Coach and Son

Wrestling season is wrapping up for my guys this week.  I've only been able to get to one of Caeden's tournaments because of my teaching schedule, but tonight I was able to go to the meet between lessons.  

Coach Daddy, helping get the headgear on right...

I do love watching Jeremy coach.  He absolutely LOVES it and is very passionate about it.  The kids like him too.

He has had several of the kids' dads get involved with coaching this year, although most of them have zero experience with wrestling.  He tells them that the best way to learn is to get out on the mat and do it!  I think the best leaders learn while leading.  Seems wise to me.

Sometimes the kids may not be all that serious about things...

I thought Caeden wrestled pretty well tonight, and he was ahead most of his match...until the very end, when he was beat because the other kid took him down at the last second.

Sometimes it's extra tough to be the coach's kid.  

Caeden says he has enjoyed wrestling season and has gotten stronger.  I know Jeremy has enjoyed coaching.  

Olympic Lego Ski Jump

We are watching some of the Winter Olympics in Sochi when we can.  Not being any sort of athlete at all myself, I am completely fascinated by how any can can even attempt the sorts of things they are doing!  

Caeden has been building Lego versions of many of the events.  Tonight he was playing with a ski jump course he made.  

MORE SNOW!!!

Oh, the forecast was right!  Today we have been having snow, sleet, lightning, thunder, wind and more of the same wild winter weather we've been having for almost 3 months now!

Although all I've wanted to do for those 3 months is sit still in the recliner, eat, and sleep (i.e. hibernate!), the girls have wanted to bake goodies every chance they get!  Today they baked Flourless Peanut Butter Cookies and Flourless Chocolate Cookies because we were out of flour, but they still wanted to bake!  (I like that the oven helps warm the house too!)  Both kinds of cookies were yummy, and we shared some with our neighbor who shoveled some of our sidewalk.  

Don't the girls look cute in the aprons they received from Great Grandma C?

Some very impressive icicles have formed on our house over the past several weeks.  I actually went outside for about 3 minutes today to take a few pictures of our "winter wonderland."

Main Street in Arrowsmith

Main Street in Arrowsmith looking north

Main Street in Arrowsmith looking south

the big icicles that Caeden can't wait to knock down from our front porch 

The snow in our back yard is pretty deep--probably drifted to about 3 or more feet in some places.

HUGE icicles on the back of our house--about 7+ feet long!!

More deep snow in our driveway and neighbors' back yard...

I don't remember a winter where it snowed so many times or that we had this much snow in a long, long time.  It feels like the longest winter ever, but really there have been a lot of sweet times at home with the kids--which makes it all worth it.

Snow turkeys

This morning, after I got ready for church, a weather advisory for tomorrow at home popped up on my phone.  The forecast changed and we are to have snow and sleet and dangerous roads tomorrow.  After mulling it over and over for a while, I decided the kids and I needed to head home today to be safe.  

While I was helping Dad explore his new tablet, Mom noticed a group of wild turkeys was walking along the edge of the yard!  I had never seen any so close, but Mom and Dad said they have been around quite a bit over the past few years--sometimes dozens of them!  They are having to walk a lot to find food in all the snow.  It was pretty neat to see them.

The kids were sure to get some time in the snow with Tessa today before we left.  

They were sledding down the pile of snow Travis has built up while clearing his driveway repeatedly this winter!  We assume it will still be there when we come for Spring Break at the end of March!

I made Dad a warm winter hat, and he let take his picture in it.  He says it's very soft and warm.

Mom, Dad, and I watched a little bit of the winter Olympics while the kids played outside.  Finally, we had to get on the road.  I think I managed to get the kids out the door by 3:00-ish.  We had to stop at Walmart because I had only brought the snow boots I was wearing when we left on Friday, and Annah had worn them to play in the snow all weekend!  

The roads were fine all the way home tonight, and we got to drive into a beautiful sunset.  We arrived home around 6:30.  

I wish we could have stayed longer, as we'd planned.  But, I am choosing to be thankful we were able to go at all during this long, wild winter!  We usually try not to travel far in February.  So we are grateful for the Lord's protection while we traveled, and especially thankful for the time with family.  

Saturday at Krampa's and Gram's

Yesterday, all morning long at our house it snowed and snowed and snowed!  We must have had 6-7 inches before noon.  I shoveled the entire driveway--a feat I never would have thought I could accomplish.  (And, I appreciate Jeremy even more now, because he has done it probably a dozen times just this winter!)  The kids were released from school at noon, but didn't get home until 1pm because their bus got stuck in a driveway and had to be pulled out.  Still, it was a light, powdery snow, and plows were coming through regularly clearing the roads as much as possible.  When I looked at weather maps and road condition maps, it was clearer and clearer the farther east I looked, so the kids and I made the trip to my parents' house.  The roads were pretty snow covered until we got to the Indiana border, so we just went slow.  After that though, it was pretty clear until my parents' road.  We arrived about 6:30 pm last night.

This morning, Annah, Sylvia, Tessa, and Gram made pumpkin muffins with cream cheese frosting.  Later they made chocolate chip cookies for Krampa.

I spent a good chunk of the day cooking meals to freeze for Mom and Dad.  I made white chili, beef stew, taco meat, lasagna florentine, poppy seed chicken and rice, and baked macaroni and cheese with smoked sausage and divided them into smaller portions before freezing them, so they can just take them out of the freezer, heat them up, and have a meal quickly.  Hopefully it will be a lot of meals for them over the next month or so, and will save them some time and worry.

Aunt Erin and Tessa delivered an early birthday present for Sylvia--an awesome set of manicure pens!  She loves them and gave Gram a very cute manicure already.

Bryce helped Annah practice piano.  He likes to sing too, and especially loves to do the "hey!" at the end of Jingle Bells.  

Caeden and Bryce playing  

Tonight, Sylvia read the kids some books before bedtime.

Tessa and her Mamaw watching "her show" before bedtime...

The kids played in the snow a little bit today, watched some Olympics on tv, and loved playing with their cousins.  It was so nice to have some time together.

Hot chocolate

The kids spent time outside playing in the snow today.  We've had snow on top of snow, but a lot of days have been much too cold to go out and play in it.  Today, it wasn't too cold, and they had some fun.  And, of course, they had to have hot chocolate when they came back inside.  

Craftiness

I finished that pillow over the weekend.  (Both sides are the same.)

I'm going to make several in different patterns using the same yarns.  Here is the second one I've started.  

Here's that little craft project I had the girls working on last week...The one they didn't enjoy.  I got some smaller styrofoam balls and finished it myself.  It looks cute in our music room.

Along with the pillows, I'm working on a baby afghan using up yarn from Annah's scarf and sweater in this fun vintage fan stitch.  I guess all this snow and cold and being stuck in the house is good for accomplishing something.

Does this make me look smarter?

Annah finally has her first Scholastic Bowl meet this evening.  (She would have had a few already, but...snow days and cancellations happened instead.)  She is enjoying this new challenge.  She is having to sacrifice some violin lessons in order to be part of practices and meets over the next few months, and is doing some extra sitting and waiting at school since we can't always get to her right when practice and meets are over.  Honestly, this is a difficult adjustment for Momma, but we are hoping it will be a positive growing experience for Annah.

We're only a few months into this parenting a teenager thing, and I'm already feeling inadequate.  This week she secretly gave herself bangs.  It doesn't seem like a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but other things had control of my emotions when I found out and I knew I wouldn't react well.  I chose not to discuss it or deal with it right away.  By the time Jeremy got home that evening, I had also discovered she had broken some of the email rules we've set.  Fortunately, Jeremy handled it without me even asking him to--and with much more caution, gentleness, and love than I could have in the moment.  

Living room wrestling

Today was snow day #7 for the kids.  

A little living room wrestling happened this evening before bedtime.

Together time

Yesterday, I went to the dentist in the morning for a cleaning.  I've been having tension in my lower left jaw (No, I'm not having a heart attack.) for a few weeks, so they did some x-rays and the dentist said I have muscles in my jaw that are in spasm.  Apparently I'm stressed and and clenching my teeth a lot.  So, they took impressions for some kind of mouthpiece that won't allow my teeth together in the back of my mouth, to help the muscles stop spasming.  Fun times.  

It was snowing all morning, and while I was at the dentist my mid-day meetings at the church were canceled because the roads were getting pretty snowy.  Since I was already in town, I decided to pick up a couple things I needed.  I texted Jeremy to see if he wanted to have lunch, and he invited me to come up to eat with him at work.  We had Chick-fil-A with Nancy and Mollie.  He also bought me a delicious Raspberry Lite Latte at Caribou!  (You can't get Caribou or  Chick-fil-A anywhere else in town, so both were a special treat for me, besides the bonus of having lunch with my Honey!)

Jeremy started moving into his new office this week!  It is still pretty bare, but he has a huge desk.  The walls are metal, so I need to get him some nifty magnets and pictures to hang.  

I was going to run errands after lunch, but it had been snowing for several hours and I just wanted to get home.  I had to drive really slowly, so I took advantage of the bluetooth in the car and called friends to get me through the slow drive in the snow.  By the time I got home we had about 5 inches of new snow for the day and it was still falling steadily.  

Sylvia was supposed to have a volleyball game in Deer Creek last night and more of the tournament starting early this morning, but fortunately they were both canceled by midday yesterday.  Jeremy worked late, trying to finish up some things for his "old" job, so the kids and I relaxed at home.  Caeden and I snuggled up and watched Wall-E, and the girls read, crafted, and played upstairs.  

This morning we all slept in!  A miracle has happened!  When the kids woke up around 7:45, they all came and snuggled up in our bed.  What a rare and wonderful occasion!  We had to document it with a selfie.  Boy, that word just kind of ruins the fun of documenting a special moment...selfie...ick.  Anyway, we were all happy to be home and snuggling up together on a Saturday morning!!

Jeremy made pancakes for the kids and I worked on that pillow I've been crocheting.  We watched a couple movies that Jeremy rented on his way home last night--Monsters University, and Turbo.