Snow Day!

Well, the snow did indeed come, as promised.  It wasn't piles and piles of it, but we seem to have gotten a good twelve inches or so, and it's still coming down at this point.  I'll probably have to go out and shovel again before EP Dude gets home from work.

Or he could just plow his sedan right through the snowplow mound at the end of the driveway and skid to a stop as best he can before slamming into my car.

I'm going with option B.

Don't look at me like that, it's cold out and I've already changed into my comfy pants.

I did go out to shovel this morning, with Wee Ninja Girl in tow.  She was content to just stand on the sidewalk as I shoveled around her for a long time.  Then she discovered that I had cleared a path to the road, and I spent the rest of the time shoveling, warning her to STAY OUT OF THE ROAD, threatening to pick her up and bring her back to the front stoop, and then picking her up and bringing her back to the front stoop. 

So it took a bit longer to clear the driveway than I had anticipated.

But we did have lots of fun and WNG got to wear her snowpants at last.  I love the *zip zip* sound they make when she walks around!

We did not sled down the driveway into the backyard on pillows in garbage bags, cardboard boxes, or any other kind of bootleg sledding device.  We did wander around and catch snowflakes on our tongues and draw a baby face in the snow on my car.

WNG had so much fun doing just those simple things that she started crying when we came inside, despite her cold hands and the snow up her sleeves.  I had to distract her with YouTube videos of the Muppets, which has become her favorite pasttime.

I will expand on that failure of motherhood some other time.  For now, here is the snowbaby all geared up:

Snow baby

I'm so jealous.  Everyone else is getting piles and piles of snow while we here in Rochester have just a few scant inches on the ground and fitful flurries.  Sigh.  Wee Ninja Girl hasn't been able to use her snowpants yet! 

She did, however, get to build a snowman and enjoy some wintry shenanigans last weekend when we hauled ourselves to Albany for my grandmother's 93rd birthday party (more on that in a minute).

Our trip was pretty uneventful, actually.  We took my little sister, The Queen of Musicke, along and she rode in the backseat with WNG, so we didn't have to stop once!  WNG was supposed to nap in the car, but she is the only baby this side of the Mississippi who doesn't ever sleep in her carseat.  Plus, she had her auntie and godmother to entertain her for 3.5 hours, so why would she even try?

Amazingly enough, TQOM even sat in the back with WNG on the ride home as well!  Awesome!

Randomness alert!

One thing I learned while in Albany was how lucky we are in our parish here in Rochester.  (Surprising, I know, to anyone who knows the situation in our diocese!)  We went to a Mass at one of the cluster parishes, so it wasn't the parish I used to attend when I lived there.  It was... an experience.  I don't want to badmouth or criticize clergy, but I will say that I've never in my life had this sort of conversation with a priest before:

Father:  The Body of Christ.

Me: Amen.

Father: Hey, how are ya?  Good to see ya!  How've ya been?

Me.  ...

Yes, folks, he tried to strike up a conversation whilst I was receiving the Host.  I didn't know what to do, so I just moved away and continued back to my pew.  Strangeness. 

It also made it difficult for me because this Lenten season I am focusing on the positive and trying to be more charitable in my daily interactions with people.  It took a lot for me to not seethe and rant about it (and other oddities during the same Mass), although I admit that I did vent a little bit to EP Dude and my mother.

Sigh. 

Anyway, my grandmother's party was tons of fun, and it was great to see so much of my family.  I was able to catch up with a cousin I hadn't seen since my grandmother's birthday last year!  My grandmother just glowed having all her children and most of her grandchildren there.  WNG was the only great-grandbaby present, which was a bit of a bummer, but understandable as the others have a lot farther to travel.

And yes, the candles on her cake are backwards to say "39" on purpose.

It was also EP Dude's birthday, but he graciously agreed that we should spend it in Albany celebrating with my grandmother rather than relaxing in Rochester like I know he wanted.  I'm so lucky to have such a guy!

And to make up for everything, I baked him his favorite Dr. Pepper Texas Chocolate Cake from the Dinosaur BBQ cookbook.   Sadly, we forgot to bring the leftovers home with us, but my mom froze it so we can enjoy it the next time someone from Albany makes their way westward.

Mmmmmmmm..... cake.............

Tripping, Turkeys, and Tires

Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and hasn't yet gotten trampled in a Black Friday frenzy.  I can't even imagine going out shopping today.  I am running out of some really essential groceries like milk, bread, and Goldfish crackers, but I'm staying home and waiting until tomorrow to venture the streets.

Plus, my car has a flat tire.  Again.  But that story should end yesterday's narrative, so we'll come back to in a few minutes.

Yesterday morning, things were just peachy.  The cherry pie was finished and looked great.  See?  The house was clean, my outfit was ready, we all slept in, and life was good. 

Then, while I was taking pictures of important things, like this pie, Wee Ninja Girl tripped over my leg and totally face planted onto the (hardwood, of course) floor in the dining room.  She bit her bottom lip and scuffed her nose.  She now has a lovely purple mark on the inside of her lip, but she doesn't seem to be bothered by it.  I think it took me longer to recover.

Later, we packed up and went to my Awesome-in-laws for dinner.  We brought WNG's port-a-crib and all her bedtime gear in the hopes that she would take her nap there.

She didn't.  Not one wink.

Luckily, even when she is overtired, WNG is generally well-behaved, although she did hoark down what remained of a cranberry-walnut topping for brie and crackers and then refuse to eat any dinner other than about 3 green beans.  Needless to say, she has been eating an awful lot today!

Dinner itself was wonderful and we had a great time.  The turkey was perfection itself and all the trimmings and desserts were fantastic.

On the way home, in the cold and slight drizzle, we got a flat tire.  It is literally a two-mile drive from the A-i-L's house to our own, but we only made it halfway.  Of course, the trunk of my car was packed full, so we ended up having to put as much stuff as possible (including the tire!) in the backseat next to WNG, who wasn't as cranky as I was by then.

This stupid tire keeps going flat, even though we've had it checked out by tire pros and they all have said it's fine.  We tightened the little metal thingy in the valve thingy and it seemed to work for a while, but now we're going to replace the whole valve and hope for the best.  Or we could just buy a new tire.  Sigh.

Enjoy your leftovers!

Are you there, blog? It's me, Jess...

Hi there.

I am still alive.

Tired, but alive.

Busy as all get out, but alive.

Last week, EP Dude and I celebrated our second anniversary. We decided to celebrate early so his aweseomer than awesome parents could watch Wee Ninja Girl, allowing us to dine *gasp!* alone. Our actual anniversary was Tuesday, the 15th, but we went out to dinner on the previous Saturday. Nothing too fancy, just dinner and dessert at Carrabbas and then home early enough to play a couple hours worth of The Secret of Monkey Island. It was our gift to each other.

It was much more relaxing than our anniversary last year, which actually provides a lovely segway into our second celebration we had last week.

Wednesday, the 16th, was Wee Ninja Girl's first birthday!

Thus, our very first anniversary was spent in the hospital with me in labor and EP Dude being the best labor coach ever. He was told by more than one nurse that he should teach the dads' class!

I remember thinking at some point during all the fun that I hoped WNG would be born on her own day so we wouldn't have to share our anniversary with her birthday, and she held on until 2:34am to get her own special day.

Really, though, 12:01am would have been just fine with me, but I guess she wanted to be sure!

At any rate, WNG's little party was lots of fun and she was very good. It took a little while for her to understand the whole "opening presents" thing, but she eventually got the hang of it. The cake... not so much. It seemed at first as though she'd inhale it, but after three smooshed fistfuls, on the floor it went!

More for me, I guess.

What's that, you say? Two little parties don't sound like they could keep me away from my blog for so long?

You are correct. There's more!

On Friday, EP Dude left work a bit early to pick up my little sister from college and then we all drove to my parents' house in Albany for a weekend visit. Relatives were in town for the first time in over a year and we just couldn't let them leave without seeing them.

The trip was... interesting. WNG is a pretty good traveller, but after a couple hours she just wants to run around.

Did I mention that she's walking? She started back in August and is now practically running everywhere. She prefers to dash around in haphazard circles while clutching random items, which she switches out every few minutes.

< /end brag>

Anyway, the trip was a whirlwind of awesome. We had tons of fun with the family, ate way too much delicious food, and I got to shoot arrows and actually hit really close to the bull's eye once!

Then, Sunday morning right after Mass we piled back in the car and drove home. Short and sweet!

This week, I've been experimenting with WNG's naptimes. I know, I'm completely insane a glutton for punishment just plain bonkers ambitious, but WNG has been fighting her late afternoon nap for a long time and her morning nap keeps getting bumped further in they day until she's going down too close to lunchtime. So, I've combined those two naps into an early afternoon snooze.

It hasn't gone well. She's cranky. I'm cranky. EP Dude is not cranky, so we have to make him cranky by the sheer volume of crankiness WNG and I exude.

Fun times.

As for yarncrafting... I hope to pick it up again soon! I have a few things in mind for which I would need to invent patterns, so perhaps I'll have some downtime soon!

The birthday girl!

Adventures in Pittsburgh and Poopy Ice Cream

Last week Wee Ninja Girl and I travelled with my parents and my youngest sister (Ms. T, age 12) to visit my Big Brother, his wife K, and my three nieces: Energizer Bunny (age 7), Sweetie-O (age 5), and Newbie (age one week!).

I will spare you all the details of the car trip. As someone who travelled by car frequently as a child, I am used to my parents' grueling ambitious methods. For example, when we stopped (once every four to five hours), we used the bathroom. It didn't matter if we "didn't have to go." We just WENT. Because it would be a long time before stopping again. We were given small treats every once in a while as we passed a milestone—usually smarties or a travel game. I hate to think how much smartie dust my poor dad vacuumed out of cars when we were young.

Their methods certainly worked, though. They drove from Albany, NY, to Fort Leavenworth, KS, in three days with five kids in an '86 Volvo station wagon. In the winter. As an added bonus, at least three people in the car were sick at any given time. Fun times!

Unfortunately, Wee Ninja Girl is not quite conditioned for that sort of torture regimen, so we ended up stopping more than I would have liked.

Anyway. As expected, we had a blast visiting everyone. My sister-in-law was amazingly spry and energetic for a woman who just gave birth naturally a week before we arrived. What's that? Green isn't a good color for me?

On Thursday, my mother decided to treat us to some ice cream. She and my dad had seen a sign for an ice cream place as they took a stroll that morning. Never one to be left out when there is ice cream involved, I strapped Wee Ninja Girl into her new umbrella stroller and headed out with my mom, Ms. T, Energizer Bunny, and Sweetie-O.

It was hot. And humid. And the umbrella stroller turned out to be too short for me and a huge pain to push uphill. Because they live in Pittsburgh and one can't seem to take three steps in any given direction without going uphill. Needless to say, I was less than cheerful by the time we saw the place, although I'm sure no one could tell as I cleverly masked my displeasure.

It turned out to be a Greek lunch counter that "Now Serves ICE CREAM!!!!!" according to the hand-scrawled sign in the window. Our choices were Chocolate, Vanilla, or Strawberry. Apparently, the freezer burn was included at no extra charge. It took the guy at the counter about 20 minutes to scoop and serve five orders. I had hoped there was frozen yogurt for the Wee Ninja Girl, but she was happy with the bag of cheerios I always carry around. I know, she's awesome.

At least we had entertainment. Next door was a tattoo/piercing parlor with a giant window facing the little patio where we ate. Lots of shiny, colorful people to watch!

Energizer Bunny and Sweetie-O couldn't wait to tell Big Bro and K all about the poopy ice cream. We did clarify that "poopy" described the overall experience, not the flavors.

And at least the walk home was mostly downhill.