Blizzard 2011 - A WINTER WONDERLAND!

The biggest snowstorm of our lives . . . we made it! We have never seen anything like this snowstorm and we may not see anything like it for sometime. It has been called the worst snowstorm Chicago has ever seen. Over 800 cars were stuck on Lake Shore Drive on Tuesday 2/1/2011 as people were trying to get home before the blizzard hit. Unfortunately they did not make it and were stuck. Locally we survived the storm very well. I do not know of anyone who got stuck in the storm, thankfully. The scariest part of the storm was Tom driving to get the mail on Tuesday afternoon. He successfully made it to all of the small town post offices and back to our home by 8pm (normally he is home in Wyanet by 6pm). He took I-80 and said that all he could see was the center strip right next to his car. DRIVE BY FAITH NOT BY SIGHT. He thought forsure he was going to die. I am sure it was very scary.

Once all of the snow was on the ground and the wind had died down it was time to clear the driveway. Not an easy task, especially without a snowblower. The drift in front of our garage was a good 3 feet. Curtis worked 1 1/2 hours and got about 7 feet of the driveway clear. And then our wonderful friend showed up with his snow-plowing four wheeler!! After a few break downs the driveway was cleared!! Curtis was off to help others after our driveway was clear. A few hours later, Tom came to Princeton with his snowblower and finished our sidewalks. What a blessing!

Cade and Joel have been enjoying all of the snow. Both of the boys have played outside everyday since the snow - 2/2/2011 and 2/3/2011. We have used the snow mounds as a nice sledding hill and Cade used it as his mine today. I am not sure what he was mining, but he was using his many tools to dig and crunch the snow.

Ice Fishing!

Dad had success out on the ice Monday, January 31. Curtis was priviledged to go fishing with a friend at his private pond, which provided a nice lunch for us today! Curtis filtted the 20 or so bluegill and friend them up for us for lunch today, Thursday. Cade really enjoys fish with a bit of ranch to dip with. I bought a few frozen tiliada patties a few weeks ago and he enjoyed eating that fish with simply salt and pepper on it. I have not been a big fish person, so my taste buds are trying to adjust. What a great option for us to add to our repitoire of food! Thanks for feeding us honey!

Tired Baby!

This was Joel Sunday, January 30, after church. He was exhausted from playing! I thought he would wake up when I brought him inside, but he slept through the walk inside the house, Cade playing while we changed into our everyday clothes, the trip back out to the van, and the ride over to Wyanet. What a tired baby! OOOOhhhh so cute!

Home Tasks

I am making my best efforts at teaching Cade a bit of responsibility. Our newest job - making our beds. We work on pulling up the covers so that the sheets are covered up. His bed is very hard to make because it has walls on 3 or its 4 sides, so it is quite a task to accomplish on his own. He has done it on his own a few times, but usually Momma helps him pull the blankets on. And Mommy has learned to accept "good enough."

We also require Cade to take his dishes to the counter after each meal, as well as put his drink away in the refrigerator. We have also started to ask him to put away items in the refrigerator, like yogurt, applesauce, hot pad trivets, or other smaller containers. He usually drags his feet on our request, but we still are trying to make him help out.

Last week I had him get the swiffer broom out to sweep his crumbs . He accomplished making a pile, but Joel quickly got to the pile and started to eat some of the food out of it and spread it with his hands all over the floor. Mommy came to the rescue and finally got it in a dust pan. Hopefully the sweeping responsibility will be able to come a normalacy, or maybe the crumbs on the floor will become less and less!

One procedure that Cade is mastering is taking his shoes and coat to the front door when he comes inside the back door. It is cool to see him do what I have asked without having to ask him!

Cade is also good a cleaning up toys, though it is not his favorite task. I often pick up whenever I walk from one room to the next because if I don't I will trip over the toys, but somedays I choose to pick up nothing and then have Cade work on cleaning up the toys. He doesn't understand that when you take one toy to the other room it has to be taken back to the other room. It will not miraciously appear where it goes. This will definately take awhile to master, but if he starts learning his mommy's motto - Everything has a Place - it will hopefully be in place by the time he is married (I can hope!)

My next goal is to have Joel start cleaning up the many toys he pours out on the floor. Time for the "clean up" song!

Babytub Fun!

We had a belated Christmas present given to use this week, the last day of January, by our elderly neighbor Ruth Ekloff. Ruth lives south straight across the street from us. She recently lost her husband, Carl, the day before Thanksgiving in 2010. Carl and Ruth have always adored our boys, and we have enjoyed loving them as our neighbors. Cade enjoys watching their cat, Skippy, out our window each day as he adventures throughout the neighborhood. Cade also enjoys playing on their ramp. Carl and Ruth's church family built a ramp for them a few years ago because Carl was decreasing in health. Cade loves running up and down the ramp, biking up and down the ramp, and climbing all over the rails. I hope Cade and Joel have memories of Carl and Ruth, and that we are able to bless Ruth in her loneliness for more years to come.

Well, the gift that Ruth gave the boys was bathtub fingerpaint and a rubber ducky bathtub toy! SO MUCH FUN! Cade has really been in a shower phase, which I am sure, wastes a lot of water because he loves to play in the bottom of the tub while the water is running all over him for at least 10 minutes! So this bathtub paint might be the perfect tool to get us back in a bath mode, which will hopefully save us water = money! The fingerpaint really didn't paint very well, but it did make lots of bubbles in the tub. I have never bought bath bubbles, but I am thinking about after the paint is all gone that bubbles might be a fun treat sometime! The boys love it. Enjoy some pictures!