snow babies

as untimely as possible one of our hens decided january would be a good time to hatch some chicks. so in the middle of our snowstorm last week we had four baby chicks to deal with as well. they are super cute no doubt, but seriously chicks in january?? that hen clearly has her brooding wires crossed!

gotta love chicken farming!

snow day(s)!!!

we woke up to over a foot of snow a couple days ago. sure enough the radio man confirmed the school closure and we all geared up for a fun day of playing in the snow.

we started with a little snowball fight.....

.....the chickens kept getting stuck, so we shoveled out a little path for them

we called our friends and went down to the local park for some sledding. ....

we came home and made a snow day skillet cookie, which we ate snuggled on the couch together under a blanket......

.......then had pizza for dinner, watched a movie together and fell into bed tired and smiling

day 2...no more snow but now freezing rain and ice. power outages all over the gorge. school still closed. the snow is no longer soft and fluffy but hard and crunchy....not fun for playing. so we invited friends over and played board games all day.

day 3...still frozen. no school again. yesterday was a fort day. the kids spent the day happily constructing a fort...they even got to sleep in it!

day 4...today is saturday and of course no school. we are still frozen, but it is starting to melt...though slowly. the kids had their first ice skating (or icebooting) adventure in the yard which is essentially a frozen sheet.

we have big ambitions to ski tomorrow....we'll see if the roads are even open....keep your fingers crossed cause we are getting a little cabin fever at this point. this have been a snow day for the books!

happy snow day(s)!!!

lucy turns five!!

lucy is now a big five years old!!

on her actual birthday (january 2nd) todd took the kids sledding (i had to work) and then had some friends over for pizza and a movie.

her party was at her momo's house with 'just family' with the exception of her two friends (who are really more like siblings so fit the family criteria)

this year she wanted a fairy house cake...

they played games..

had cake and ice cream....

opened presents...

a lovely little party....happy birthday lucy!!!

wrapping up the holidays

as has been my trend this post is a little late....it's actually a resolution of mine to be a bit more timely with my posts....we'll see.

we did our annual zoo lights adventure. this year my brother and his kids joined too.

a highlight for the kids this year was a trip on the 'Polar Express'. the mt. hood railroad does this annually and we were waiting until both kids were of an age to enjoy it.

they wore their pajamas on the train, and the conductor punched letters in their tickets....

the got hot chocolate and cookies served by clapping chefs...

and then santa boarded, each kid sat on his lap and got good santa hugs...

.......and they got a special bell from santa's sleigh.

........we all enjoyed the adventure.

on the big day (christmas morning) we opened our gifts from santa.

riley got a new scooter (his old one had gotten too small)...

lucy wanted a fairy outfit (she is all about fairies right now) and she also got a new pink princess doll...

the family (please read 'todd' when i say family) got a pool table for the basement. the boys love it....

...some sibling christmas love....

a shot of the overall post- opening mayhem...

truth be told, the above pictures were the best we had of christmas. i was sick leading up to christmas , then the kids started illin on christmas, and todd got it by new years. lucy spent about 4 hrs crying on christmas (not from anything specific, just tired and a little sick and a little overwhelmed i think) which eventually made her mother cry. so not our best holiday ...i figure this blog has got to be a little honest, right?

lucy's birthday was on monday.... i had to work so we haven't actually celebrated yet. we are having cake and such with family this weekend so more to come on that!