We didn’t have school today (it was already planned to be off for the end of the quarter), but some other schools in the area were called off or had a delayed start due to the cold and snow.  Annnnnnd, it’s going to be so cold tomorrow and Wednesday that they have ALREADY called off school!  Yup.  It’s going to be THAT cold.

Tomorrow the high for the day is -5, but with wind gusts between 20 to 40 miles per hour, which will make the temperature plummet.

Then on Wednesday, the high for the day is -14.  With just as bad wind… that means it will feel like -50.

Yup.  That’s cold.  So, I guess it’s probably for the best that we don’t have kids walking to school!

New this year, however, is that the kids have “homework” to do on these days off of school.  🙂  They have to do things like… build a fort, play a board game, name 10 thinks you see outside, write a story about a snowman, do jumping jacks for 1 min.  It should be a fun couple days off of school!

I love Shutterfly.  I love ordering pictures, designing fun cups/blankets/bags and magnets as well as creating photo books and having everything delivered to my doorstep.  I simply love how my pictures can be preserved in so many different (and fairly cost effective) ways.  And I love that they do promotions.  Like the free 8×8 book every once in a while.

But why is it that I don’t put together my photo books until the day before the coupon expires?

I hate that.

But, I guess if I’m honest, I don’t hate Shutterfly.  I actually hate myself for procrastinating until the very last minute.  But then I do get the book finished and I re-love Shutterfly (and myself) once it arrives in the mail.  It’s a little nugget of happiness.

So……………please excuse me while I zip off to finish my photo book before the coupon expires.  Hehe!

Levi is starting to use his imagination more and it’s the cutest thing ever.  I’m sure I said this about all of my kids as I’ve watched this happen.  I just love watching him move his toys around and make noises and voices.  I can see he will be a little like Josiah (who is still so distracted by his imagination that sometimes he forgets all about his chores and we find him lying in the corner somewhere with a book or toy, happily in his own little world) and enjoy playing by himself.  And actually, that’s probably a good thing, since Levi and Maddie do not play particularly well together.  They are so close in age and each has a very specific way that they want to play… which causes a lot of stress.  And screaming.  And crying.

Needless to say, we are all very excited for Levi and Maddie to get to where they enjoy playing independently.

As an added bonus of cuteness, these toys (the Buzz Lightyear and Woody) are from Tim’s childhood.  I remember getting them a couple years back and Josiah loving playing with them as well.  So, now all the boys in our family will have loved and played with them.

Chloe and I have been at odds lately.  I attribute it to our very similar personalities.  Very.  Similar.  We seem to disagree about everything lately.  And our tone of voice (for both of us, I’m sad to say) is over half the battle these days.

So Tim suggested I make an effort to take time each weekend to do something special–just Chloe and me.  Chloe is very interested in baking and cooking, and actually checked out a book at the library this past weekend all about desserts.  She had been excited to bake something, so that’s what we did.

She chose the recipe and got out all the ingredients and even read the directions for us.  What was her choice, you ask?

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread.

Um… yum?  Well, it was an interesting pick for sure.  She really likes pumpkin flavor.  Actually one of her favorite things are pumpkin pancakes.  So, I guess it wasn’t a major surprise.  She had about 9 recipes that she had picked and had to narrow it down from.  It took her a few minutes.

The pumpkin bread was just ok (I’m don’t think I would make it again) but we had a good time together, which is the goal.

So, stayed tuned for more baking fun over the next few months!

Chloe and Josiah have been begging for a sleepover for a while, so we finally decided it would be a good weekend–since they didn’t have school today.  One more day to recover… ha!

Because of all the kids sharing rooms, it works best to have sleepovers in the studio.  We set up sleeping bags or air mattresses next to the piano and they talk and giggle for hours without keeping anyone else awake.  Chloe has been able to have a few sleepovers with her cousins over the past couple years, but Josiah has never had one yet, which is why they were so excited.

So we got Chloe and Josiah all set up on the air mattress.  They happily brought down their pillows, blankets, reading lights and a book to read.  (I took the cutest pictures of them snuggling together) To their delight, I even allowed an extra 30 min of reading.  They were awake for a long time before finally getting to sleep, but they were so happy.

Sometimes it’s the little things that bring such joy in life.

Well, I made our first pan meal tonight.  It was met with mixed reviews.  While it was easy (basically just potatoes and chicken–but with spices) the potatoes were a little raw still and the chicken was a little bland.  So, it was a good first try.  Levi wouldn’t eat it, but that’s not uncommon for him right now.  He’s being moody about food lately.  Very moody.

But Josiah liked it a lot and Chloe ate it, with some protest, and Maddie ate a little, with much protest.  Tim and I thought it was ok.  I think I’ll need to do some tweaking before it becomes a regular addition.

So, I wouldn’t call it a flop… but it wasn’t as amazing as I hoped it would be.

On to the next pan meal to try!

Chloe loves purple.  I think that was made obvious by her last Birthday party theme being PURPLE.  Nothing else.  Just purple.  We’ve tried dying her hair purple before with limited success.  It normally stays for a little while and then washes out over the period of a few months–leaving her with a wide array of colors as it’s leaving her hair.  Purple, then blue then teal then kind of grey… It’s the color that just keeps on giving!

But for Christmas Jen bought her a new purple hair dye that’s put in like a shampoo/conditioner and then just rinsed out.  The more you use it, the more color you get.  It’s fascinating.  In fact, it’s called a “Color plus clenditioner”

It smells amazing and actually keeps her hair clean WHILE dying it!  We decided to do a peek-a-boo color, not an all over color just in case.  So, the only draw back is that it’s kind of a hassle to pull her hair part way up, apply the color, let it sit and then shower without letting the shampoo touch her purple hair… but we’ve got the system down pretty good now.

See how fun it is?

Now, I’m curious how quickly it will wash out once we stop washing her hair with it.  I expect it to wash out pretty fast.  If it does wash out fast, it would sure make it easy to have blue/green/pink/orange hair one day and then not the next!

Baking powder biscuits.  Does the baking powder matter?  She was asked by her science teacher to test it out and record her findings.

We’ve decided to put Maddie in preschool next year (starting in September).  She’ll be going to the same preschool that Chloe and Josiah went to, but the teacher they had is not teaching there anymore.  We’re bummed about that, because we all really loved her, but I’m sure the new teacher will be equally awesome.  🙂  So, Tim took her to the open house tonight to let her see the classroom and meet the teacher.  She was Over. The. Moon. Excited.  It’s adorable.

They gave her a bag of microwave popcorn as a thank you for coming that says, “Thanks for Popping In!”  She’s been carrying it around obsessively since she got it.  I love that she is so excited about school and meeting new people.  She is definitely our social butterfly!