10 snow days

In January, we had 10 snow/cold days, 2 2-hour delays and 1 holiday.

School was closed:

Jan

Fri 3 (They went to school 1 day after Christmas break and then were out for 6 more days)

Mon 6

Tues 7

Wed 8

Mon 20 (MLK Day)

Tues 21

Wed 22

Thurs 23

Mon 27

Tues 28

Wed 29

We attended school 11 days:

Jan

Thurs 2

Thurs 9

Fri 10

Mon 13

Tues 14

Wed 15

Thurs 16

Fri 17

Fri 24 (2 hour delay - which happened to be 5 hours of school in the middle of an 11 day break)

Thurs 30 (2 hour delay)

Fri 31

It snowed a lot. There was snow on the ground for well over 2 weeks - that doesn't happen often. We shoveled a lot. Played in the snow a lot. It was COLD a lot. We wore pajamas a lot. We ran space heaters a lot. Our furnace ran a lot. We dressed in layers a lot - me in my cuddle duds, Ted just wore pajamas under everything, Sophie continued to wear clothing super inappropriate for such coldness. We read a lot. Watched a lot of movies. Played a lot of games. Played with friends as much as could to get out of the house. We fought a lot. I worked from home a lot. We stayed up late and slept in a lot. The house was a wreck a lot. I got not a lot of work done at all. Everything and everyone seemed to slow down a lot.

Both kids liked to help with the shoveling.

Sophie's super awesome form.

We measured snow a lot. But I'm not sure we ever got an accurate measurement because the snow drifted a lot. (This particular measurement was in the plowed snow so that doesn't count.)

My work from home.

We made a "My Special Day" plate at the Wow Factory one day. Each of us got a quarter of the plate. My section was not supposed to look like pizza. This is the plate you get to use when it's your special day of any sort - birthday, loose a tooth, report cards, etc. It's not quite what I envisioned and there's a part of me that wants to give it a second try. But I think that might be defeating the purpose. We also went to the Wow Factory another day to paint half off Christmas ornaments.

The kids decided to switch pj's one day . . . 

Then they put on masks to see if we could recognize them. 

One morning I came down to assist Sophie with breakfast. She had sugar all over her face. When I asked her if she had been eating out of the sugar bowl she said, "Yes. Just a little. Well, a couple of spoonfuls."

 Last weekend, we had our annual Regional Leadership Weekend at Oglebay. We took 95 college students - leaders and leaders in training. This was the back of my van. That didn't include most of the paper products.

I had Undo's cater Saturday night dinner which was hugely awesome - both the great food and not having to worry about it.

Susie Berg SAVED THE DAY by taking my kids to the lodge pool with her kids. They had a great time and it was something I was just not able to do.  She's my hero.

This is what meal time looked like in our cabin.

 Our stellar leaders and leaders in training. I am so proud of them!

 

We packed up Sunday afternoon in the middle of dumping snow with a lot of snow on the ground. Sophie's boots were soaked so she wore Ted's gloves on her feet to warm up on the way home.

The drive home.

 Back to snow days. One of the cool things about these days is that the kids played games on their own, especially bigger kid games that Sophie can now play and that they enjoy together.

On one of our last snow days, Aunt Lois and Uncle David came to Morgantown, got a hotel room and we swam! It was so fun. We had a debacle with the first hotel (they had drained and filled the pool the night before and it was freezing) that caused us to move hotels. It's always hilarious to be in your swimming suits and wear your snows boots to get to the room to change.

After swimming we went to Buffalo Wild Wings for dinner and some game playing.

On what we knew would be our last snow day, I took the kids and 3 friends to see Frozen for the second time. The storyline, the characters, the music - it's my new favorite! GO SEE IT! The second time was better the first. Sophie got the Elsa doll for Christmas and spent her own money to get the Ana doll before the movie. She's been singing the songs with them all week. 

Other highlights of our days off included: 

- keeping friends a few days so their mom could work

- playing at the Underdonks

- painting half price ornaments at the wow factory

- sledding at the park 

- 2 days at the church office with Grace

- bowling

I'll leave you with this:
There was quite a bit of spirited debate on social media this last week about how people should not be whining and complaining about their kids being home and not in school. There was a lot of talk about how you should enjoy every minute of being with your kids and take full advantage of the time. I won't get it, but I'll share this text I got from a friend on snow day #8.

"So, how are things over there? We are at Def-Con 4."

inconsistent

I was trying to think of a word that described our January, and just this moment, the word "inconsistent" popped into my head. Inconsistent schedules, weather, school, discipline, bedtimes, exercise, work, cleaning - pretty much everything. I thrive on routine and so do my kids. We all do so much better when we know what's expected of us. I realize you can't always know what's coming next but when things are so wishy-washy it really throws us into a funk.

I was sharing with some friends last night that this has been a really hard season of parenting. After an extended period of really enjoying my kids, one child in particular has gotten to the point of being on our very last nerve. It revolves around arguing, not obeying the first time, being cooped up indoors and just being in a really curious stage of life that results in a relentless barrage of questions every day.  Our inconsistency with discipline, using teachable moments, training, speaking love languages and snow days has served to really fuel the fire so to speak. 

(I would like to clarify that I have no room to complain about snow days as our friends in Charleston have been in school only a couple of days since the beginning of the New Year. I'm on my knees for you, friends! Your rewards are in heaven!)

So, over the past week we've developed a behavior chart, chore chart and I'm doing my best to speak both kids' love language every day. (I am a very big believer in love languages. I know it matters to me and, whether they know it or not, I can tell that it matters to my kids.) I'm being more attentive to the words I use to speak to them. I'm remembering that I need to train them instead of yell.

It's yet another snow day today. I'm putting bets on tomorrow too. We just got back from sledding at the park near our house. And sledding down the street too because we could and it was better than the hill at the park. It's snowed a lot today and it's going to get super cold again tonight. So I've got plenty of time to work on using my nice voice.

In picture world:

I LOVE listening to Ted read. He doesn't love reading as much as I would love him to. But he's getting there. In an attempt to do better with homework, I'm having him sit in the kitchen and read to me in the evening while I cook dinner. It's good for both of us.

My birthday cake from Doh. Very cute!

Last week was our first leadership of the year/semester. The staff did club for the leaders. We had a good time doing it for them.

Ben & Will Santen stayed the night with us Friday. I took them to the WVU Women's basketball game on Saturday. They are really very good (unlike the men's team). Highlights included pictures with the Mountaineer and making the big screen.

I just finished reading this book - "Playing for Keeps" by Reggie Joiner. I totally recommend it for parents and anyone working with kids and teenagers. Not your average book, but I really enjoyed it.

And we'll revisit Thanksgiving because I haven't done that yet . . .

Ted & Henry

Celebrating Ben & Heather's birthdays. I am so thankful that beard is gone.

Sophie chose a different dessert right after lunch and then was very sad she didn't get cake. Next time, sister.

And pre-Christmas dinner at Black Bear. A favorite of the Kozel/Tuel families. Especially on Maniac Mondays - $5 meals with any WVU ticket!

the christmas break that never ends

It's January 8th and we've been in school one day since December 21st. It was way back on January 2nd. I was so sad when Christmas break ended and ours had been filled with back injuries and puking. Now, I'm just like "It's time for you people to freaking go back to school!" So, here's a little of the last 8 days of being home.

I came home from the grocery store Saturday morning and Ted said, "Look, Mom, the new Harry and Marv." In case you haven't watched Home Alone recently, Harry and Marv are the "Sticky Bandits." The kids love that movie and Ted can say most every single line. Who knew bad guys wore princess dresses?

Sophie wrote this totally on her own the other day. 

"I like my famule (family) dad ted mom.

I like misshay (Miss Shay - her teacher)"

It snowed kind of a lot on Thursday night. We didn't have school on Friday but it was really too cold to be outside. Saturday was 30 degrees and sunny. It was perfect to be outside. And it snowed enough that it didn't disappear the minute you played in it. We played at the park. The kids loved sliding down the icy slides in their slick snow pants. It was a most excellent snow and one we don't get much.

We knew this polar vortex was headed our way and I anticipated not having school Monday and Tuesday. Sunday night we went to Pies & Pints with Joanna and Ken. Ben hadn't been out a whole lot because of his back and was a little cranky. So it was nice to get out of the house and be with people we can have fun with. 

We didn't have school Monday because I'm really not sure why. But the temps really started dropping Monday night. Coldest I've ever experienced. Notice the "RealFeel" - -23 degrees!

We invested in 4 new space heaters. When it gets below 15 degrees, our furnace can't keep up. We have an old house with old windows and it gets a bit drafty. With the new sun room and new front and back doors, that is huge help. But it was just too cold to keep up. So we cranked the space heaters and we all now to be dipped in a vat of vasoline because our skin is so dry. Sophie's hair is out of control too so she occasionally takes a trip to the humidifier to calm it down.

Sophie obviously did not get the memo that it was subzero outside. She wore this all day Monday.

She added the heels for the national championship. Girl is stylin'.

Sophie spent some time in the bathroom working out her second tooth.

Thanks to Seth Broadhurst, Sophie thinks she should now be given $5 for pulling her own tooth. I'm kind of ok with that though because I don't do teeth. Any incentive for them to pull it themselves is good for me.

 Watching a movie on her new dvd player while we've watched a lot of great bowl games and play off games in January. The only great thing about not having school is that Ted gets to stay up and watch the games until he falls asleep. Not sure what the blanket falling on her is about.

We spent an evening with the Underdonks. The kids always play "Spies" at their house. This is the "spy" in my house that you can't see if they are standing still. She likes to follow me around the kitchen.

Ben and Ted made home made play-doh for a project they are doing at school. It's been in his backpack since Sunday so it might be all dried out. After that, Ben and Sophie made some for her personal use and Ted worked on his report about hyenas which we thankfully finished today. 

Doing your spelling words in full uniform makes it a lot more bearable.

The Kings came over for dinner on Monday. We invited the people with the newborn over on the coldest night ever. Oops! We had a great time and Sophie always loves a good snuggle with Eliza.

Tuesday was FREEZING! And we had to get out of the house. We went to the Wow Factory to paint some BOGO free ornaments and then to Eat N Park for lunch with the Kozels. It was so very, very cold. Ted helped Millie snuggle up before we left. 

Ben's back is on the mend - or at least it's feeling a lot better. He went to the chiropractor Thursday and Friday last week.  They x-rayed, electroded, stretched, adjusted, iced, massaged and a host of other things. He has a ruptured disc. We go back next Tuesday for a plan of how to deal with this a little more long term. But after about Monday, he has been feeling a lot better. 

Last night, Ben surprised me with an early (by 1 week) birthday dinner. Actually, I made my own dinner unknowingly. He brought home the decorations and my birthday gift. And a blizzard - the Dairy Queen kind. It's pretty unusual for him to do something like celebrate a birthday early. But it was fun.

We put on party hats and made birthday videos for Graeson and Madison.

Amazingly, school was cancelled again today. It's going to be a rude awakening tomorrow morning after 19 days of staying up late, sleeping in and wearing pj's all day.