Let it Snow! Yes, yall... in Georgia!

It snowed!

It really snowed this time too... we calculated it at about 3 to 4 inches, which in our terms is quite a lot of the white stuff. Usually when "snow" is in our forecast we get a nice little dusting and it's over as soon as it falls... this time it snowed all afternoon and into the night, leaving us in a beautiful winter wonderland of white.

Our children were absolutely thrilled... they had so much fun making (and throwing!) snowballs, and creating snow angels...

Did I mention the snowballs?

School was closed on Friday (day of the snow fall) and after spending most of the afternoon playing outside with the kiddos, I was frozen. EJ and Cub were too, but they would never admit to it, and were still ready to get back outside... it was getting dark though, and those little hands and feet needed a break!

Brrrrrrr!

That evening it was really nice to go my brother Billy and Reynie's house for a family supper. They live down the dirt road from us here on the family "compound" as we (semi) jokingly call it. This past August they had a beautiful baby girl, their first child, Kimberly Grace... she is such a sweet baby, and they are such good parents.

We went back early enough to see Kimberly before her bedtime, and then all enjoyed spending time with family. Momma and Diddy were there as well, and we had a nice evening inside, as the snow still fell outside.

The next morning I got up before sunrise to get some pictures... all of the pictures I posted here are from my morning trek... I made lots of them, and posted more on facebook, but for some reason it takes forever for pictures to upload here on blogger?

I know, more of the technical stuff I don't understand, but just accept!

By Saturday afternoon, believe it or not, most all of the snow had melted away... I have to say I wasn't too upset, but did miss the serenity of it. I find snow beautiful and fun to photograph, but I am not a big "cold weather" girl.

I am (patiently!?) waiting on spring... Easter is 6 weeks away, and I am ready for warmer temps, beach trips and the more unstructured days of summer ahead!

Meet Mr. Lily...

Well, since I have been away from this blogosphere we gained a new family member.

HIS name is Mr. Lily, and trust me, please don't try to explain to our daughter that, yes, this IS a male cat.

You won't get very far.

Elizabeth is so sure that our Mr.Lily is a girl that she named him Lily, after one of her best friends. After trying many times to let her know that her Lily was a HE, I gave up and renamed him Mr. Lily... it's actually kinda funny now.

Yall should have seen the vet when Mr. Lily first went in for shots and such... but I am sure they see a lot of strange names.

Mr. Lily came to us by accident, in the midst of the crazy house remodel. Lee, Geoff's sister, found him in the engine of an old cadillac, at a gas station in South Carolina. She was coming home (here) for Cub's birthday party and had to stop and get gas. As she was pumping gas, a guy pulled up on the other side in an old caddy... while they were standing there, both waiting for their tanks to fill, they began to hear a small "meowing" sound. After pin pointing this to the hood of this old guy's car, Lee asked him to open it up.

Soon as he did Lee saw this tiny little orange kitty pop up, out near the engine. He was covered in oil, and not much bigger than 3 weeks old. She immediately wrapped him in a towel from her car and brought him with her.

On her way home, she called me with the news. She had already saved 2 other cats last summer, and knew she couldn't keep this one. Surprisingly, when I asked (begged) Geoff for the kitty, he said yes!

We had a new member of the family...

Since then Mr. Lily has truly added more fun to our home. He is not really a lap cat like I was used to, but loves to play. We bought some jingly balls that he likes to punt around, and if you can't find him all you have to do is pick up on of those balls and shake it. Mr. Lily will come running!

I still love sunflowers...

Cub and Elizabeth in Cub's room before bed last weekend...

on the weekend they usually sleep in his room and play Legos until they fall asleep from exhaustion!

Wow!

I really didn't check before I began writing this, but I believe my last post was in the spring of last year. So much has happened since then, obviously, as life does move on... but I so wish I had written down so much of the past year. I stated when I began this blog that I am doing so in order to look back and remember those sweet (and not so sweet!) days of my children's lives, as they do grow so quickly, and I want to remember as much as I can.

But sometimes life does get in the way... and sometimes silly technology does too. In my case I believe it is both!

I use a gmail account for my email, but to write here on this here blog I have to use my old email address. I have tried to fix this "small" issue, but either it is not possible to use a gmail email for a google blog, or I am just not savvy enough to figure it out.

On second thought, it's probably both!

I think my last post was about our remodel in Elizabeth's bedroom. I love it, and we have made some more improvements since then. It's a true little girl's princess room, and Elizabeth has really enjoyed the change...

I just never knew at that time that it was only the precursor to another, bigger remodel coming just around the corner... that we would spend most of the summer and fall living in an all out construction zone.

No, I am not kidding!

Let me fast forward through May... Cub finished his first year of preschool and first year playing t-ball... EJ graduates from kindergarten and we watched as she danced onstage at her tap recital. I was so proud of them both.

Just for reference sake (and my memory) EJ was 5 years old, and Cub was 3...

June brought relief from the structure of the school year, and just as we were getting into the swing of things, the "flood" came through.

Okay, so we live on a little hill of sorts, and a flood would be a stretch here. But after I explain you will understand a bot more. The kids and I went to Atlanta to meet one of my best friends and her son at Olympic Park... we spent the morning there enjoying the water fountain, playing in the park and catching up on life. I am sure I would have stayed longer, but we needed to get back in order to make our church VBS on time, so mid afternoon we began the hour drive home.

As I pulled into the yard and opened the door, I heard the sound of rushing water.

??????

Water? We don't have a pool, and our water garden had not been turned on yet that summer. So, where was that water sound coming from? I headed towards the porch and saw the dogs were having a grand time in a large spray of water coming from the place a water hose should be.

??????

I then wondered why the hose was not hooked up, but slowly realized that this was a BIG "Oh my Gosh" and "What the *#$&" moment... As I ran inside the house and turned toward our kitchen, I came to an abrupt stop.

A river ran through our house.

Yep... hence the reason why we spent the next 5 months living in an unexpected remodel of our home.

Looking back now I feel like maybe it was a blessing. Our home was becoming outdated, and there was a lot we wanted to fix and do, but I hadn't been gathering my ideas yet. I wasn't prepared for FIVE MONTHS of construction and picking out flooring/granite/paint colors/etc.... did I mention that it was the summer? You know, the months when you can sleep a bit later and stay in pajamas until noon if you like.

Not this time, not for us, no sir ree! The guys got there really early, and of course we decided to also take down a wall, and add a room, and more cabinets, among other things. We either left the house every day and found things to do, or lived in our master bedroom.The sheetrock dust would kill you, and I still think I see it as I dust the house.

Geez!

August rolled around and school began. Our now 6 year old daughter began 1st grade, and our 4 year old son began PreK 4... the structure of a schedule began again, and the home construction was still going on. Don't get me wrong... we love the guys who remodeled our home. They also did EJ's bedroom, Momma's house and other projects for lots of folks in our extended family. Our kids call the boss "Uncle Randy" and we think of the whole crew as our friends.

As a side note, EJ had an episode with her heart racing, and after a trip to the pediatrician, then the ER, and later a heart specialist at Emory in Atlanta, we had a diagnosis of chest wall pain. So much better than the other option they thought it might have been... I can't spell it, but it's something like tachycardia.

Next came all the holidays, and then the new year. And now here I sit, trying to write a catch up post. I still have some painting to complete, and lots of decorating, but we are very happy with the results of the redo.

Sigh! I have skipped over a lot of great stuff that happened this summer and fall, but I could never get it all in. Camp Nana was awesome, and a lifesaver for this construction weary family. We took some nice trips and enjoyed our family. Life passed by slowly, yet so fast I find that I am nearly a year behind here... how does that happen?

So, I hope to do much better now in posting again. I make no promises as I seem to get so busy I tend to forget what groceries I need to buy, but I will make a great effort. I do want to look back years and years from now and read these snipits of life when the kids were small, laugh, cry and read it to our grandkids. =)

Of course, I also turned 39 in December... so those days are closer than they used to be!