59: Snow Day #2 for the Week!

Everything shut down around here today!

I don't remember having so many things closed. Ever. Mission kids already didn't have school scheduled for the day, but all the Missoula schools were also closed.  The tribal offices were all closed. SKC shut down at 11:00. The UofM had a snow day for the first time in decades. The local schools cancelled all sporting events for the evening and weekend, and our boys basketball team stayed overnight in Hamilton so they wouldn't have to travel. The Mall in Missoula closed early, and the church even cancelled Skate Conference which was supposed to be this Sunday. There was so much snow in Missoula they even had an avalanche in the Rattlesnake. It slid down the mountain, took out a house, and trapped an 8-year-old who was outside and the older couple who lived in the house. All three were alive when they took them to the hospital, but it took 3 hours to find them all and gt everyone out.  Avalanches are not common around here either--at least in town. It sounds like this one came down right onto Van Buren Street. A few hours after the avalanche they diverted some of the rescuers to look for two skiers who were lost up at Snowbowl.

We did get a ton of snow, too. We measured this afternoon and it was about 17 inches. A few of those inches were left over from Monday, but in many places in the yard it's twice that deep because of drifts. It wasn't too cold in Mission, so the kids had fun playing outside and just generally not being at school.

And, It sounds like we're supposed to get yet another storm Sunday. Apparently we're really having winter this year.

58: I made him carry the basket. The frolicking is all him.

But, the snow was pretty darn perfect for frolicking.

Zayda: 7 Months!

 
Seven months. . . she's a little less baby every day!

She doesn't sleep a whole lot; she stays up late, gets up early, only naps occasionally. She doesn't seem to ever want to miss out on what the older kids are doing.  But she is still almost always in a good mood. (Maybe she sleeps all day when I have to leave her for work & just stays awake the days she's home with me? Of course she doesn't want to miss hanging out with me. ;) ) She does like to help me work, but now she's so grabby and restless getting things done with her on my lap isn't as easy as it used to be.

I was realizing the other day she's about old enough we should probably back away the swing and baby chairs– but she was hardly ever in them. A couple of my other babies loved the swings for the first few months; I bet Zayda hasn't even been in it a dozen times. She doesn't mind it, but I think she's just always had so many people around and always been so content wherever she is, I just always forget it's an option. 

I think she'll be excited when she can crawl around (she already loves getting into everything) but I was betting the other kids she'd walk later than any of them. She's not nearly as determined to be mobile as they were. But we'll see... she is getting really annoyed now that she can't quite get up to sitting on her own.

She does love her hands and tries to get a hold of everything. And everything she gets her hands on goes in her mouth. Food is her favorite–nearly every kind of food except actual baby food that comes in the little jars. She seems very unclear about why she would want to eat any of that. But she's pretty much game for anything else and is always excited about eating.

And so far she likes being outside.  She's been enjoying her first winter and all these piles of snow!

57: hand-me-down books

Gwen cleaned out their books today and sent Zayda home with the board books her girls had outgrown. I actually threw away most of the ones we had a few weeks ago because they were so beat up and destroyed they were hardly books anymore. Last time we had people this size I had about a dozen of them around every day--we read our toddler books to pieces!

56: perfect powder

I couldn't get over how absolutely perfect the day was: warm enough for no coat, gently falling snow, piles and piles of beautiful powder. You could see each little individual snowflake. It was so hard to go to work. I really wanted to just stay home and wander around outside.

(I may have been about an hour later than I was planning to be. . .)                                                                                                                                                                  

55: Snow Day!

Another no-school-due-to-weather day in February! I'm not quite sure why we got this day off--sort of feel like they were anticipating a storm that never really made it here? It did snow 3-4 inches and it was about 15-20 degrees– definitely winter but nothing more harsh than most other snowy days. There was a huge storm in the area, and a lot of the schools did a delayed start, but both Mission and SKC had the entire day off. We took advantage of it and played outside much of it–ever unburied the sleds and went sledding in town with some of the cousins.

54: piano

I meant to have my kids take piano lessons. And then suddenly they started growing up before we got around to it. Maybe with this youngest one...

53: tending to the birds

Gwen gave Lex the job of taking care of her birds while they are in California. I'm not sure why you would put Lex in charge of small, harmless little birds, but apparently they're planning a trip to Washington D.C. together so Lex needs to start saving some money. I think he may earn about $5 by the end of the week for this job, so he better line up some more work.

52: cuddling

51: glowing hills

When I finally make it to Thursday I'm really excited to get up in the morning and hang out with Zayda and not have to drive into work.  I always plan to use the day to get caught up on reporting and grading and email and all the work that piles up when I have to work in the middle of all sorts of other people all week. But, my house is such a disaster by that point in the week I end up doing nothing but trying to catch up there. And I'm in such a bad mood by about noon I find myself violently washing dishes already thinking about how I'm not going to have any time to sleep before work the next day.  Probably working from home is not the best set up for me right now.

At least this week I achieved a three-day streak of actually cooking dinner: lasagna, enchiladas, and white chicken chili. Israel cooked the day after when he didn't have to work. Sadly, I think that may be our real mealtime record for 2014. Something to aim to beat in March, I guess.

50: morning dash

Zoran and Lex running to school. Again.  This has been my elusive goal all year: both boys on time, in clean clothes that they like, happy, with zero yelling or pouting in the process. We make it sometimes. (Most days, actually.) Surprisingly, this arrival in a good mood all depends very little on when they get up and mostly upon how the morning unfolds.  I decided happy and ready to start the day trumps on being on time, so we've been late more than ever before. This stresses me out some, but not nearly as much have having a pair of boys who start off their mornings hating the world.

49: Going up...

We've known it was coming for awhile, but today they actually starting putting this thing together. So unhappy about this. Who wants a cell phone tower in their backyard?

48: baby's first selfie

Photo of Zayda by Zayda. She's already working on the interesting angles.
I'm sure someday she'll be glad I've saved this.

47: another full Saturday

photo by Aodhan

We had ambulance trauma training all day Saturday and Sunday this weekend. We went from there to the wrestlers' escort for their return from the state tournament, I went on an ambulance call, and then the kids and I ended the evening at Mom & Dad's for our regular Sunday dinner.  At a little before 6:00pm,Todd was baptized in the creek. The younger kids are setting a family precedent for outside, sometime dramatic, weather baptisms. Afterwards we had some of Dad's chili and then some belated birthday cake for Mom. As we were visiting Aodhan deleted from my phone all the pictures he didn't feel were worth keeping. Apparently only his from the evening made the cut. (I also have about 45 blurry ones of Mom holding Zayda and a few of the back of Gwen's head.) This one appears to have been taken right before he was gathered up onto Teri's lap to help with his focus during Papa's talk. (Yaya was providing the same service for Lex.)

46: Last Games!

The 6th graders had their last basketball games today. Ronan hosted a tournament just for sixth graders, and it was a lot of fun to see all the sixth graders from Mission play together (rather than dispersed to cover the sixth and seventh grade teams). Mission has so many girls they still had enough for two full teams, but they did such a great job when they were playing other girls actually their age. They've all really improved a lot over the last month and are more fun to watch all the time.

45: Valentines Day!

We stopped by Mom's classroom on the way to school to wish her happy birthday. (She needed a picture of my cute little sock monkey with all her sock monkeys.

Last year we surprised her on her birthday with a sonogram picture of Zayda. Crazy how that doesn't seem that long ago!

44: Bingo for Books

The school has been putting on this program through a variety of different grant programs for a few years now. It's always fun to see all families there together and all the kids so excited about all their new books. (They always make sure all the kids leave with at least one new book--most end up with a pile.)

Schizophrenic Weather

Our weather is so crazy, over the course of less than a week we had a 70 degree change...from -30 below to over 40.

But these two pictures were taken in the same spot less than 24 hours apart. It hardly even looks like the same season!

43: slush

Piles of snow, followed by rapidly increasing temperatures, equals tons and tons of slush. The kids walked home from school and were soaked by the time they made it back to the house. I sort of doubt people without four-wheel-drive could navigate in and out of our driveway.

42: snowy drive

So this is what it looked like today as soon as I turned out of my driveway to head to work.

(And then by this afternoon I think it was like 45 degrees and sunny.)

41: toys supplied by big brother

Zoran found her some toys, and they were even nice and soft, but they all were all also covered in sports logos. The Oregon and Miami sock monkeys are some of his favorite possessions. However, he said he didn't care if she puked all over the Roethlisberger doll because "they suck" so apparently he is not a Steelers fan. I think he just likes that one because he got it out of one of those big claw/ hook machines. I guess winning things makes them cool even if you don't like the team.

40: Snow (the perfect kind for playing in)

So I was pretty happy the snow shovel was right beside the door, ready to shovel all this white stuff, and not buried somewhere underneath it (as was the situation with the last big snow storm). However, I was not so on top of remembering where the sleds might be located.

A kayak kind of works when you can't find the sleds, right? Kind of? (Not so much....but at least they're creative.)

If I had any idea where the garbage can lid was under all this snow I think that might work as a sled. This seasonal organization is so hard.

39: winter batting practice

The Osprey team has cool little batting cages hidden under downtown Missoula (accessible only through the back of a store, with an owner who likes to pretend he has no idea they exist, down a starcaise, and into the basement). It's kind of cool to have somewhere to practice even when it's too frozen to do much outside. I wish our schedule was a little less crazy so we could get down there more often. And I wish our local Mission girls had a pitching machine they could use anywhere....

38: Mom Honored by the Governor's Office

Mom receiving her award from Governor Bullock

Mom received a state award from the governor for her more than two decades of volunteer service on our ambulance. She's kind of amazing--she has covered more calls than anyone in the history of our ambulance service--by probably close to 1,000 calls.

My kids were really excited to go over and then they moved Azia's game in all the shuffling of activities because of the winter weather, and Israel's state drama conference conflicted, so it ended up just being me and the boys making the trip over. Zayda got left at home at the last minute, too, since she probably wasn't too enthusiastic about the road trip and since I didn't have any older kids with me I didn't have anything to do with her while Gwen and I had lunch at the governor's mansion with Mom after the ceremony. We still had a group of the grandkids there, but I wish I could have brought them all over. It's fun that she got recognized for the amazing service she's been giving to our community for so long.

37: too cold for...pretty much everything

We didn't get any snow days yet, but today they called everyone at about 7:00 am saying the school basically was having a day off because it was too cold to function. The boiler wasn't working and fuel lines were frozen so they had no heat, and heat seems really important when it's -24 below. (I don't actually know what the temperature was in the morning--the day before my car said -24 when I dropped the boys off at school and I think it got colder after that.)

I stayed home with the kids because I was worried about leaving them alone when it was so cold. Or mostly worried about leaving Lex, who doesn't believe anything I say. It looked beautiful and sunny and deceivingly warm, and I didn't want him getting stuck outside somewhere. He's the one who touched the hot stove because he wouldn't believe it was still hot after we turned it off.  This was last year, not when he was tiny. He did it after I told him it was still hot and we discussed at length how long it takes things to cool off and the lights built into the stove to remind people it's still hot. And then just reached up and touched it anyway. I think the blisters swayed him to side with me on this issue from now on, but we have no experience with extreme cold. Last night after an ambulance call I couldn't feel my fingers by the time I got back from the ambulance shed--about 4 blocks away--and had trouble opening the door to the house. I didn't trust him to figure out the danger of this situation by experience.

The kids did  have fun experimenting with just how cold it really was. We turned boiling water into steam, froze bubbles, and played outside in really short spans. I tried to get work done, which was much less successful than I'd like, but expected since I was also trying to keep track of eight kids. They got the boiler in the school working by the afternoon and actually had practices and the basketball game and drove the middle school girls to Ronan to play their game. I wasn't too on board with this--really sometimes it's okay to cancel things. There are very few reasons to get people out and driving around when it's that cold and I don't really think kids' sports is one of them.

36: penguin pjs & pigtails

It's kind of amazing how happy this little scene here makes me.

35: near Ninepipes

2/4/14

34: Snow!

Woke up to huge piles of snow everywhere! It seemed to surprise people in change of keeping snow of the roads, too, because we needed 4-wheel-drive just to get around town and people were still getting stuck in the middle of the streets when I got back into town at like 4:00pm. We haven't really had winter or any now yet this year, so I'm not minding the big piles everywhere. (Though I am thankful for our all-wheel & 4-wheel drive vehicles.)

33: another Sunday

The only time I left my house today was to take the kids over to eat at Mom & Dad's for an hour or so. Sometimes it's the highlight of their weekend. They forget to actually eat half the time, so I don't think the food is the biggest draw but their house is probably their favorite place to be.

This cell phone picture of a handful of the cousins playing games is more interesting than the piles of laundry or stacks of papers that occupied most of my day. Everyone else in the world seemed to be enjoying the Superbowl. I don't even really care about the Superbowl, but I would have like to go visit people for the afternoon instead of spending all evening cleaning the laundry room, especially since I didn't even have time to finish. I switched to grading papers and getting ready for work before I was done, so now the laundry room still isn't clean and I didn't put all the clothes away (because the kids' drawers are also all tossed & disorganized, too) but I spent all day angry about never having any time to do anything but work and then didn't even have time to go to sleep before I went to work. I would say work and clean but my house hasn't been clean in months, so mostly I'm just grumpy about that too. Mostly, it appears I'm always just grumpy. What a great way to start the year...

32: Every few months I decide it would be fun if I had a nice picture of all my kids together...

and then I make a bad decision like agreeing to take the photo by a nearly frozen creek, which of course the two youngest boys are already falling into (in the background of this picture) before we've all even made it to the creek.  And now this photo here is the only one we have without someone pouting because they are soaked and freezing and wondering why I would come up with this dumb idea to take pictures of everyone all wet in the snow...because clearly that was my plan.