If she had the proper words to say,

Today has been the laziest of days. My shoulders/neck/upper back area is quite tense, and I'm sure I didn't help things along by standing at the counter for a while earlier. I was seeding two pomegranates, as well as sectioning four grapefruits and eleven oranges. Still, I'm glad the fruits are done. I love to eat any of these in the mornings, but I'm too groggy at the time to get into such labor-intensive foods. Now, I'll just need to open the container and dig in!

I haven't made cookies in several days. It feels... weird.

Dinner last night with friends was amazing. We sat at the restaurant gabbing for almost three hours - and that was with all of our kids! I can't believe they weren't running for the doors, but I think they were perfectly content to gab on their own with each other, too. It was just a great, perfect opportunity for all involved.

We're having a winter storm right now, and I would bet that we've already had 8" of snowfall since 4pm or so this afternoon. It should continue until tomorrow morning, but then we're supposed to have 50mph winds, too. My neighbor's mom is coming in tomorrow to spend New Year's with them, and I hope that her plane can still arrive safely tomorrow night.

I still have my Christmas decorations up, and while I do want them down for cleaning, I don't want to go back to just regular home decor yet. It's much too early for Valentine's Day (despite what the stores/shopping centers would have me believe already), and I just love my holiday things. Still, I would love to be able to shut my window for computer time during the day, too...

The snow is lightly falling and has been for a few hours. It's soft, and pretty. I have lit every candle in the house (18!), and the lighting is warm and cozy. Jack's still sledding outside with friends, A.J. is practicing his clarinet in his room, and Philip is napping. I'm grooving to the Glee soundtrack while I tidy the office (yeah, it's been playing for days straight!). We have an easy dinner planned tonight, and then Philip and I will knock out some movies later.

Ahhhhh.

I'm waiting on the moving company to come today and pick up all our boxes and packing material. I can't wait to have all the space back in the garage!

It's lightly snowing now - large, beautifully crystalline flakes that are so, so fluffy - but I think I'm going to head out there anyway. There's less than a 1/4" of new accumulation on the driveway and sidewalks, but I'm going to try to move the huge mounds of snow along the side of the house to... somewhere else? (I'm not sure where, but it just feels ominous where they are at right now. I mean, it's packed up as tall as me, and we've only just begun the winter season. If it's not moved, where will we put the new snow?)

It's 5° right now, but the wind is blowing less than 5mph at the moment. I don't think we've had winds that low since we arrived in North Dakota. Add in that we should stay in the above 0° today, and it's all the better to take advantage of it!

Edited to add: Whee! Philip just came home for the day (already, and it's not even 10am!), so now we're going out together. We should be able to knock out a lot of this! :-)

So. Much. Unpacking.

It feels like it will never end! Realistically, however, it will be done late tomorrow or Tuesday - I can't tell just yet. I am so very much looking forward to calling the moving company and asking them to come back and pick up all their boxes and packing material! (I'll have space in my garage again - whee!)

My dining room is just gorgeous and huge. I still cannot get over all the space in there. That, to me, is the most drastic difference between our old house and this one. I love the fact that it's not situated off the main garage entrance into the house, and it's not near a television of any sorts. It's awesome, truly.

The plan tomorrow is for Philip and I to move/unpack all the stuff in the garage. See, the movers unloaded all our shed and garage items directly into the garage, so we've got to unpack everything and get it moved into its proper place in the storage room in the back. Philip already took apart our shed, and we'll put the pieces in our "renovation space." (When they renovated this house, they built on an extra room along the basement wall, and they entered through there, bringing all their equipment with them. Once they finished, they closed off the room and left a large access flap. We can easily open it via the flap, and it's an 8x10' space, at least.) While we're doing that, the boys will be playing hard in the snow. Once we're done, we'll have all our space back in the garage, and we'll move all the boxes and packing material to the breezeway until pick-up. Trash Day is also on Tuesday, and it'll be great to have all that gone, too. (Gosh, but moving creates a lot of excess trash!)

Depending on how long we're out in the garage tomorrow, we'll work on the office afterwards. It's the only room left, and that's because I considered it the lowest priority of all the rooms. I mean, *I* love this room, and I practically live in it sometimes... but everything I really need (computer, bills, filing cabinet, etc.), I can already reach, and we brought with us ahead of time. What needs to be unpacked are the bookshelves and lots of Philip's military memorabilia and knick-knacks. He heads back to work on Tuesday, and I can finish this room by myself, if needed.

As a reward once ALL of the unpacking is done, we plan to go see Alvin & the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel. The boys are dying to see it, and I think it looks pretty cute, too. I thought the first one was good, and I'm sure this one will be about the same. The boys are also anxious to spend some of their Christmas cash at the mall, too. *wink*

Speaking of movies, we all went to see New Moon last Friday. It was the boys' first time seeing it, Philip' second time, and my seventh time. I probably won't see it again in the theatre, but it was just as good this time again. A quick rundown of the showings I've been to:

1st - with Marissa as my 'date' to Amy's midnight premiere party (11/20)
2nd - with Marissa again on Sunday afternoon (11/22)
3rd - with Liz on Sunday night (11/22)
4th - with Philip the following Tuesday (11/24)
5th - with Cheyenne on Thanksgiving night (11/26)
6th - with Aimée on the Saturday after Thanksgiving (11/28)
7th - with the family (12/21)

We also recently saw The Princess and the Frog (on opening day!), and we all loved it. I cried a little near the end, but it was wonderful to see the old-style animation again. And - I was so surprised when the first song began! I'd almost forgotten how the older Disney movies always had original songs - how sad is that?! I thought the characters were very charming, and I really hope the movie does well enough that Disney will do another one in this style again soon.

We saw Disney's A Christmas Carol in 3D, too. I found it to be much darker than I'd imagined, but the effects were amazing. Honestly, though, there were parts of it that unsettled even me, and I don't think I'd let younger children see it yet (though the Disney Channel promotes it constantly). We were late to the game on this one, having been planning on seeing it ever since we rode the official movie train back in August (what a neat experience, too!). After seeing the movie, we bought my favorite as a young girl: Mickey's Christmas Carol. I didn't have the movie growing up, but I had a record of it, and I played that over and over all year long. I still have most of it memorized. :-)

I'm hoping to have mail tomorrow, but I'm not terribly optimistic. There was, of course, no mail yesterday in the face of this major blizzard, and then today was Sunday. Philip and I did watch some lady trudge through all the snow with her key, falling down in the deep drifts and then crawling on her knees atop them to get to the box, only to open it and find it empty, of course. We learned long ago (in both Alaska and Nebraska, actually) that even though the post office's motto is, "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds," that isn't always the case. We've had numerous times with no mail delivery due to inclement weather, and on a day where no travel is advised, I'm surprised that anyone would think there would be mail.

Perhaps she didn't check her box on Christmas Eve, then? *nods* We'll go with that. :-)

Jack is sledding again. :-)

The past three days, there's been a LOT of sledding going on. Both of the boys have been out in it the last two days, but Jack hadn't had enough yet, and is out there with friends right now. When Jack is finally done today and comes in, I'll start the third load of snowgear in the laundry in as many days. Crazy, but so much fun!

Speaking of sledding, I'll have bunches of pics later on, too. Heather brought Catherine over for some snow play yesterday, and there are SO many, many cute ones!

Can I just say how badly I wish this new cold front would NOT come? Minnesota, you're more than welcome to keep your snow - I don't want it, and especially not for Easter weekend. It's so ridiculous, too. The forecast is for a high of 40° on Sunday with a chance of snow, but it should be sunny with a high of 60° the very next day, Monday.

Wouldn't it make so much more sense to just skip Sunday's weather and go straight to Monday's? We've hunted Easter eggs in the snow before (when we lived in Alaska), and it's just not as much fun.

Plus, our new Easter outfits are not suited for snow. *sigh*

We went to church very early this morning. The weather was cold and blustery, and it was gray and spitting snow (not really sticking nor amounting to anything), but we still attended early as planned. We were set to attend the 9:30am service, but on Thursday, both boys had received letters of invitation to a special family project scheduled during today's services. As we had to be home by 11am for Philip to work at Runza, we didn't have time for the project after our service, so we'd planned to go before.

And we were the very first ones there this morning! We arrived at 8:40am, and we quickly settled on making an advent candle wreath as our family project (there were three activities from which to choose). We talked and laughed as we pushed pencils into tiny squares of green tissue paper together, and we all picked a candle and base to add as well. After many minutes, we all stuck the wooden red berries in between the green papers, too.

It's a beautiful wreath. :-)

After our project was completed, Ms. Nicole (the Children's Director) came up to us and exclaimed happily, "Oh, you guys are early! Oh, and you are the ONLY ones so far to actually make your project as a FAMILY! That's so encouraging to see! We had over 50 families last night at our Saturday service, but each person made their own. Look at how beautiful your wreath is, and you made it together!"

We were bewildered. After all, the invitation had said "family project." I suppose it never occurred to us to do anything other than pick one project and do it together. *blush* But we felt good, and we'd had a nice time working together. I'd steal squares from Philip's stack of tissue, Jack would then steal from my bunch of squares, and then he'd separate the tissue for both he and A.J. to use. We all did an equal share in making our wreath, and it now sits proudly in the middle of our dining room table.

We had a light breakfast of grapes, mini doughnuts, sweet breads and muffins (provided by the church) before heading up to our service. There was no Sunday School this morning, and so the boys sat with us in the pew. The service was wonderful, and it was a peaceful, fresh-feeling start to this glorious Advent season. We ended with communion, too.

We came home, changed clothes, and Philip left for work. I heated up some lunch for myself and the boys, and then I set to baking. Today was Lacey's last day at Runza, and as a friend, I wanted to make something to let her know how much I've appreciated working with her. Philip bought the ingredients for the gift last night, and I set to work making a 'Milk Chocolate Bar Cake.' It was rich and delicious-looking (I didn't sample any), and it had TEN full-size Hershey's® candy bars in it! It was a triple-layer cake, and I finished frosting it only a few minutes before Philip returned home from work a couple hours later.

He changed clothes, and then we all headed to Runza with the cake for Lacey. We stopped at Hallmark® on the way, and I tucked in and bought her a card as well. When we arrived at the store, Lacey seemed so touched. She read the card, and we hugged for a good while. Then Philip served up very tall pieces of cake to Lacey, the boys (they split a piece - it was so big!), and the other employees there. Everyone who ate some cake said it was very good, very rich. Lacey grabbed a milk from the cooler to wash hers down, even. I'm happy it was so well-received, as I think it was my very first attempt at making a layer cake.

We chatted for a few more minutes with her, and then it was time to really say goodbye. I hugged her again, and I wished her the best of luck in her new job. She's a sweet gal, and I'll miss her.

Afterwards, we headed to the BX to pick up a video game Philip wanted, and we picked up some stocking stuffers along the way. The boys helped me to pick out goodies for the kitties' stockings, too. Then we had a snack at the BX, stopped at the commissary to pick up some orange juice and soda for Philip, and came home.

Jack and I spent an hour or so making a project for his kindergarten class, and he is very proud of it. He even used lots of glitter glue! (I really hope the big splotches dry overnight - yikes!) Then the boys had their baths, and I helped them to make a special dessert tonight with the two leftover Hershey® bars we had - S'mores! We watched the marshmallows "blow up" in the microwave, then quickly smashed a graham cracker on top while they were still hot, and the chocolate was perfectly melty and gooey in seconds. Jack even had chocolate smeared ALL over his face. :-)

I have so many things for which to be thankful.

Now it's bedtime for the boys, and I'm getting pretty tired myself. A much earlier Sunday morning routine yields a much earlier Sunday night routine, methinks. ;-)

Even though I said I wouldn't, I've been out to shovel the piddly little snows (about 1.5") that fell last night twice. Well, technically, I re-shoveled yesterday afternoon, but that was from stupid drifts that keep occurring on my back deck. And then this morning I did the new, smaller amount of snow on the driveway and walkway, and I finished up the back deck this afternoon.

I think I'm due for a nice long soak in my swimming pool tub. It's a big tub, and I'm hoping it will soothe away some of the stresses of this past week. Let's hope I don't fall asleep while I'm in there!

Or snowed in, I guess.

We'd been out of milk all day, and I finally braved the roads with the boys this evening to run and get some. I'd called a few places beforehand, as I didn't want to get all the way somewhere and find them closed, their milk trapped inside behind locked doors.

So we got in the car. And we backed out of the clear driveway and onto the street, and we set off. A-aaa-annndd wwwwwww-we sttt-taaaarr-tted bu-ummmmmpp-ppping arrrr-rrround ssoommme-th-thinggg likkkke tth-thiiiss.

The icy roads were quite bumpy, in case you couldn't tell. ;-) The boys were talking to one another, and I felt a bit guilty, but I explained to them that I needed them to be very quiet - that the roads were icy, and it was dark and that made me nervous, so I needed lots of quiet so that I could concentrate on the roads.

And they didn't utter another peep, either one of them. Once we pulled into the convenience store, we all hopped out and headed in together to get the milk. I bought a gallon of regular milk, and we each picked up small containers of flavored milks as a treat (chocolate for both me and A.J. and strawberry for Jack). Then we trooped back to the car and loaded up again.

I drove a different route home so that I wouldn't have to contend with the ice-covered hill entering Lockbourne Drive. We took it very slow - never getting above 20mph - and we made it easily back home with the new route. As we pulled into the garage again and I shut off the car, A.J. wiped his brow and said, "Whew! I'm so glad we made it back home. Those bumps were really scary!"

And we all laughed about it as we came inside to eat. We talked over 'Grandma's Chicken and Vegetable Rice Bake,' and we enjoyed our milks.

I feel accomplished. :-)

Ryan called a few minutes ago, just as I was going to put in my contacts. I was getting ready to go outside and start shoveling - not because the snow is stopping any at all - but because I was afraid that, at this rate, there would be too much snow by the time I got back from work at 2pm for me to easily make it into the garage again. And since I have no clue how to use the snowblower, I figured it would take me about an hour to shovel everything instead.

But Runza is not opening until noon today. And if things keep up the way they are right now, it's very likely they will close the store for the entire day.

*crosses fingers*

You can barely see outside, for the snow is swirling in all directions. That's why I was going to put my contacts in, too; I know there's no way I'd be able to keep my glasses clean to any degree. There is snow blown up on every window and door, making it hard to see out of the house right now, but when I opened the door to check, snow quickly rushed inside as well. It's really a much better plan for me to just stay inside until the snowfall is done, and then shovel it all at one time.

Of course, school was cancelled bright and early this morning, so we didn't have to worry about that, either. It was a good thing.

Edited to add: w00t! Runza is closed for the day!