Snowpocalyse

 In mid February we started seeing news stories about a cold front that was going to come our way. We were super excited because a couple of years ago, Joe built a snow machine and he was going to be able to test it out and make snow.  The night came and the temperature dropped.  Once it got pretty cold, the power went out.  And then the power didn't come back on.  It was out for about 2 days.  The temperature dropped to about 10 degrees.  Luckily, we could turn on a generator that would give us power so that our gas heater would run.  We had to be very careful though because the pipes in our houses are not designed for temperatures at that level and so we had to make sure they didn't freeze. 

Many houses in our neighborhood didn't have any power.  We ended up hosting a cajun shrimp boil for some of our friends who didn't have heat in their houses so that they could come and warm up.  Several of them stayed and spent the night. We had 3 adults, 7 children, and several snakes that spent the night that night.  After the power came back on and the air began to warm, then the frozen pipes really started to show.  Almost every house on our street had a broken pipe.  We just had one outdoor faucet that broke, but a couple of our rental houses had broken pipes in walls.  We were out of school for a week because of it.  Here are some pictures of our house in the snow.  The first one is the snow machine working.

Quiet Kitchen

A few years ago, about the time that Nate started kindergarten, a friend of mine started a group on groupme called "Quiet Kitchen" club.  The idea was that moms with kids at home got together all the time to hang out at playdates and such, but now that our kids were all in school, we didn't get together as much.  She figured there were lots of things that we could do when the kids were in school that we hadn't been able to do for all the years when we had them at home.  Incidentally, she was also the preschool teacher for most of my children, so she was ready to have fun.  And it has been fun.  With Covid closing everything down, there weren't as many things that we could do, but we figured out how to do some things.  One of the things that has worked out super nicely is that we have an adult religion class one day a week, and then we either go to lunch or stay and have lunch at the building directly afterwards and talk.  As we have spent so much time together, we have really gotten to know each other and have become good friends.  

In November of 2020, we went on a girls trip to Orlando, and went to Disneyworld and Universal Studios.  It was super fun to go without kids.

I know that I get sick on rides, but I had a special arm band that helped with motion sickness.  It was working really well, but then I went on a ride that was crazy, and I got pretty sick. I took a time out.  The rules in the park were you had to be wearing a mask all the time unless you were eating.  I had a lollipop I put in for a second because I was so nauseous and the mask was making it worse.  Then I fell asleep.  It was nice to travel with fellow moms because when they found me after a break, they gave me drink powder and ice packs and things that actually helped!  I really enjoy the theme parks, and the last time I took the kids, they didn't so it was fun to go without them!

Another girls trip we took about then was a trip to Waco to see the Magnolia Market.  It's close enough that we can make a day trip out of it.  Its kind of amazing every time we go how much it has expanded since the last time, but there are lots of fun shops to visit and go in around there.

 Another day, we went down and went to graffiti park. Its a couple of buildings in one area that have been allowed to be painted with murals.  This next picture is not in that area, but it needed to be put in- for years someone painted this railroad bridge over the I-45 freeway so that it said "be someone."  Any time someone changed it or painted over it, they would redo it.  Just recently they decided to stop doing it.

At the Van Gogh exhibit.

Preparing flowers for Ashley's reception.

Another trip we went to the Natural Science Museum to see a Body Worlds exhibit. 

Another time we went to Dallas to a Pinterest Conference.  There I learned how to crochet a blanket, some photo editing techniques, some watercolor painting tricks and just enjoyed being away!

Christmas Card Photo

 

Ellie track

Last summer, when Ellie was preparing to go to high school and the world was all in lockdown, the high school track coach contacted me and said that he really wanted Ellie to come join his team.  He had seen her numbers from her jr high school track meets and he felt like she had a lot of potential.  In fact, he told her that her best long jump was higher than any that had happened at Grand Oaks that past year.  She started training with them over the summer, and joined the track class at school when it started.  Since school started virtual for a few weeks before it was in person, they practiced in the afternoon when the school hours would normally be over.  (Just think of Houston in the summer in the afternoon!)  When it was time to put girls on teams, Ellie was put on the Varsity team! She competed in long jump and triple jump.  She had some great meets, where she placed 2nd in triple jump.  Her personal records for the season were:  15'2" for long jump and 34'4" for triple jump.  

This is at the awards banquet with Coach Higham.

With Lucy and Coach Burleson.

 

Turkey legs

Joe figured out he is allergic to chicken, so he can't eat it anymore.  One of the easiest things to do when making dinner is to have canned chicken on hand for things like soup, enchiladas, pot pie, etc.  I can't use canned chicken anymore because of his allergy, so after Thanksgiving, when the turkeys were cheap, I thawed several of them and canned the turkey breast.  That meant that we had a bunch of turkey legs leftover, so we made them into a meal.  It wasn't well liked....
 

Christmas 2020

 Because of Covid, Texas A&M had all in person classes end meeting at Thanksgiving and then the students would just take their exams online after that point, so Adam was able to come home at Thanksgiving and stay home until mid January.  He went right back to working at Chick-fil-a.  He was home to help decorate the Christmas tree however.  Decorating the Christmas tree is always interesting because the kids think it is great fun to throw the ornaments at the tree, or take all of the ornaments that look alike and put them together on the tree.  They also complain that decorating the tree is so painful. Once they get started, they enjoy it, and this year it went super fast.  Joe even participated.

A few days before Christmas, we did a special Christmas evening where we ate a nice dinner and the kids reenacted the nativity.  This year we did a throwback picture from when we did the nativity with the Frosts and the Wests about 11 years ago.  The kids were awesome to do this!

The annual Christmas pj's picture!

Christmas morning:

Every time we asked Michael what he wanted for Christmas, he said "raisin bran."  Funny thing is he doesn't even like raisin bran.  So for Christmas from Santa he got raisin bran and nothing else.  Then everyone started opening presents and everyone got something, except for Michael who got nothing else. He sat there nicely and didn't say anything about it.  At the very end-Joe asked him what he got and he said, just the raisin bran, but he still had a great attitude about it.  Then we showed him that we had put all of his presents under the couch, and he really did get Christmas after all.

Nate got supplies to make hot cocoa bombs.  They were pretty complicated to make, but he did a great job with it.  Unfortunately, no one really liked them when they were done.