There Was This One Time In February When I Got My Camera Out

Hey! did you know that when you have more than two children, odds are at least one of them is crying/whining/having a complete mental and pysical breakdown at any given moment?Also chances are good that one or more of them can simultaneously be found making faces/laughing/saying something that is hilarious and totally whack. Many times children will sit to allow for love and adoration to fully set in. Asleep is one preferable example. Sitting in the snow is another.It goes: one emotion then another.Children of all emotions must be played with in the snow. Fathers are especially good at this, regardless of the catastrophe that is getting children robed/disrobed for such ocasion. Mothers are especially "good" at this. Can you feel the love?

Like Blogging And Chewing Gum

Things have been smooth sailing around these parts this past week and I have been tearing pictures off the wall and re arranging furniture. The children have been gratefully receiving three square meals a day and the baby has had all his naps on time. And don't get me started on the kitchen floor- it's.....clean. whew.

Blogging has been the neglected chore of the past week- the proverbial dirty cloth diapers on the basement floor if you will. (but you don't have to if you don't want to)

Do you feel like you've read this post on a 100 different blogs?

Blog stalling and reasons for absence sounding familiar?

I've read (and posted) it all before

And since the weather is the most (un)interesting thing I can come up with I will say it has been 50 and 19 this past week. I have seen grass and my current least favorite- white out. I don't care what they say, February is the longest month of the year and I have bored children and a clean house to prove it.

And because that's the best I've got, here are some random images you've missed:

and my personal faves:

I'm not going back out there till it stops snowing sideways

and I'll be back here when my brain thaws.

but if you told me you missed me I might change my mind;)

A Trip to the Arctic Tundra, Or to the Rochester Zoo in January

On Saturday, we coated up and booted up and went to the zoo.

It was snowing and 20 degrees and I resisted the idea when Jeff brought it to the what-the-heck-should-we do-today-Saturday agenda. But in the end, aside from the smell of the indoor monkeys (awful beyond awful), we throughly enjoyed ourselves.

The sharp winter air turned out to be just what we all needed. Imagine that!

phone pics using vignette camera app- makes the simplest days seem like a work of art;)

Have you ever been to the zoo in the snow?

It's quiet and peaceful and you don't have to push your way through to the front of the glass to see the sea lions. We saw two rhinos go head to head (cabin fever?), the polar bear (we never see the polar bear), and the tiger pacing and growling ferociously back and forth right next to the fence. I felt bad for him. The children enjoyed his presence.

the last picture is Binners freshly peeled and sweaty from his baby snowsuit. One day I will eat him from start to finish.

Winter at the Rochester zoo might make the animals bonkers, but it also makes our bonkers family of animals just plain happy.

So happy together. How is the weather.

The New Snow In Town

On Wednesday, it snowed the mother-load.

We self-declared it a snow day and ditched preschool.

I like to think that one day I will be the type of mother that scoops her children out of school just because.

I always daydreamed my mom would come take me out of school during the middle of taking a test for no reason. She never did. One time my BFF and I faked sick together (sounds like a solid plan, right?) and we both went to the nurse's office and called our moms. Her mom said she couldn't come home, but mine said it was ok and since my mom worked, my friend's mom came and picked me up, took me back to her house and I laid in her bed until my mom came and picked me up promptly after work. Total backfire.

School is so overrated.

On our snow day, Lena and I passed the time by making popsicle stick replicas of everyone in the family:

putting the final touches on Esq.'s business attire

admiring her handy work

note: Jeff's red afro, the desperation in my crossed eyes and sketchy smile, Simon's tears

also note: baby consumed 2 entire slices of bread while witnessing the creation of his popsicle stick replica

The rest of the day was spent building train tracks, making and eating batches of chocolate chip cookies, making play dough castles and birthday cakes, snuggling on the couch, practicing doing business on the potty, and watching movies. Some simultaneously! I even gave the housekeeper the day off (in other words- I pig sty-ed it up all day).

And if there's one thing I've perfected it's coming up with new justification to just stay home.

But darn it all if those snow plowers aren't totally on top of their game in Rochester!!