Snow!!!

Ok, maybe if you live some places big snow in late March is no big deal - but here it is unusual; especially since we had NO snow on the ground yesterday! It has been pretty balmy all of March. I guess all the people getting a head start on getting their snow tires off are sorry now. (like us!) So this is our back deck, the cats are very annoyed. Also I had just put out the hummingbird feeder (which is currently frozen solid, with tiny drifts of snow on it). J finds this hilarious and insisted on several pics. I guess he wants to see them with their tiny little bird snowshovels...

Easter pics

Here is D in his suit (no tie, but one must pick one's battles!) for Easter - I thought he looked great! This is last year's suit, still too big so maybe it will fit again next year. His favorite thing in the basket was the Tube-o-rats...I just don't understand.

Biggest Loser

Ok, I am hooked on this show! I really like some aspects of it - how even the people who everyone has given up on can make a positive change in themselves. But I HATE the "game" part, where they vote people off, and have "alliences" and stupid gameplay.

This week I was so happy because the 4 guys finally got broken up - the two girls both did great!!! I would love to see a female win the big prize. Even though I liked Dan, the guy who got voted off, I think it will be good for breaking up that "us vs them" mentality.

Sick sick sick

Well, D went back to school today after being sick for 5 days. Coughing etc. Seems great now. Yay!

All my friends are sick! C fell in Paris (what a place to fall), and 10 days later got an xray to discover she broke her foot. K has been wheezy and feeling awful for weeks, to find she has walking pneumonia. And my sweet Uncle D had an emergency appendectomy that apparently got infected, hopefully not too badly. I hope the karma around me isn't gearing up for some big event. Best of luck to you all in recovery!!!

sick sick sick

Well, the fake pinkeye episode turned into the creeping crud - don't know what it is but it's bad! Been up for two nights with wheezy boy, nothing is worse than when he is just exhausted from breathing, and nothing seems to help. Hopefully they worst is over.

So D stayed home from school again today, we did a bunch of online shark quizzes. Fun. I know far more about sharks than the average joe. Yesterday was Easter - poor D came into our room and pointed out the bunny had not come...I said that since we live in the country the bunny doesn't come until after church (nice one mom)! I hadn't even gotten a basket or anything, so I stopped at Freddy's for 10 minutes on the way to church (barely making it in time for rehearsal). I got home first and hid the eggs like a crazed person and threw all the purchases into an old basket - my mom is much better at the whole gifty thing! But since D's favorite thing was the $1 Tube-o-rats (yes, plastic rats) I guess I'm not going to fret too much about the basket.

colored eggs

D and I colored eggs yesterday - he was home from school on a fake pinkeye problem (by the time I realized it wasn't actually pinkeye, I figured we'd just stay home). J's new work takes Good Friday off, so he was home too! D was really into green, teal, turquoise, blue etc. We did get one yellow and one reddish egg. I wish it had worked out to do our group egg dying with friends, but schedules were too complicated.

After the pinkeye problem, the nurse had suggested he might have been sick, or allergies. So I didn't really pay much attention to his lowering voice towards bedtime, but during the night we had croup-y coughing. Terrifying - really nothing worse than lying there wondering if your child can breathe. Last time he had croup we spent two days in the hospital, but we survived the night and I think things are looking better.

The other weird thing is that we had a blizzard yesterday! It snowed about 5 inches - and we had NOTHING before, people were taking off their snowtires and planting things in the garden - I had just put out the hummingbird feeder (which looks really hilarious with drifts of snow on it). Then it (mostly) all melted. We now have our own personal mud pit/driveway, I spun about 125 degrees trying to get out (and covering the car with mud. Cool.

Concert and aunties

In addition to all my musical junk (see wildreeds), J had a concert tonight in the band. It was hot (weirdly so, something must have been broken) and they had a lovely tribute to Mark Williams, our friend and former bassoonist who was murdered last January. He wrote lots of music, mostly for jr hi band, and I guess his method books are widely used all over the US. But they played three of his pieces, which sound pretty impressive but are easy to put together and cleverly arranged. Anyway, to me it was the high point of the concert. They also played an arrangement of Copland's Fanfare for the Common Man (apparently in a somewhat lower key than the original, but it sounded pretty good!) a medley of horror tunes and Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries (both conducted by students), and other band-y stuff. The oboe player did a fine job, I guess he is a junior in HS! This is my first concert I haven't played since we got married. Wow.

Even more fun is that Auntie C (really J's cousin's wife) was here on a business trip, and we went over to her hotel to go swimming. Sadly, the hot tub was out of commission, but we played in the pool until D was getting blue (just slightly) and then he had a hot bath. Then we went across the street for Mexican food - yay! J joined us in his tux for a bit, he even had a beer before he had to get to the concert, but we stayed and while D drew a giant lobster, C and I had a great conversation. Fun fun fun. Wish our families lived closer!!!