Merry Christmas!

Blizzard 2009!

Wow!! I had no idea until 2 PM yesterday that a blizzard was headed our way. My husband called me from DC. "Go buy a sturdier snow shovel". Last I had checked, we were to get about 5 inches....no big deal. Ummm. As of 2 PM today, we have 16 inches and it is still coming down heavy! It says we are supposed to get 12-22 inches through the night! The last storm we had like this was in 2003 when Logan was just a few months old.

After the boys and I finished up a few things at home yesterday, we headed out to get a sturdier snow shovel. Costco was our first stop. They ran out at noon. Picked up some toilet paper while there...don't want to run out of that. Drove to Home Depot and saw a worker outside. Stalked him in my van until I was close enough for him to hear me. "Excuse me. Before I drag both of my kids out, can you tell me if you are out of snow shovels?" " Yes. We are sold out". I didn't bother going to Lowe's because it is right across the street and I figured if Home Depot was out, Lowe's would be, too. Headed to a Ace Hardware that is kind of tucked away and not in the main area of town. They were out, too, but expected a truck around 7 PM. Drove across to a grocery store. Stocked up on a bunch of food and found some ice melt there. Drove back to Ace...it was now 7:15. The sign on the door now said they expected the truck around 8 PM (possibly). I entered and saw a line. I went to the end and asked if it was the line waiting on the truck. Yes, it was. I called my husband, who was on the bus on his way home, and asked if he really expected me to wait in the line. Of course, I was only kidding when I asked him because I had no intentions of waiting.

Headed home and got all the groceries in and put away. I needed to mail a package and thought we could grab some food while out. Well, the snow came early and it was pretty bad when we finished eating. Should have gone straight home, but decided to stop at the Post Office since it was on the way. There was a line at the 24 hour kiosk. I was watching people drop their packages in the slot and hoping it didn't get full before I got to it. Sure enough, the woman before me dropped her packages in and it was jammed. I was out of luck. I had already bought my postage, so decided to take the route home that took me close to the other post office in town. Well, a lady was just going to leave her packages there and when she heard I was driving to the other post office, she gave me her packages, too. Guess I look like a good person :-). Made it to the other post office, but saw one person had slid into the curb, and another had crashed into a pole. Dropped my packages in and we were on our way home. Turned onto the road we live off, but had about 2 miles before we got to our neighborhood. Saw a few other people that slid of the road. I drove slow and steady. Made it 2 blocks from our house and the road going the other direction was closed to through traffic. We had just come down a hill and had one final one before turning into our neighborhood. The light was green, but the cars weren't moving. The person at the front of the line was just stopped in the intersection. I guess they just decided they didn't want to go up the hill. Several people got out from behind them and headed up the hill. I watched as they all slid around. I figured the roads were only going to get worse, so we went around. There was a pickup two cars ahead and they were literally almost sideways going up the hill. I passed the car that was just sitting and switched lanes. I headed up the hill and passed the sideways truck. Wow! We made it up the hill and I've never been so happy to turn into my community!!

Here are a few pictures that I've taken so far---The picture above was taken at about 1 AM on Dec. 19.This picture was taken at noon on Dec. 19.This was taken at about 2 PM on Dec. 19--about 16 inches, so far!!

Prim and Proper!

Last Friday, we took the boys to get their haircut. We use a barber shop and the boys LOVE it! Logan gets his hair cut by the same guy just about every time. He calls him his "friend" :-). There are a couple of ladies that I have cut Lucas' hair. They are both mom's and have lots of patience. He does pretty well, though. He has to go often because his hair grows so fast!

Anyway, Lucas was able to get in the seat right away for his hair cut. When she was all done, the lady spiked his hair up a bit. I, of course, thought it was cute! I told her that Logan wouldn't like it because he is very prim and proper when it comes to his hair. When we went and sat by Logan while he waited for his "friend" to be ready to cut his hair, he noticed Lucas' hair. "That is horrible! Just terrible", he said as he made a mad dash towards Lucas and began smoothing his hair down. I told him that I thought it was cute, but he insisted that it wasn't. Finally I told him to leave it alone because it wasn't his hair. When his "friend" was finished cutting his hair, he walked past me (on his way to get a lollipop) with his hair all perfectly combed and laying flat, I asked him why he didn't have his hair spiked, too. I got the "are you crazy" look!

This morning I decided to spike Lucas' hair up a bit after I got him dressed. He immediately got offended. "NO!! I wanna smoov my hair down". Oh my, I was laughing so much. I would spike it up, he would smooth it down. By the end we were both laughing and momma got her way! I can't help it, I just think it is cute! It also makes him look older than the 3 that he is! Here are a few pictures of my styling boy:

Santa Train

Last weekend, we took the boys on a train ride with Santa. They really enjoyed it!Lucas especially liked the candy cane that they handed out!After the train we did some shopping, had lunch, and then that evening we went to see a friend's daughter in a play. It was certainly a fun-filled Saturday!

In the beginning....

The curriculum that I use with Logan is Christian based, so just recently we have started learning the books of the Bible. It had been a few days since we had done school and Logan was having a hard time remembering the first book. I was trying to prompt his memory and offered the beginning sounds to him.

me: "Gen....".

Logan: "iffer".

Oh my did I get a laugh over that one. Yes. The first book of the Bible is Jeniffer! Ha!

Story Time with Grandma....

I just wanted to share a wonderful idea that my mother in law had. A few years ago, she started recording herself reading children books. She loves to read, but doesn't live close enough to read to our boys very often. We typically only see her once a year. So, to make up for this, she has been sending recordings of her reading various books to the boys. Just recently, Logan has really enjoyed being read to. We put the cds on for him and he listens to his Grandma read to him as he drifts off to sleep. It is fun for him to be able to talk to her on the phone about the story that she has read to him. Just today a Christmas package arrived with the last few chapters of The Wind in the Willows and a couple of other stories, too. I know that Logan will be so excited to open the new cds from Grandma!

Bed time....

Last night, in an effort to put off bed time, Logan announced that his food needed time to congest. I was on the phone with my dad and my husband had no clue what Logan was talking about. Ummm. Digest. I think he means his food needs time to digest. Good thing these boys have their momma to translate for them. HA!

The Christmas tree....

On Saturday, we got our tree up and decorated. Does it make me a bad mom that I waited until Lucas was in bed to do the decorating?? He was so excited just to have the tree up. He laid underneath it and talked about it all day. Once he was in bed, I shaped it and Logan and I decorated it. My husband helped some (like putting the angel on top), but it was mostly Logan and me. We were up pretty late getting it done, but it was so nice to sit on the love seat and cuddle with Logan admiring our hard work!When Lucas woke the next morning, he was very excited to see that the tree was decorated! We do Hallmark ornaments....we typically buy some each year, but my MIL sends each of us one yearly. She always asks for my help in deciding which ones to get for the boys. Funny thing is, I think we discuss in Oct. and then I totally forget which ones they are getting by Christmas time! Anyway, last year Lucas got a Pat Pat rocket ornament that plays the theme song. He loves it! I put it down low so that he can press the button all by himself. Logan and I had do some thinking before placing ornaments on the tree. The cute little snowmen with tiny twig arms went up high--those twigs can't withstand a curious 3 year old. I figured some ornaments would get broken, but I think we are already down 3 and the tree has only been up a full day!! They can mostly be put back together. Lucas broke the cover off of one of my Winnie the Pooh books (my MIL has been buying me this series ever since it first started in 1998!), so once I glue it on, the book will permanently be open. He is still touching the ornaments, but he is being more careful with them. He was pretty sad that he broke one. Logan broke one, too. He was a cranking the handle on one a little too hard and a bear's head popped off (it moved back and forth with the music)!! He was sad, too. I think they both learned their lesson that maybe the ornaments aren't toys after all. And momma learned a lesson that ornaments don't hold up well when they are dropped.

Does this look like a lot?

Yesterday, the boys and I went to the thrift store. Logan gets pretty bored while I look through the clothes, so his entertainment is to collect empty hangers. Yesterday he had a handful of them and he held them towards me. "Does this look like a lot of hangers to you?" I told him that it looked like a few, but not a lot. "Well, it is 5 hangers. If you think that 5 hangers isn't a lot, then why do you think that 5 dollars IS a lot?" I'm wracking my brain. Why is he comparing hangers to dollars? Oh yes, I've got it!!

When Logan lost his second tooth, the Tooth Fairy brought him $5. This was while we were working on our kitchen and our ladder was in the dining room (and no, Dad, we've still not done anything else on it....maybe once the holidays are over). Well, for some odd reason, Logan decided that he should slide his $5 into a slot on the ladder. Not too bad, except that it went inside the foot of the ladder and there is no way to take the foot off. So, that $5 was basically wasted. I told him that $5 was a lot of money to lose. Of course, I don't think that $5 is a lot of money, but when you are 7 (well, he was 6 at the time) and got it from the Tooth Fairy, I think that IS a lot!

Logan's logic was that if 5 hangers isn't very much, then $5 isn't either! I thought it was pretty clever of him.

How old are you?

I just had my birthday somewhat recently (Nov. 3). Logan asked me how old I am. Thirty. The big 3-0. He thought for a minute. Then said, "30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, 100. So, that means you are close to 100, right?". Goodness, I know that 30 is getting older (not old, older...as in no longer in my 20s), but please, oh please don't speed the clock up that fast!! Time is going by way too quickly as it is.

It seems like this was just yesterday:But it can't be because one week ago I was out taking pictures and that little (or not so little, since that was the day I went into labor!!) bump in my belly now looks like this: