Christmas presents in February

Here is the result of a wonderful present from Ken. This beauty was the product of a bulb, a pot, and a bag of dirt. I did just what he said, and it worked!! Thank you, Ken.

The groundhog was right!!

Last weekend while Dad was enjoying summertime in Brazil, we had more snow.

Julie and Justin and the kids came down on Saturday to play in the snow left from the blizzard and the topping off snow we had just gotten.

Check out the snow grandparents and the huge icicle on the garage roof!!

If I were more tech-competent, you could see video of Aspen dragging her own sled up the hill on the side of the house and sliding down all alone over and over. And there was more great sledding (and some attempted snowboarding-on-a-sled) down the back slope.

I love whatever is outside my window each day. I think it was President Benson who observed that any weather was better than no weather. I like that thought.

Give your local groundhog a hug!!!

Blizzard 2010 part 2

So here we are at part 2.
It began on Tuesday at 1 pm and ended Wednesday at 10 pm. There was an additional 26 inches of snow and winds around 20 mph, gusting to 35, blowing snow everywhere. The drifts on my driveway were 6 feet deep and took a Bobcat to clear.
The first picture shows the snow that blew into the garage from a crack under the door. The second is the garden all full of snow. The third is the view toward the street where the plowed snow is higher than the mailboxes.

Dad missed the whole thing because he couldn't get home! For blizzard part 1 he had been in Napa but could not get home to BWI on Sunday because the airport was closed. Since he had to fly to Miami on Monday, he changed his flight plans to go San Francisco to Florida direct. He settled in Sunday night and worked in his hotel Monday. When he went to his meetings Tuesday, he found out they had been canceled because no one could get out of the Northeast airports but nobody told him!! And then again he could not get home. He did get to Chicago on Wednesday, but BWI had been closed again and did not open until Thursday afternoon. He finally got home about 7:30 last night, just as the skiploader was finishing up our driveway!

We have been told to expect another little snow clipper Monday, but after this last week, what is another 3 inches??

Reflections on this date 32 and 28 years ago

On Wednesday, February 1, 1978, I was very pregnant and driving 4 kids (Eddie 8, Billy 6, Danny 3, and Lynn 16 months) to Primary at 4:45 pm when it began to snow. We lived only about 5 minutes from the building in Hamilton, Ohio, but it was dark and cold and the snow was already sticking by the time we arrived. The two older boys had classes, and I hung out in the foyer with the little ones and other moms and toddlers. When we drove home an hour later, the roads were coated and slushy and the wind was blowing. Ed was slowed down getting home by the storm.
The blizzard blew up quickly and ferociously. By morning, the whole Ohio River Valley was locked in a record snowfall. Everyone was ordered to stay off the roads, the entire industrial community was shut down, and nothing was functioning. That continued for three more days. Stores had run out of food, nothing could be delivered, some people were without power for more than a week.
In the midst of this, Julie was due on Monday. Our subdivision was cut off from the world because we sat on a ridge, and no one had plowed the access roads from either side. We had it figured out, though. There was a GP around the corner, and his wife was a pediatric nurse, so we were ready for a home-born baby! Finally on Sunday the plows made it up the hill and cleared the streets. There was a huge pile at the end of the driveway that Ed had to clear. Did I mention that we had a VW bug and a Chevy station wagon (the yellow and brown one)? No 4-wheel drive!
I went into labor Sunday night. We called Sister Harnish who was able to make it over in her husband's truck to stay with the kids, and we took off on the country roads to Oxford and McCullough Hyde Hospital. The doctor got in just in time to catch the baby and announce she was a girl--I never did think he earned his fee for that appearance at the last minute. It must have been a full moon or something because in the next two days there were so many babies born that new moms were in beds in the hallways. I was sent home Tuesday night (unheard of!! this was when you stayed four days at least!).
When I came in the door close to bedtime, Lynn was coming down the stairs, saw the baby in my arms, and let out a blood-curdling scream. Not quite the quiet introduction to the family I was hoping for, but they ended up being best friends.

Flash forward 4 years--another baby is due on February 6. We had Julie's birthday the weekend before so that there would be no problems. I fully expected this baby might be early, after all it was number 6. But when the 5th rolled around, nothing had happened aside from a few Braxton-Hicks contractions. Ed got home from work about 5, and I suggested a trial run up to the hospital as a date night activity because I hadn't felt really well all day and needed to get out. Eddie was 12 so he was babysitting.
After dinner we bundled up and took the station wagon out. It wasn't snowing, but it was really cold. I was having fairly regular contractions, uncomfortable but not serious. We made the trip up, pulled into the parking lot, and they stopped. Ed suggested waiting around a little bit, but I wasn't willing to do that, so we turned around, got an ice cream cone, and drove home. We went to bed and the pains started in earnest.
At 11 pm they were 5 minutes apart and getting stronger. We called the hospital and Sister Harnish, got the bag, and took off again. The trip is about 30-45 minutes, and by the time we got there, they had stopped. I was not going in with false labor, and Ed was not driving home again. Our compromise was for him to try to sleep in the back of the car while I dozed in the front. That lasted an hour or so until he was frozen. I still would not go inside, so we drove back home and went to bed again. At 8 am they were intermittent and the hospital called and asked where we were. They had been waiting for me, and said just to come in for a check. So back we went.
Once they got me settled in a labor room, nothing. It was my due date by now, so they had me start walking the halls. Dad and I walked the halls of that hospital for 6 hours--nothing! They broke my water, put me to bed, and figured we would be there the rest of the night. Fifteen minutes later I said I needed to push, but no one believed me after the day we had had. I insisted, the nurse checked me, and shouted, "She's crowning!!" and began yelling at me not to push until I was in the delivery room. Again, the doctor rushed in just in time to catch him and announce a healthy boy--another fee for services not rendered!
Ed called home to tell the children about a new baby brother, and there was a serious problem. Julie was thrilled with the idea that we would be the Brady bunch, 3 boys and 3 girls. In fact, Paddington Bear had confirmed that truth to her very early in my pregnancy. (Remember, this was before ultrasound to tell you who was coming to dinner.) When she heard the baby was a boy, she threw the bear under the bed (a terrible fate since I had not been able to vacuum under there for months) and cried about how he had lied to her.
Tommy had to stay in the hospital for a week because of jaundice, but the kids came up to look through the windows at him. When he came home there was another fight amongst the siblings--Eddie claimed the baby as his property and we had a power struggle over who got to hold him, mom or big brother.
And so for many years the family was complete at 6. It did take four more years before Tommy got to celebrate his birthday on his birthday, because it was Julie's day first and she wasn't going to share it. That was actually a condition of her baptism, so the first shared day was her 8th and his 4th.
Now the little girl has 4 of her own, and the baby has had his first baby. What a joyful ride!! Happy Day to both.

Tom and Julie's amazing snowy day

Julie and the family were supposed to come down this weekend to celebrate, but we knew this was coming so we canceled the trip. That was a great decision!!
The snow began on Friday at about noon. It is now 24 hours later and it is still coming down. These shots are of the cornice hanging off the deck caused by the blowing snow, the wishing well out back from the basement door, and the bushes in front of the dining room windows. There is over 2 feet of snow on the ground now, and there are drifts on the deck over 6 feet high against the house. Because we have storm doors that open out, I cannot open any of my doors with the snow stacked so high against them. Dad is in Napa CA, so we have someone coming with a Bobcat to plow the driveway. Church is canceled, and I just hope the roads are clear enough for Dad to get home without too much trouble tomorrow. (He is landing at BWI where they are recording the deepest snowfall since records began in the 1800's!) No one is supposed to be out on the highways--there were even 5 snowplows that were stuck on route 30 2 miles north of us this morning.

I LOVE IT!!

"A Wonderful Day with Gramma"

One of the things Ilana wanted for her birthday on January 25 was "a wonderful day with Gramma". So on that Friday I drove up to State College to pick her up right after school and bring her down here for a quiet weekend with just the two of us. (Grandpa was on his way home from Africa and arrived very late Saturday evening.) As we drove the 2 1/2 hrs to my house, she wrote a list of things she thought would be included, such as "playing a speech game" (which she won three times!), teaching me "Hankey Pankey" (which I never quite got because it takes a circle of giggling girls), and lots of hugs.
We started the wonderful day with dinner at Cracker Barrel on the way, and ended the evening with popcorn and Ground Hog Day, learning about the ratio of commercials (5 min) to movie (6 min) and how to extend a short movie into a 2 1/2 hour marathon.
On Saturday we snuggled in bed until the cats insisted on breakfast. We made new clothes for Julie's beloved Paddington (who turns 29 on her birthday) and gave him new ears (I wonder how many pairs he has had in his lifetime?). We played M&M's Monopoly, started a Muir Woods puzzle, watched Indiana Jones and the Lost Ark, and went to the grocery store. Ilana played a long time with Rica and decided she needed a top and a skirt and proceeded to make them for the snake and then stage a beauty pageant for her.
And most impressive of all, Ilana learned how to run my big quilting machine and began to quilt part of her wild and crazy new quilt. She did an amazing job, and now I will finish it up and bind it, hopefully to give it to her in a couple of weeks.
We went to Church on Sunday--it was our Ward Conference. Then I drove halfway to her house and met Julie there to pass her off. It was truly a "wonderful day", for me especially.