall (and fall and fall and fall).


This is what we woke up to the next morning. You can see the snow is up to the bottom of the chairs.



Jim kindly got out and shoveled a path so Lucy could take care of business that morning. The snow is over Jim's knees and over Lucy's back. She wasn't too pleased by this turn of events in her backyard.



A neighbor had parked a car in front of our house, and we watched it slowly get buried deeper and deeper as the snow fell. This is what it looked like the next morning - a combination of snow falling and snowplows plowing. We still have a rectangular parking space in front of our house where they shoveled it out a few days later. I think it's quite the coveted spot at school pick up time.



While Jim was working on the driveway I took the kids across the street to the big hill behind the school for a little sledding (this picture was taken with the kids standing on our driveway with just a path shoveled through, so you can see how deep the snow was). But it wasn't a very good trip. The snow was light and fluffy and not packed yet, plus the school was not plowed so it was VERY slow going to trudge through the snow there. We were all trying to create sledding paths on the new snow. Plus the wind was still really strong, so you got a lot of big blasts of snow blowing in your face. So after a bit the kids and I returned to our warm, cozy home for big mugs of hot chocolate.


The next day the wind had died down so we headed across town to the big sledding hill (along with half the population it seemed). The kids had a great time, and luckily the cheap sleds I'd bought Sunday at Target were light enough that there were no complaints about lugging them back up the hill.







One last picture. These are our little lollipop snowmen decoration in front of our house. This is about four days after the big snow once we'd had a lot of melting. For a couple days they were totally covered in snow - the only indication that something was there was every evening starting at 4pm there were four very faint lights glowing in that spot, changing colors and patterns. Finally now, more than a week after the snowfall, you can spot some ground at the bottom of them.

Let's open some presents

Before I post pictures of all our snow outside, I figured I'd post a few of Christmas Eve/Morning present opening.

Since we traditionally celebrate Christmas Eve with Jim's family, the kids each picked out a couple of presents from Grandma and Paw Paw to open on Christmas Eve here.


Alex chose one of his biggest presents - a jungle adventure set with lots of cool animals and parts for it.


Alex shows off the best way to display your jungle adventure set snake.


Grace opted to chose one of her smallest gifts - glasses for her American Girl dolls.


Here she is showing off her Chrissa doll in both new glasses and new holiday outfit. Now it really is a little mini-me doll for her. Grandma did a great job of picking out the frames that most closely resemble Grace's own glasses.


Just two photos to show of Christmas Day gifts, both because in all the excitement it is hard to stop and take pictures, and our light in the morning in the living room isn't that great.



Alex opens his Nintendo DS from Santa. Now other than Eva he won't be the only cousin at Cousin Camp without one.


Grace opens her Me-Mo Ugly Doll from Santa. This gift was very special in that it is an Ugly Doll that Grace designed herself and put down on her letter to Santa, because since it doesn't really exist to purchase in a store only Santa could get it for her. And Santa did just that - had an elf make a special Ugly Doll just for Grace. Since she reads my blog she will probably comment on here how wonderful it is!

Little bit of decorations

Just a few pictures of some of our Christmas decorations this year. Pictures aren't that great due to using the flash inside, but you'll get the idea.


Little paper Christmas tree craft Grace and I tried out this year. Pretty fun, though I'm not sure if they will survive being packed away until next year.


The wonderful Christmas banner Grace made for us this year.


Someone added some friends for the angels on the table in the living room. The red and gold really brighten up the holiday season.


Gimpy Santa purchased probably almost 20 years ago at a church bazaar.


My felt wreath received MANY years ago as a gift from a godmother.


Grace in front of the Christmas tree.


Alex pretending to eat the bead candy cane he made at school, positioned next to his absolute favorite ornament - Batman who hangs from the tree by his grappling hook. Used to be Jim's ornament, but no more.

Once I download pictures from Christmas morning I'll see if there are any worth posting. Otherwise I may need to take some day-after-Christmas-Day photos.

Wow - I still feel the same way

I was looking back on old blog postings and found this one from December 2005 and was surprised to learn I'd been complaining about this for five years now:

Merry Hanukkwanzmas

The hoo hah lately over "Put the Christ back into Christmas" is driving me nuts. If you've been under a rock and don't know what I'm talking about, it's the religious right all up in arms and wanting to boycott retailers who focus on "Happy Holidays" versus "Merry Christmas" in their advertising. Never mind that there are actually other religions out there celebrating during the same holiday season. And while it may be weird to have to purchase a "holiday tree", BIG DEAL! Just call it a Christmas tree (or Hanukkah shrub or Kwanzaa branch or Festivus pole) when you get it home.

There was a great letter to the editor in the Dallas Morning News this morning about this. It pointed out that the American Family Association shouldn't be worried about the very "essence of what is being celebrated" being taken out of the season by retailers pushing Happy Holidays on us. If anything, getting a great deal on your dvd player/Playstation2/iPod enabling you to buy more, more, more is about as far from the real essence of Christmas as you can get. So just lighten up and focus on some real problems out there.


I liken the "uproar" to that regarding gay marriage. Gay marriage certainly doesn't affect the quality of my own marriage, and hearing "Happy Holidays" from a retailer doesn't affect the way my family chooses to celebrate Christmas. So there.

Traditions go on

Last weekend we continued our annual tradition of visiting the tree farm and chopping down the Christmas tree (actually "sawing" down if you want to get specific). As before, we went to Hidden Pond Tree Farm in Mendham. It's about 45 minutes from our house and is always a fun family outing. Unfortunately this year we left later in the morning than usual, and it was so busy already by noon that we had to wait in our car in line for an hour before we could even go park in their parking lot. But luckily that was the result of crowd management, so once we had our turn there it wasn't crazy and overrun with people. And we'd had the foresight to have the kids bring their electronic games to pass the time, but they actually had more fun climbing into the very back of the car and playing house until our turn came.



The tree farm offers free marshmallows for roasting and free hot chocolate and coffee (usually very much needed - you can see by our gear that it was definitely a New Jersey winter day). There are a couple stations set up for the marshmallows - this one is near the field where we cut the tree down.


Alex giving a scowl to Jim for interrupting his eating of the marshmallow.


Grace likes her marshmallows like her mama does - burned to a crisp!


As seen by the expression on their faces, sibling friendship and goodwill always seems to come out on this trip.


Jim celebrates the conquering of the Christmas tree. And will probably hate that I posted this picture here.


Apparently one of the most fun things to do out there is play some game you make up that involves running through the trees.


Grace and Alex posing as a "Christmas tree". I think Grace's scarf was the decorations.


For as much as a pain the needles falling off the live tree are every year, this couple of hours makes it all worthwhile.

It actually works!

I've often read that if you have a child that is a picky eater one trick to try to get them to expand their palate is to have them help make the meal. Now, my kids aren't especially picky, but there are some things that defy logic as to why they have convinced themselves they won't eat them. Grace is that way with sauces/dressing/condiments/gravy (even though everyone else in our family RAVES about my cream gravy for the pork chops the girl still won't even taste it). And Alex is that way with soup. Doesn't matter what kind of soup - he will flat out tell you "Mommy, you know I don't like soup!" Kind of a drag as this weather has gotten colder where soup would be welcome.

So yesterday I decided to take out some of the leftover turkey and make a simple soup with it (from a Cooking Light recipe found here). And I got Alex to help. After I did all the chopping he sauteed the veggies in the pan, added the other ingredients, helped set the kitchen timer, stirred whenever I saw he was getting restless, and helped peel clementines and bananas for the accompanying fruit salad.

And don't you know that boy ate every single bit of soup I put in his bowl AND drank every last bit of broth. I was floored.

Guess it's time for me to have Grace help me make my pork chops and gravy.

Holidays with family

We had a wonderful visit from Mom and Dad this past week for Thanksgiving. While I love my little family, an extra dimension is added when other family members are included in holiday celebrations. That is one of the things we miss the most about living so far away from the rest of the relatives - Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, etc., are all a little bit more fun when you have the traditions of gathering with family.

The first half of their visit had beautiful weather. A little chilly, but nice and sunny so we took advantage of it and everyone went for a walk in the park.


We always need to stop by the little pond to see what animals are out and about that day. Canadian geese (of course) in the background. I think the ducks were out too.


Grandad is the BEST at enticing reluctant hikers into coming along. Alex as usual wanted to stay home. So Grandad pointed out that there is probably some hidden pirate treasure in our park. Sure enough around some select large trees Alex was able to find aluminum foil wrapped coins under the leaves. Sweet Grace even got into the spirit of things by hiding some of her own money for Alex to find once Grandad ran out.


And Gramma got the kids to gather pretty Fall leaves from the trail, which also kept them nice and busy on the hike.


Grace wanted me to take this as proof that she truly is a tree hugger.


And after the hike in that good crisp air even my kids were getting along with each other.


As for the Thanksgiving meal, we certainly hold true to being very laid-back and kid-friendly in our approach.

Grace made her annual decoration of tracing our hands on paper and having us name five things we are thankful for. She then wrote one thing on each finger of the hand and illustrated it. These are Grace and Alex's hands. Don't know if you can see when you enlarge it, but on Alex's thumb he is thankful for the solar system.


Everyone got Thanksgiving hats to wear during the meal. The hands on these are actually turkeys - there is a tiny face drawn on the thumb of each.


Everyone wore them - even Gramma and Grandad.


Grace also made the centerpiece for the table out of our Beanie Baby turkeys and lots of nature found on our walk the day before.


Alex checks out how his hand compares to the one on Grandad's hat.

As always even though it was a nice long visit, it still didn't seem long enough. So just know, grandparents, that you are welcome back again any time!