Hodge Podge of Highlights

The past week has been fairly typical. Nothing too out of the ordinary for me. There have been some nice highlights, however.

Sunday, we got a little snow. Sam promised the kids that we could go out and play in it. So we all bundled up and went outside as the snow fell.

Andrew LOVES being outside in the snow. He is a lot like his sister at that age. He tends to just be in awe of the snow.

Ella wanted to build a snow “castle.” We grabbed one of her sandbox toys thinking we could make bricks, but the results weren’t so good, despite the fact that the snow was a bit wet.

We attempted to build a snowman, but Andrew kept tackling it or picking up the snowballs to throw. Ella was in the middle of the yard and said, “Let’s take a walk, daddy!” So we did.

Andrew held my hand for most of the walk, but occasionally wanted to run up to Ella. She was happy to see her puppy friend, Louie. He was out on the porch (waiting to be let back inside!). She was yelling, “Hello, Louie! Merry Christmas!” It really was a nice little walk.

On Tuesday morning, Ella had her third birthday pictures taken. She won’t be three until the 10th of next month, but we got her in at our photographer friend. Sam and Ella went out looking for a dress and she actually picked out the one she wanted pictures in.

Sam asked her if she wanted to take her Elsa dress that she got for Christmas for an outfit change. She said she wanted to wear the Belle dress that she wore for Halloween. We may have gotten more pictures in that dress. Urgh!

The area got hit with a good snow that started Tuesday Night and continued through the day on Wednesday. Sam had a physical on Wednesday morning. She had to drive in the snow there and I was driving home from work in it. I met her at the doctor and picked up the kids so they weren’t running around during her appointment.

When we got off the expressway, we were passing the row of restaurants and Ella says, “Daddy? I would like chicken nuggets and French fries. I chuckled and said, “Baby, it is 8:30 in the morning. I don’t think they have any made this early.” She paused for a minute and then blurted out, “Are you serious!? Are you kidding me?” It was hilarious.

Having to stay indoors can be boring for the kids. So we took the “nugget” (which you can see on the floor to Ella’s right in the picture above) and built a mountain for them to climb and play on. I tried to get some pictures of them playing on it and I snapped a cool one of Andrew.

I wish it wasn’t so blurry, but I love him jumping up on there!

They have been at each other’s throats all week. The sibling arguments have been plenty. My wife shared a fantastic photo of them, today. Proof that they really do love each other!

I finished The Word is Murder this week. I really enjoyed it. I timed it perfect as the library emailed me to let me know that the author’s Sherlock Holmes story, The House of Silk, was there for me to pick up.

I just started that tonight. I will let you know how it is.

Later today, I have a follow up with my doctor. Blood pressure check/Medication check/Weight check. I’ve tried to be careful, but I know I have gone over my points more than enough times. I know I have put back on some weight since the holidays. I really need to get back on track.

I hope you are having a great week! The weekend is almost here!

Silly Kid Stuff

To my Facebook friends, most of this blog is a recap of things I have already posted there. However, some of this is stuff I want documented in my blog for future viewing.

Andrew

Ok, I’m not going to lie, this is something that makes me laugh out loud every time I see it. Sam had AJ in a striped onesie recently and I only saw him in it briefly. Then, on one of my days off, I put him in the same onesie. I couldn’t really place what it made me think of at first, and then it hit me! I had to do a “comparison” picture.

AJ and Curly from the short “Dizzy Pilots”

What is even funnier is that I was wearing a shirt that had stripes on it a few years ago in a picture and my dad is the one who told me it reminded him of Curly from that short. Personally, I think AJ’s shirt is much closer to Curly’s. Now, if you are talking hair … then I am closer to Curly!

I’m not sure what it is, but I seem to make AJ smile a lot. Sam even said that I make him smile more than she does. I’m not sure that is the case, but I won’t lie, when he smiles at me – it is one of the many things that make me so very happy.

His hair reminds us of Ella when she was a baby. Depending on the light, it can look brown, blonde, or red. I guess we have to wait a bit to see what color it winds up being!

Ella

So we had a little snow storm here in Michigan this week. I think the “official” total accumulation was about 10 inches where we live. That is about half of what they said it was going to be. Because of the storm, many patients called and cancelled their sleep studies. That meant that I got called off and got an extra night home with the family.

For dinner last night, Ella wanted pancakes. I thought I would be the “cool” dad and attempt to make some Mickey or Minnie Mouse pancakes for her. She’s been watching Minnie Mouse on TV a lot, so I though she would think they were cool! So I fired up the griddle and made these beauties for her:

I was pretty excited about how they came out. I put them on the plate, walk them over to her and say, “Look, baby! What do they look like?”

She looks at them and back at me and replies, “pancakes!”

As one of my Facebook friends observed – “She’s not wrong!”

After dinner, she grabbed a few books to read. She has this Pete the Cat book that had a sheet of stickers in it. She’s been all about stickers lately. We’ve been finding them stuck all over the house in random places – on the bathroom wall, on the living room floor, inside the kitchen cupboard doors, etc…

I was on the floor with her and AJ and she began to place her stickers on a huge canvas …

MY HEAD!

At one point she tried to put one on my eye! I woke up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom and as I was walking out, Sam was walking in. She began laughing because when I removed the stickers, I had forgotten one and had actually fallen asleep with it still on my noggin!

Today, before I took my nap before work, I wanted to get out with the snow blower and go over the driveway and sidewalks again. Before I did that, though, we bundled Ella up so she could go outside and play in the snow. I pulled her around on her sled for a bit before we attempted to go out into the snow on the lawn.

10 inches of snow made it pretty hard for her to walk around, so I kept shuffling in my boots to clear a path for her. That allowed her to play in the snow for a bit. She seemed to like falling in the snow better anyway. I showed her how to make some snow angels, but I think she just thought I was being silly. The wind cut our play short. Her nose and cheeks were really red when we went in the house. We were probably only outside for 10 minutes.

What a joy it is to spend some one on one time with her in the snow! She loves being outside!

Sadly, play time ended and when she went inside, I pulled out the snow blower and cleared snow before napping.

So many fun moments with the kids this week! God, do I love them!

“Just Write”

I have been at a loss for what to write the past few weeks. I’m not sure if that is because I am busy with other things or if I’ve run out of things to talk about. Everything I read about blogging always says “Just write!” So here I am – writing.

I went through countless “writing prompts” and the ones for this month are all pretty lame: “Five things you like about yourself,” “Describe the view from your window,” and “What do you want more of.” I really don’t think that these are the kinds of things my readers what to read about. Do you really want to know what’s out my window? I mean, I’ll write about it if you really want to know…..but our house has a lot of windows!

Random thoughts

Recently, this blog hit 200 followers! The fact that I have even 50 followers amazes me! Thank you for deciding that my thoughts are worth reading. Please feel free to drop a note in the comments and let me know what you’d like to see more of. I am grateful for my old and new followers!

Coming up soon, I am happy to announce that one of my blogger friends has decided (after much begging by me) to write a guest blog (or two) on a subject that I have wanted to write about for some time. He is currently working on it and I will let you know when to expect it (and give more details) as we approach publishing it.

We recently celebrated President’s Day. Maybe I’m just old, but I actually remember when we celebrated both George Washington and Abe Lincoln’s birthdays separately. I may be remembering it wrong, but I could swear we had both days off school. Do you remember that? I guess I could Google it, but was it really necessary to combine the two days?

A month and a half into 2021 and I have been following a plan to read the entire Bible in a year. I have missed a day or two along the way, but I always make it up the following day. I am right on track. It has been a nice way to either start or end the day (depending on the day of the week). It is a mixture of Old and New Testament right now, which I like. I am noticing just how everything fits together. I also have a plan to read through all of the Apostle Paul’s epistles in a month, but have yet to start that. I hope to do that in March.

I think I read somewhere that half of the population of the United States was affected by the winter storms that came through this week! I know many folks in Nashville and in Texas who were without power and struggling. We got hit with something like 8 or 9 inches the other night and more accumulation tonight. Tuesday morning, my wife called me from the street and said that the snow was up to the windows on the van and could not get in the driveway. The snowplow had blocked the end of the driveway, so I ran out and shoveled so she could get into the driveway.

The night before I had gone out and shoveled the driveway and my neighbor brought his snowblower down for me to use. One of the sheer pins was broke, but he had bought new ones and he gave them to me. He had surgery recently so he couldn’t use the snow blower. So I went in my garage and tried to put the sheer pin in, but it was too big. I had no idea if the thing could run with out the pin in one side, so I just went back out and shoveled the rest.

I texted him that night and said the pin was too big and told him I would go to the hardware store to get a smaller one the next day, not knowing that we were going to be slammed overnight with a ton of snow. After I got my wife’s van into the driveway, I went out and shoveled the whole thing. After I came back inside, I got a text from the neighbor saying, “You know, you can still use the snowblower. Only one side will work, though.” 800 mg of ibuprofen later – I sent him a text that read “thanks.”

I think if that stimulus ever gets here, I’m going to go buy me a new snow blower!!