Shoveling Roofs

Weather.com, for what it's worth, is not worth a great deal, in my personal opinion. It told us that the snow storm that blew in on Thursday would be over Saturday afternoon. It is snowing harder than ever right now. Massive amounts of snow mean that, basically, there's a lot of snow up there, and it all comes down here. And it lands on things like trees, cows, haybales, the ground, roads, roofs, etc. The fact that snow lands on roofs is the topic of today's post.

Our neighbors have a barn. The barn has a roof, like most barns do. And the roof had snow on it -- in the sense of, 4 feet deep of snow on it. Now, if you were a barn roof with tons of snow on you, what would you do? For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction, quoth Newton, many years ago. (Newton never shoveled a barn roof. Wussy.) All that to say that he barn roof started to bend slightly; also, some part of the barn structure became dis-attached. What does this mean? A barn-roof shoveling party, of course!! We had already been planning a Game Night for tonight, so the guys and their dads (and us and the neighbors whose barn it was, and who are part of our game night group) came on up and shoveled.

And shoveled. (And got tired.)

And shoveled. (And got more tired.)

For three hours. (And got exhausted.)

Around quarter to seven, it was determined that enough of the roof had been rescued so that we could now safely go eat pizza at Rachel's house, which is where the Game Night was held! We devoured aforementioned nutritious food, and played some group games.

Methinks I'll be sore tomorrow...

Random Photo Shoot...

...just totally random, for fun. For Christmas, Jessica got me a ring that matches hers. So today, I was taking a walk outside with my camera. And I decided to have a photo shoot with my ring :)

I married an icicle, to be exact.



And a shadow.

Then I decided to live dangerously and perch it way up on top of a really tall tree stump.




Barbed wire. Of course! Makes perfect sense, doesn't it?

You know, the snow made it really cold so my finger almost got frostbite after I put it back on...
Thanks for reading till the end! I hope to post something considerably more substantial next time. (Translation: I wanted to put up these way cool pics, but understand that in order to keep my remaining blog readership, I must promise to, actually, like, post. Something like that.)

Being Sick in Our Family

Hopefully you'll never be with our family when we're sick. I wish I never had to be with my family when they're sick either. But sometimes it happens, and when it does, there is only one thing to be done. And that one thing is to blog. So here goeth.

It starts when one of the little kids -- say Joanna -- starts blowing her nose and lying around more than usual. These are indications that a Sickness is coming. As more children fall ill, the chances of the older kids (namely, Jessica and yours truly) getting sick is greater. Finally, if it's a really bad sickness, we all get it.

There are pros and cons of getting a mass sickness or your own solitary one. If you are sick with 5 or 8 other people in your family, you will get no sympathy. Fevers of 98.7 will be scorned. Fevers of 100 are likewise denigrated. The only way to get pity is to LIMP. (I haven't gotten that desperate yet.)

Getting sick all by your lonesome means that you have more of a chance to get pitied, if you play it right. BUT, compassion in this instance takes longer to receive. See, when you stagger downstairs and announce weakly to the family (who is happily munching their Cinnamon Squares at the breakfast table) that you are sick and don't expect to live past 3 PM, their reaction is indicative of the loving, caring nature of their generous souls. "GET AWAY FROM ME!!" they shout, leaping up, and rushing past you far, far away. They hold their breaths, lest a lethal germ should enter their breathing system and thereby endanger them. Then, for the rest of the day, they sidle warily past you, turning blue from a germophobic asphyxiation as they hasten to do any urgent business they might have. Then they hurry away, leaving a safe radius of, say, four miles, between themselves and the hacking, coughing you.

And then, horror of horrors, if another sibling should come down with the same illness, that member is shunned like a Hindu priest does a beggar. Discussions are held amongst the well ones as they try to recall how exactly the new sick member got sick. Then they avoid anything that person had previously done. Consultations and updates are held with frequency as the kids who are not sick try desperately to remain so. Then, as another child gets sick, the process repeats itself. Or, no one else gets sick and life goes on.

Either way, life eventually returns back to normal, and siblings stop monitoring each other for unusual things which could point to a succumbing to sickness. Then someone gets sick again, and the whole process repeats.

As you might have guessed, our family is going through a mass cold. It's an annoying, lingering one, and its existence is the reason that I am home blogging instead of at Cadet Leadership School like I have anticipated for the last year. Have you ever heard the term "her fever broke," and wondered how a fever breaks? I have, and I found out a couple nights ago. It just stops. I was in bed, awake, feeling shivery like you do when you have a fever, and it suddenly went away. And I went back to sleep. But last night, I had a fever, and it went away somewhat gradually, so I guess I'm not sure. I thought it was cool though.

That was an update on my life. What about yours?

Chocolate Mousse and Chicken Sandwiches

How's that for a totally random title? It's referring to what I've been doing today - cooking. Plus cleaning. Now I'm blogging, and then I'm going to do some math. They are getting back this afternoon. Actually, their flight has apparently landed, so I'm expecting them back home in about an hour or so. Daddy took Josh and Katrina with him (yay!!) so it's quiet :)

To sum up some of the main points of the past 9 (nine?) days:

*Katrina likes her bedroom light to be left on for about 15 minutes after she goes to bed, but if you forget and it's midnight or so before you go up,that's okay too (just don't tell her mom I did that...more than once...)

*If you think Harold and the Purple Crayon is bad the first time through, let me assure you that it does not get any better the second time, or the third time.

*Likewise for The Best of Dr. Seuss...I am forever scarred from the scene in "Horton Hatches the Egg!" where the fish commits suicide. "Now I've seen everything," the fish says, and promptly pulls a pistol from behind his back and blows off his head. Shocking.

*Naptime. Is wonderful. Nuff said.

*Even if kids say they are going to throw up, they probably won't.

*Let me warn you that mopping the floor with 5 and 3 year olds is not for the faint of heart. They turn it into a slip-n-slide. And then they want to mop the floor again. Maybe here would be a good time for me to say that I am faint of heart.

*A 5 year old and a 3 year old can have pretty interesting conversations, such as on marriage. Josh and Katrina have Katrina's future spouse picked out. (I don't wish to publish his name here, but email me if you're curious...which you should be considering he's 16 years older...) He narrowly edged out his younger brother and a buffalo for this lovely slot. "Katrina! Do you `want to marry L____?" "Yes!! No...C______..." "Oh...ok. Wait, do you want to marry a buffalo?" "Yes!! A buffalo!" "You can marry a buffalo!!" "Yay!! Well, actually, I want to marry L____!" That was the gist of it. Sigh.

*Jane Austen is wonderful.

So needless to say, I'm glad they're getting back. And I'm signing off here and shall go stare at my math book :)