Hell has frozen over

...Or at least Louisiana has (frozen over, that is.) It has been REALLY cold the last few days (which, of course, is totally relative) and we heard that there might even be snow, but didn't believe it. We were woken up this morning to two completely out of their heads excited kids. Here is the dialogue: Foster: "Maya! I can't believe that it actually snowed in the Loo-zi-anna! It has been, like, years!" Maya: "Yes, Foster. The weather patterns are different here than in other parts of the country that we have lived." Ella: "Yeah!" Both back and forth: "Now we can teach all of our friends how to have a snowball fight and make snow-angels at recess." Ella: "Yeah!"

In my pre-six a.m. grumpiness, I told them not to get their hopes up as they cancel recess at school at the slightest threat of moisture.

I think our total accumulation was just over one inch. North of us, they got around three inches and cancelled all public and private schools and shut down the highway due to hazardous conditions from the "blizzard." At first I thought it was crazy, but after driving the kids to school this morning, decided that it was a good idea not because of the slickness of the roads, but because of the idiocy of the drivers being over-cautious to the point of being hazardous. Yikes.

What is totally crazy to me is that it is supposed to be back in the 70's on Saturday.

Our house in all of it's winter wonderlanded glory.

Three very excited kids. Ella was a little freaked out by it, but made a valiant effort to have fun.

These are a bunch of pictures taken in the recent days and weeks.

Gingerbread House construction. Very tricky. Must be done on Monday evenings while wearing PJ's.

Ta-da! Pride of ownership. I love Foster's smug expression.

So this is the way I see Ella anytime I come at her with a camera. She has turned into such a poser. I have to hide this ballet costume because everytime she sees it, she MUST wear it! At least she conceded this day and let me put it on over her clothes. It was actually the greatest amount of clothes she has worn for the longest amount of time for weeks. She either likes to tear off all of her clothing and just wear a diaper, or the ballet tutu. I get her dressed on average ten times a day. If you are wondering about the laundry basket, I call it Mommy's 'Lil Helper. I just put her in there and she can't get out and she is good for hours on end, or until her diaper starts leaking. It's good for when I want to get out of the house and don't feel like having a two-year-old-tag-along. (I hope you all know I'm just joking about that. I would never leave her in there until her diaper leaks. I just take the diaper off completely and hose her and the basket off when I get home.)

He's the happy elf... One of the many times that I am sooooo glad to be a girl.

So of course these pictures were uploaded backwards but, whatever. On Thanksgiving, the kids made these turkey headbands. This is little McCord (or "Baby Goat" as Ella likes to call him, I think it is her version of "Baby Cord.") My brother Ryan and his family moved here last year and we LOVE having them here! (Baby McCord is there new little guy.)

Ella and cousin Merrit sporting their fetching headgear. Ella adores Merrit and gets so excited anytime she is mentioned.

Our gaggle of turkeys.

7 Things, Cont.

So I am a blogging idiot. I have just learned that while I can only upload 5 pics at a time, I can upload more within the same post. I haven't technically posted in over a year. That is my excuse. If you want to read the 7 things in order, scroll down for the first three and come back to this post. Sorry. Anyway, as I am sure everyone is waiting with baited breath to see what is next, here goes:

4) Designing and re-designing furniture. While I love decorating, I am very cheap and I can never quite find exactly what I want in the store, anyway, so I often make up my own stuff. I designed this and Jon begrudgingly built it for me and it is working out really well for us. It is still in my design plan for him to build three boxes on wheels to go in the cubbies underneath, but he is totally sick of working for me. As he built this over a year ago, I have learned to cope with the baskets. While I really like how this piece turned out, it is sort of a let-down to open it up and expect to see a giant tv inside, only to find our dinky little 27 incher. It is always my secret hope that the sneaky tv-fairies will spirit away our old set in the night and surprise with a beautiful, new, giant one.

5) School Pictures. I hate them. Or rather, they hate me. I always had the same feeling when school picture time would roll around. Excitement that this would be the year that my picture would be so good that the photographer would be forced to use it as an advertisement in all of their brochures and that all of my classmates would beg to have a wallet-sized momento. Maybe I wasn't an attractive enough child. I don't know. Anyway, these hopes were always dashed. I like to think that it wasn't my fault. Maybe it was the parent that volunteered to help with picture day sabotaging me. Using that little black comb to ruin my perfection of a hair-do. Who knows. Be that as it may, I have never taken a good school picture and I am very sad to report that my children are following in my un-photogenic footsteps.

Do you see what I mean about the hair? Even at the tender age of eight, I would not have left the house with a butt-part. Darn you parent helper and your disgusting comb that you used on every child in the class except for your own! How sad for me that I had two attempts in the same photo to get a good one. Sadly serious Jenny just looks really freaked out and smiling Jenny isn't much better.

This is Foster's misguided attempt. At least you don't have to prepay and they give you the proof so you can decide if the picture is worth buying. I like to call this picture "The Jack-O-Lantern." (His real smile is really much cuter!)

Yikes! What can be said? In an attempt to get a smile out of Maya, the photographer inadvertantly frightened away her upper lip. Time to choose my favorite smile. Hmmm, sepia, black and white, or color? So many choices. What to do? I know, save the 50.00 a package and buy none!

6) Hair Product. Love it. Can't get enough of it. Wish I could marry it. And yet, 13 days out of 14 my hair remains in a ponytail.

7) Holiday Decorating. How great is it to have an excuse to decorate every other month? Sorry about the picture quality. A photographer I am not.

7 Things

I have made it my new old-year's resolution to do better at blogging. As Jon posted our one and only contribution about a month ago, I will have doubled our posts with this one! Yay for lofty goals!

So I was tagged forever ago to post seven random things about myself. As I am a very random person, this will be very easy for me.

1) Decorating. I LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE it. I obsess and plan and plot and do and start all over again. It is all-consuming for me. I so wish that I would've done design school instead of something so non-useful and boring and completely impractical as stinky old nursing school! I recently converted our playroom into Ella's room. Don't tell Jon, but the real reason behind the change was not that Ella wasn't letting Maya get to sleep at night and that Maya was waking Ella up way too early in the morning, but that I just really wanted to do a room like this:

I am not quite finished, but I am really liking how it is coming together so far.

2) Monogramming. I think it is the coolest thing ever! I love that I can take super cheap hand towels and for 5.00 turn them into something really custom. The kids' bathroom is the "M" bathroom and how cool is it that they can wash their hands and work on their alphabet? (Okay, so Maya and Foster pretty much have had their ABC's down since way before the time lapsed since my second to last post, but I love the concept, anyway.)

I dont' know if monogramming is as big in other areas of the country or if it is a southern thing, but it is big business around here. (Obviously, anyone that loves Pottery Barn loves monogramming though, right?)

3) Soap Dispensers. Janitors install them, school children use them, and who doesn't love them? I think that soap dispensers that go on the wall are so great and definitely far superior than their counter-sitting cousins.