Second Half of February

As I mentioned in my last post, Isaac needed to get glasses for his one bad eye to wear anytime he needed to see at a distance. We got to pick them up February 14th. 

February 15th Thomas has his class performance with Brother Ghana. This was a residency that visits our school and the kids learn African Drumming and dance. Hopefully the video comes through. 

Me chatting with the kids via Alexa on my way to work. Having fun with the effects, :-) 

Putting that new air fryer to work. We did a rotisserie chicken and kabobs. 

Saturday February 18th was the rescheduled Luminary Loppet (Pronounced LOW-pet). This is right by our house and usually done on the lake but due to the rain and weather they moved it to land... which made it a little less fun and more crowded it was just on our side of the lake, so short walk for us. 

Here's a map of the event as you see it goes along the west side of the lake. We live just about where the star is on the legend. 

Late night, time for bed. Captured this sweet moment of brothers reading. 

Monday was President's day and time for the boys to get a haircut. Thomas was developing a cough so had him wear a mask for safety. 

Kyle was traveling for work and the kids had off school Monday (for president's day) and Tuesday for conferences. Well our school systems got hacked and all their tech was down so conferences were cancelled for Tuesday.... making it a VERY long day. We were also anticipating a HUGE storm. A historic blizzard as they were predicting. So they moved school to 'e-learning' for the rest of the week... before a drop of snow had even fallen! This was Tuesday. We were in the middle of our school's read-a-thon so we spent a few hours reading - me reading Harry Potter to everyone and doing fuse beads. 

 

This was what our outside looked like BEFORE the storm. 

Tuesday night movie night downstairs on the new couch. 

Wednesday we had received the first wave of snow... which was only a couple of inches. Kids helped in shoveling. 

The blizzard was to start Wednesday evening... which cancelled Kyle's flight and delayed him getting home. Thursday we woke to the bulk of the snow total of 16" adding in the day before too. Not quite as much as they were predicting. 

More shoveling on Thursday. 

Thomas keeping us serenaded with his drumming routine.

Got them outside again on Thursday... we were getting tired of each other. 

Kyle made it home Thursday night after having to drive to Wichita from KC and then taking the Jet home Thursday evening. Friday got the kids outside again, but it was getting cold so they didn't last long. 

Saturday our school had their scheduled sledding party. Perfect timing with the fresh powder. Mary had her basketball game earlier in the day and Isaac's was during the sledding party. 

Sunday we got up, went to church, had brunch at Hen House (as usual) and then headed over to the History Center to see the special Sherlock Holmes exhibit before our second to last ski class that afternoon. 

Because of the snow last week we had a middle school tour lined up Thursday that got rescheduled to Monday. So Kyle, Isaac, and I attended that Monday morning which ended up being really encouraging and where we will select to go for 6th grade next year. 

Monday night we had our normal BSF, since Kyle was home he brought the kids later so they didn't have to come early with me since I help set up. They love this slide :-) 

Kyle left again for work travel, but I got to go with the school to a school wide (minus kinder) to the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. It was pretty fun.

That brings us to TODAY right now, been working on yearbook got the order forms out and doing some editing for portraits to get everyone's missing picture in place. 

I brought Harpo downstairs with me to hang out :-) 

More snow events & catching up

 Getting in all things snow this winter!

Our school had a sledding party (and will have 2 more this year). I'm doing the yearbook for the school and brought my drone to capture some cool photos. 

 

Saturday night Kyle and I had a date night to see Lorna Landvik - that author I mentioned in my earlier blog that we saw at the art museum. It was an okay show. We are not huge fans of improv... and the crowd was way older than us :-D so we didn't get a lot of the jokes. 

Then skiing on Sunday as usual. It's been nice for this commitment to force us to get out. 19˚ this week

The kids were out of school on Friday January 27th. The girls attended their FIRST slumber birthday party the night before. We wanted to get out and ski as a family. Kyle worked a half day then we loaded up and headed to the trails.... only to arrive to find LOTS of people as the high school nordic team races were taking place. We went over to the natural ski area (where Isaac's class had skied the week before) there was a little hill there that was perfect for practicing the downhill. The kids had fun getting more confident at hills. Kyle also appreciated the mini-lesson as he hasn't been skiing much with Thomas's class. 

Then our plan was to go tubing. Well the tubing hill didn't open til 4:00 and it was 2, so we went home for a quick snack and headed back to Theo Wirth to start the tubing. Passes (while pricey) were only for two hours so we wanted to get there close to open. 

The kids loved it. Emma said "This has been the BEST two days of my life! First a sleep over and now tubing" :-) 

Saturday I got to go to Isaac's basketball game. Kyle had been taking him, but I was wanting to watch him this weekend. 

Been eyeing this couch at Costco. 

A busy week of Kyle traveling and then me working, brings us into February. Saturday the 4th we made it over to the fair grounds to see the snow sculptures. 

Kids weren't prepared to be outside long... even though we TOLD them before we left the house for Isaac's basketball game that we weren't coming home, we were going to the winter carnival. 

That was at the state fair grounds then St. Paul has its ice sculptures in downtown St. Paul. Harder parking so this was just a drive by looksie.

While we were in the neighborhood we dropped into the Children's Museum. Thankful our science museum pass from Wichita is good at multiple places. It's good til March this year so still making use of it. 

This brings us into February. They ended up canceling the prior week's ski because of the cold. And then this weekend it was cancelled because of the Loppet Festival. Which is like a marathon but on ski's. The classic ski race is on Saturday, and the skate ski is on Sunday followed by snow shoe runners and fat tire bikes to finish it off. I signed up to volunteer at the start line from 10-1 on Sunday. February 5th.

The last heat went out a noon. I was helping with the bag drop, collecting bags from the start line and putting them in the sled to be taken to the truck to be driven to the finish. The guy working that with me says "It's be pretty handy if you wanted to ride in the sled to go pick up the signs on the course with me?" I was like "sure! I'm here to help", that sounds fun riding in a sled behind a snow mobile. His response "Really?! Wow that'd be so awesome that would really help me out and make it go faster"

I wasn't sure what I was getting myself into.... but it was fun!

About 2:30 I was like gosh this is taking a while. I didn't realize what I was agreeing to was a THREE HOUR ENDEAVOR! Ooofda! Like I said, this was like a marathon for skiing... they actually shorten the course this year due to the light rail construction. Here's the map below of the course. We had to ride the BLUE line which was the longest to ensure we gathered all the signs. The star is my house, the square at the top is where we ski on Sundays. 

After abandoning my family all afternoon LOL (the kids probably didn't even notice) we decided to go out to eat. We wanted to run by Costco first to grab something and I noticed the couch we'd been eyeing was on sale! We decided to just get it and since it was almost closing time I'd come back Monday and make the three trips to get all 6 boxes home. 

Monday morning Isaac had an eye doctor appointment. His well visit they noticed his right eye was struggling. He sees great through the left but the right needed some help. The verdict ended up being glasses for school. He doesn't have to wear them all the time. He can see find up close to read but when he's looking at the board, or watching a movie at home he'll want to wear them. (I just got a text they are ready so need to go pick them up today) 

Got Isaac to school then did three trips to Costco and back and Kyle helped me unload the new couch. 

Work view on Tuesday from my parking spot. 

Isaac's basketball on Saturday 

Then this past Sunday back to skiing after 2 weeks off. 

Phew LOOK at that I am fully caught up with this thing. For now anyway Happy Valentine's Day!