Snow Day!!!

We had our first ever Texas snow day today!  And by that I do not mean the first time things closed down due to cold and weather, but instead, the first time the accumulation was such that we could really go play in it!  Now I'll admit, calling it snow is being nice, but this is probably as snowy as it ever gets here.  In the end what we had was more like a half inch to an inch of ice frozen over all the sidewalks, driveways and the road.  I even found videos of people skiing, snowboarding and ice skating down the roads around Austin.  In total, I think we saw 1 or 2 people walking dogs the whole time we were out playing, but we never saw a car drive by.  We could hear other kids somewhere in the neighborhood also out playing too.

You may remember that last week ended with Winry's baptism and us having a bunch of visitors.  Well, that means people were still here Monday!  What great bookends to this week, visitors and a snow day.  Michelle's flight was early so I took her and Laura to the airport, and then when I got back we all went out to breakfast.  We tried a new place called Nick's and it was pretty good.

After breakfast, we took everyone for a hike to see the dinosaur tracks in the river bed.  It looks like all the construction is done, which means we even got to walk over the new pedestrian bridge to cross the river from where we parked.  The hike out was fun, and the kids really liked these giant boulders that have fallen off the cliff.  I will say that you can see people's houses over the edge of the cliff above... so that's a little sketchy for them...

Also, I just need to mention how crazy it is that on Monday we were out on a hike in shorts and were feeling warm, and now there's an inch of ice on everything!  What a week!

We eventually made it to the main event.  I used up almost all my water to make the tracks more noticeable, but it was totally worth it.  These tracks are pretty awesome, and there's like 10 of them in a row.  In fact, you can almost imagine the dinosaur who walked through here.

And here's everyone on the walk back from the dino tracks.

Oh my, and here's Winry and Clara keeping those houses safe!  Also, we found a nice location for skipping rocks and I had the best skipping of my LIFE!!  Like, the first one I threw looked like it just slid across the water for like 10 feet, I couldn't even count 'em.

That afternoon it was time for my sisters to head back home, but not before group hugs!

The kids liked getting to lean back for their pictures.

And we'll wrap it up with Brooke's turn.

Oh, wait!  Brooke wasn't the last one.  I was!!!

On Tuesday when I headed to work, I got a pleasant surprise.  Turns out they haven't taken the Christmas wrap off yet.

Brooke got to go on a fun hike for toadstools this week. They went to a reserve for the gold-cheeked warbler. This is the only one in the world. So every single one of those birds is born here!

In preparation for the cold weather this weekend everyone had to go nuts, right?  Monica wanted to get like a banana or something, and tried to go Friday to beat the craziness of the weekend, but not so!  I think the real lesson here is that no matter how dire things get, NOBODY wants to eat celery!

Grayson had a week where they talked about doctors at school, and I think a dentist came in to talk to them about teeth one day.  Looks like the kids got to play doctor as well.

Grayson was in need of a hair cut, and actually made a great time of it.  He got to play Angry Birds, which I think was his first time.

In preparation for the cold, the kids put on some socks.  Like 5 pairs of socks.  Gotta keep those toes warm.

We've had this water bob for a while, and we figured this would be a good time to try it out.  So on Friday we put it in the tub and filled it up.  It comes with a little pump so you can get the water back out as well.  We haven't had any water problems yet, but it was a good reason to try it out.  Hopefully we won't actually end up needing this water.

And on Saturday night the ice storm started!  It was kind of like snow, except you could hear it clinking when it landed.  But it wasn't like hail either.  Anyway, in the morning there was like a half inch or more of solid ice frozen on the driveway, sidewalk, everywhere.  The kids were so excited to get outside and play first thing in the morning.  Time to boot skate the driveway.

Here's our house, for the first time looking snowy.

We left our sleds with our neighbor in Colorado, but I did bring my snow skate, which we pulled out as our only sledding option.  Our driveway has a small slope, so with a little push we were able to slide across it, and I even gave the neighbors steeper driveway a try once.  Also, we never saw a car the whole time we were out playing, so the road ice was safe to use as well.

I tried, you know, snow skating too.  I eventually got the hang of hopping on the board, and those sick kick flips?... yeah, not gonna happen.  But really, I put this in here because I loved Winry throwing snow at me.  We'd slide our boots around and grind out some ice to make a snowball, but it was too cold to actually get it to stick together, so when you threw it it was pretty much an ice cloud.

The kids also had a lot of fun kicking the ice and trying to break it up.

Inside, it was a good day to work on a puzzle.  We got 2 1000 piece puzzles that I would call puzzle+, meaning they're a puzzle but promise to have more.  So far the more seems to be some where's Waldo like finding of items in the picture, etc.  In the end I'd say they're pretty much just puzzles, and we personally prefer 500 or less pieces.

Here the kids are back out and at it in the ice.  They were trying to kick the ice in the gutter to get it to chip up.

And Grayson did a science experiment and poured some salt on the ice.  It was mostly some random pours in the gutter, but I took the ice and poured a smiley face on the sidewalk, so I guess we'll see tomorrow if it worked!

And that's it for now.  It's been so much fun to have snow, or ice I guess, but it's been so fun out playing in it.  The kids have had a great time, I had a great time, it's been wonderful.  Oh, the world did shut down, and church was cancelled today, so we got to spend the whole day together as a family and have fun.  Oh, we also played an escape room like board game where you scatter some clue cards around the house and have to find various keys to unlock the doors, etc.  The kids had so much fun running around the house trying to solve the clues.

I'm supposed to fly to Chicago tomorrow morning at 9 am.  I moved my flight to the afternoon as I don't think the drive will be very fun at 6 am, so now I'm leaving around noon.  Hopefully the roads clear up and the drive goes well, and also the flights don't all get cancelled!  One way or another I'm sure I'll have a story to share next week!
 

Winry's Baptism!

We now have more kids baptized than not!  So I'd say things have been pretty successful.  Winry was baptized this past Saturday, and a whole lotta friends came to support her.  Monica and I are so proud of her.  She's been doing great and reading her scriptures and saying her prayers and has been trying her best to prepare herself, and the day finally came!  We're all so proud of you Winry!

Monica caught this rather gorgeous sunrise sometime this week.

Grayson LOVES spinning.  It's honestly a problem and he usually spins way too much on the ground, but give him a swing?  Well, it's his favorite thing to do out on the playground.  He's recently discovered that I'm willing to be spun up in the swing too, so now whenever I get home from work he wants to head right out to the swing.  I don't have the same resilience for it that he does.  If I'm laying the wrong way I'll feel not so great when I'm done, but I guess it's helping keep me young at heart, right?

We were trying to take apart this cardboard mini-store that we had to put in the recycler because it's falling apart, and Jelly just couldn't resist getting her one last change to climb in.  Even if that means squirming under the roof while it's upside down and popping up in the sun roof.

I got some good pictures of Grayson from school.  This might be from this week, or from last.  I'm never really sure when I get them exactly when they're from.  Grayson's New Year's resolution for 2025 was to cut something every day with scissors, and he did a pretty good job.  It's even carrying into the new year at least a little bit.

Here's his class in a group hug.  I have no context, but it is a cute picture.

Guests started arriving Thursday night, which meant it was party central at our house from Thursday on.  If memory serves correctly, my sisters came Friday, and they all happened to wear all black as their travel gear.  This did not go unnoticed to Grayson who started calling them his "black aunts," and he proceeded to rank them 1, 2, and 3 for the rest of the weekend and had them compete for his favor.  They put him to bed, and he refused to let me in too, so I went and changed into all black so he wouldn't notice me when I came in.  We're like zebras now, you can't even tell where one starts and the other ends, or how many of us there are!

The highlight of Saturday was Winry's baptism.  We showed up a little early to work on setting up and taking some pictures.  Eleanor and Clara were able to travel out from Colorado with Hannah, their mom, to attend the baptism.  It was so great that they could come join us.

Here's Winry and I listening to Brooke's talk on baptism.  She did a great job.

And here's Winry being baptized.  I'll assume that Oriah took this picture at a time when it was okay to do so!  She was managing my phone for me to make sure we captured all the best moments.  But really, pretty cool picture to have.  Also, the turnout was incredible!  We had a lot of people come support Winry from our new ward, and from our previous ward we just left a few months ago.  It was awesome to see so much support there for Winry, especially from her friends.

Our kids, as well as the Cammack girls and Laura sang a musical number together.

And we of course had Winry's confirmation as well.

... there's no cat here.... moving on.

Winry had her butter themed party for real Saturday evening while everyone was still out with us.  There were all kinds of yellow/butter decorations, and for dinner we had soup and lots of kinds of butter with biscuits and crackers.

Here are all the kids that were in attendance. Though as I wrote that, I realized that only Jonathan joined the picture, but Cameron and William were here as well.  So I guess this isn't quite ALL the kids under the giant butter stick.

And we all sang Happy Butterthday to Winry and watched her blow out the candles.  We watched Descendants and ate buttered popcorn and had cake to close out the evening.

The kids all had a great time out on the playground.  It's been really fun to have, and everyone really loves to go play on it when they come over.  It's also nice to have an easy way to get the kids outside.

And that brings birthday season to a close.  It opens in October with Grayson, and ends in January with Winry.  Things should finally calm down around here for a little, though if things being "uncalm" means visitors, maybe it's better to be busy!  Tomorrow's a holiday, so we've got most everyone still for at least part of the day before we have to come back down to reality.  Also, this weekend has been so packed with things it's felt like a full on mini-vacation, not just a weekend!  Thanks everyone who came and helped make it so much fun.
 

Winry Turns 8!!!

Oh my goodness, this little girl turned 8 this past week!  She's getting so big! And she'll be getting baptized this Saturday to boot.  She had a wonderful birthday, and even got to go to church on her birthday.  It's not every year you can say that.  Here she is getting ready to open her presents in the morning.  What a wonderful blessing she has been in our lives.  She is so lively, and full of fun and rhythm.  She's always got a little extra energy to share, and lights up our whole world!  Thanks for being amazing bubs!

Rolling back earlier in the week, Grayson got his hot wheels shark car wash for Christmas.  He loves playing with it, and Jelly has recently found out she loves it too, as it's got 2 new water bowls in it!  Yes, she's drinking out of Grayson's toy.

Winry and Grayson tried out a tae kwon do class this week.  I think they both had a lot of fun. Though the first thing Grayson told me when I got home from work was something like "look what I learned how to do today" and then started kicking the wall.  So maybe he could use a little break and some growing up before picking up a martial art.

Grayson went with Brooke to her Toadstools homeschool co-op this week and had a blast.  They found and painted rocks along a trail nearby (I don't actually know where).  The co-op is all about getting out and learning about nature, and they do a hike every week.  Brooke's really been loving it, and it definitely sounds right up Grayson's alley if you've ever been around him outside.

Brooke and I went to Subway for dinner (her choice, she could pick anywhere) this past week to get started on the journal I gave her for Christmas.  It's a pass back and forth journal, but there are some pages at the front where you talk and decide things like how quickly you want to try to get it passed back and forth, etc. so we got it started, and I get the first turn to write in it.  The pages have different prompts on them, so I get to scan through and pick what I want to write first.

I think Winry's dress for her baptism came this week, or at least Monica went out with Winry to take some pictures in it this week.  So in my mind, that means it just arrived, right? (It didn't...we got it a few months ago :) )  She looks SO CUTE!

I caught Jelly napping with her legs out.  I love catching her in various weird poses.  I probably have a few too many sleeping cat pictures on my phone by now, but when they're mixed into all the pictures of the kids it really doesn't seem like I have too many.

And we're back to Winry's birthday.  In the morning she opened presents.  She got a stuffed animal from Grayson, some Phineas and Ferb books from Brooke, a Garmin watch from Monica and I, and an awesome butter shirt from Jelly.  She was very excited, and enjoyed getting to finally send messages to her aunts all on her own!

Winry requested to have a butter themed birthday party, which also meant a butter cake.  We didn't have her party on Sunday, but we did have cake.  Monica did an out of this world good job putting this thing together!  OH! Also, someone in our ward was moving out, and they knew Winry well because she used to work at Whitestone Elementary.  Anyway, since they were moving they had things they needed to get ride of, so they gave Winry all their butter!  She got like, 16 sticks or something.

Grayson, ever looking to be a stink, helped Winry blow her candles out while we sang Happy Birthday to her... We relit them and I held Grayson on the other side of the room and let Winry have another go.  Other than that incident, cake and ice cream went swimmingly.

Aaaaaand CUT!  We're definitely all excited for Winry's baptism this upcoming Saturday, but Winry most of all.  I'm so proud of her for wanting to be baptized and try to follow Jesus Christ!  We're also excited to have a bunch of family and friends come to visit as well!  Hopefully we'll be seeing you, dear reader, next weekend!