Equinox

It's not just the First Day of Spring ... it's the First Day of Bubbles!

Maike's favorite pastime

Early Birthday

G turns 12 over Spring Break, so she had a little birthday party with three friends today. Dan & I took them to paint pottery and then to dinner at Noodles & Co., a group favorite.

Painting pottery

The gang at Noodles (before the hot chili sauce and Rice Krispie treat experiment began)

Cake 3

Snickerdoodle Cake with Vanilla Buttercream Frosting (for Grandpa's birthday)

Wii-Ha!

We've been trying to buy a Wii since the week after Christmas. We (foolishly, erroneously) thought that they'd be easy to get once the holidays were over. Finally yesterday, despite Daylight Savings Time and the fact that Dan was out of town, G & I went to stand in line in the cold before Best Buy opened to see if we could get one of the "minimum of 15" advertised in the Sunday flyer. (I keep reading that Wiis are big with senior citizens, but the only other people there matched the demographic of the Star Trek Convention I attended in 1994.) Fortunately the manager at the store was a decent sort ... as people lined up he'd come out and hand out tickets for a unit to be claimed before noon, so you could go and do something else until the store opened. We got ticket 12, which G took as A Sign, since she was getting it for her 12th birthday. I couldn't figure out how to hook it up, so we had to wait for Dan to get home this evening. G & I played tennis, bowling and boxing. What a blast! We are already planning the add-ons!

Spring ... Sprung?

We've had more than 80 inches of snow this winter and days on end of subzero temperatures. Despite cold weather, intermittant snow flurries and lots of the white stuff still around today, G & I saw three examples of what my dad proclaims the true harbinger of spring ... the dead skunk in the middle of the road. Sorry for those poor little critters, but hopeful that spring really is nigh!

Book 'Em

Today was G's school's Third Annual Scholastic Book Fair and Read-a-thon. The kids really look forward to this event because they get to dress in pjs, bring bean bags/sleeping bags/chairs and spend the whole day reading. Plus they can browse and buy books. I co-chair this with another mom, and while it's a lot of work, it's worth it. We raised enough money to buy a Promethean Interactive Board for the school and our library is going to get more than $500 in free books. Thanks to all of G's sponsors!

G browses the book fair

Reading one of the 10 books she purchased

Cake 2

G looks forward to March because it's a big birthday month here, and therefore filled with opportunities to make cakes.

Dan turned something north of 40 today. We made his favorite, Swiss steak, and had a little party with his dad. I got him a book that answers his fall-back question: WWMD? (What Would MacGyver Do?) Then he and G went to the pool to do a few laps.

Making a Deeply Chocolate Almond Cake

Adding the Chocolate Cream Cheese Frosting

Birthday boy & pal

Cake 1

Maike turned nine this weekend. As the Swiss say, "Three years a young dog, three years a good dog, three years an old dog, and everything else is a gift from God."

Alpo Prime Rib Chophouse cake with Medium Milk Bone frosting

Birthday pup & pal

lolcats

It escapes me when, but G and I discovered the Web site "lolcats" (see link to the right). For those of you not familiar with it, people make up captions in broken English for pictures of cats and other animals. There are running gags about cats in search of cheeseburgers, monorail cats, the Ceiling Cat, a walrus with a missing bucket and smart-aleck sharks, just to name a few. G and I find them highly amusing and check the site every couple of days; the humor is lost on Dan, who does not find strange syntax and spelling funny. We haven't posted to the site yet, but G has come up with a few that she'd like to. A sampling:

Laptop

Wish I'd had one to ease the agita of homework ...

Never Too Late

My dad has always been big on reunions and keeping up with people. The Internet has allowed him to get in touch with friends he's lost touch with, even if it has been 30 or 40 years. He's told me several times that "it's never too late." I was fortunate this week when Cindy, a high school friend whose wedding I was in, found me, serendipitously aided by someone we both didn't connect each other with (see Don Version 2.0 at right). Now I know Dad is absolutely right. It's only too late if you miss your chance.

"Swim" Party

G's swim team had a sledding party this afternoon. Almost too many daredevil stunts for my heart to handle, but everyone had a great time and no one ended up in the ER.

Sometimes the downhill trip was a success ...


... and sometimes it wasn't!

D takes a group down

D & G race a swim mom down the hill

Snow Train

Guess who organized this ...

Eclipse

Last night at 7:30 p.m. it was a beautiful, clear night for viewing the total lunar eclipse. It was also minus 3 degrees! Luckily for us, the moon came up directly east of our picture window, so we had front row seats without having to go outside and freeze our noogies off.

G uses binoculars to watch the lunar eclipse from her Papasan

Cupid's Wish

Snowshoeing

The stars finally aligned ... G is not sick, she doesn't have a ton of homework, it's sunny and in the 20s, there's lots of snow on the ground ... so we went snowshoeing after school. We're supposed to get a few more inches of snow tomorrow, so we're hoping Dan can get out with us this weekend.

G & Maike blaze a trail

Maike waits for me

Maike's favorite pastime

Less Than Zero

Yesterday started another patch of subzero weather. It should break tomorrow afternoon, when the forecast calls for it to warm up enough to dump another 3 to 6 inches of snow on us.

Dan & Maike brave double digit negative temps and blowing snow to get the Sunday paper

More of Same

It snowed for more than 24 hours here, and finally stopped about an hour or so ago. No idea what the total accumulation was ... deep and drifting. There was no school today, but G has been sick *again* so it didn't really matter. Spring cannot come fast enough at this point.

Maike loves snow. She and I plodded around in it for a while this afternoon

Subzero

No school yesterday in this part of the state because of high winds/sub-zero weather. Because the front was out of the east, our house was freezing. The only warm place was G's room. She & I spent the day there, playing games and watching Discovery videos.
P.S. That isn't a beard or a kitten around my neck as some have inquired ... it was so cold I borrowed one of G's faux fur stoles and her Barnard sweatshirt.

Perfect Winter Day

We had perfect winter weather on Sunday. Temperatures were in the upper 20s, there was no wind, it was sunny and there was lots of powdery snow over a snow/ice base. We spent two hours sledding, tubing and tobogganing on our front hill with some friends. We finally gave up not because we were cold but because we were so wet.

G breaking in a path

Paths got faster as time wore on

You can stay out a lot longer when you're not slogging up the hill with your snow craft!