After the snow

I'm starting to feel like I'm seeing nothing but white. Well, it's now turning gray but showing little sign of diminishing. A bit of blue sky is at least something, spotted out of the kitchen window while working from home at the tail end of on of our recent blizzards.

And some of the snowy stuff outside. 

Seasonal Catch-Up

Zach turned 3 today.

He's now in his bed, hopefully not getting ready to barf up the 4 cupcakes plus Friendly's quesadilla dinner now. Alas, I was sifting through piles of pictures that accumulated during our last few crazy months and realized I had missed posting a few milestones in my son's life.


Halloween:

Clearly, this was a dinosaur. Right? An off-the-shelf-from-Target costume, no less - I'm almost ashamed to admit. However, while trick-or-treating, Zach was repeatedly asked if he was a dragon, or, even better, Yoshi. He still asks on a near-daily basis when it will be Halloween again.


Lightnng McQueen "big kid" bed:



This was the carrot we dangled during the long and painful process of packing up all our stuff. Various loved objects disappeared, and Zach had to spend his weekends hanging out with a guy named Adam (our realtor) instead of at the playground, so we needed something. In reality, the bed is plain wood (it was handed down from his cousin, Sarah). We just tossed on a Cars bedspread. But as far as Zach was concerned, it was the perfect Lightning McQueen bed. (For those not around toddler boys much, that movie is like crack for them.)

And as an added bonus, he was given the freedom to wander out of it in the wee hours of the night to find mom. (Which actually isn't so bad, now that we also have upgraded, to an enormous king size bed.)


Chanuka:



We had a bevy of menorahs, but no pictures. Just this stellar snapshot showing a bunch of presents, and the awesome combo of striped sweater and track pants in  matching baby blue. Probably one of those days when potty training didn't go so well.


Christmas:



Seeing as we're Jewish, we had no tree or official festivities. However, we did have a ham and a duck and a festive dinner with my mother, Terry, and the Wades. Saru was kind enough to steal this gingerbread house from a co-worker, which the kids pretended to eat for quite some time before being allowed to snap some of the nonpareils off the roof.

Also looks like we forgot to dress Zach for the day, as this was dinner time.

S'more Monster

Especially scary when it's in your living room, within reach of the couch.

RIP Snowmen

There once were 3 snowmen. Ok, technically speaking, 2 snowmen and one snowlady. They lived for about 3 minutes before Zach decided it would be more fun to shove them over. Which he did with glee. Then they got snowed on. And started to look like big white dinosaur eggs. Which is what I told Ryan they were, and he almost believed me.

See?

Cold house

I may have mentioned the new house. Here it is, after the first round of snowstorms. There are several things about it that don't make any sense, like the rounded "bow house" roof - despite being built in the 70s. Someone had a bit too much fun laminating rafters for that pseudo antique look (and yes, we fell for it!). 

Ice on the inside of the window - that's a bad thing, right? But these faux antique windows...we can't replace them in any reasonably cost-effective manner. Hmm. Guess we'll just keep the blinds down till spring and hope for the best. 

For posterity, here's the whole thing, with snow cover. Actually, there's a lot more snow now... in fact, if you stand in this spot and look up, you can barely see the house at all, just a heap of white:

Red things in the snow

Red thing #1, probably obviously, is Zach's coat. Red thing #2 is one of the several dumpsters we've had in the driveway collecting debris from our basement reconstruction project. I love that the snow sits on the hood in almost the same pattern as it does on the dumpster. 

Candy Craft

 

Zach really got into this craft project. Started with a kit from IKEA which was quite tasty, before we covered it with nasty Betty Crocker frosting.

Ice

 

Before we were inundated with snow, there was ice. Those are air bubbles, looking a bit like frozen fireworks.

Zach was highly fascinated by the invitation to walk on the frozen lake, not to mention the couple kids playing hockey.

 

He watches a lot of Caillou, which is a Canadian import. While highly annoying, it has taught him about hockey, taboggans (though strangely, no curling). And, most importantly, about Zamboni trucks - so of course he wanted to know why there wasn't one on the lake.

Zach vs. snow

It's that time of year when we measure by the foot. Screw inches, those are lame.

Zach has been having a blast doing all things snow - shoveling, licking, climbing, sledding. He really likes Josh's new gadget, the Snow Brum, for clearing high-volume snow off of cars.

And it's helpful that he wears red, as I might otherwise loose track of him. Snow exploration is one of the few activities that he will do on his own.

PS: In between continuing to try and move into the new house, shopping for a new bed and all its various parts, taking care of a 2-year-old, life, etc., I have a few abandoned photos from the last few months. In the shuffle, I'd lost my mini USB cord and was unable to get those photos from the camera to my computer. Till yesterday, when I found it in my underwear drawer. God only knows how it got there.

Turkey Day, Turkey Leg