Snow Much Fun

I'm finally getting around to posting pictures from last week's storm.  It started out as a lot of fun - our first snowfall of the season!  But it turned into a whole lot of not fun with ice storms, power outages and broken trees.

Kate sledding with Daddy

 Kate and Jack playing in our front yard

A second round of snow to add to the first

And then the freezing rain and ice storm came

All of the snow & ice weighed down all of the branches on the trees

And broke some trees - that's our Magnolia tree out front with the top half broken off

And took some trees completely down - our neighbors' tree in our side yard

 And once the trees started falling, the power went out - thank goodness for a fully charged iPad!

And our new headlamps from the Schufreiders!

 And then the windstorm came - that's the kids' playhouse turned upside down

We all obviously survived.  The power eventually came back on.  We were able to salvage much of our food by storing it out in the snow.  And thanks to gas fireplaces, we never got too cold in the house.  

Our weather seems to be returning to its normal rainy self.  But the damage has been done.  Trees and branches litter the sides of the roads everywhere you go.  Multiple trees in our neighborhood had to be completely cut down.  It is going to take a long time to clean it all up.  And this Spring will be very telling to see just how much survived.  We were lucky to only lose part of a tree at our current house and one full tree at our rental house.  I know many people that sustained a lot more damage.  Hopefully Mother Nature is done out here for a little while!

Train Museum

My parent's house in Colorado is just a few miles from the train museum.  So we took the kids there during our visit this last week.  We had lots of fun checking out all of the cool trains and playing with the train tables in the gift shop (how come they never play with the one at home?).

Ringing in the New Year in Colorado

Last week we returned from a week-long visit to Colorado where we had a delayed Christmas celebration with my family followed by ringing in the New Year with great friends.  I am still trying to catch up on everything.  I've managed to get everyone unpacked, I've done the majority of the laundry and I've gotten the Christmas decorations put away.  But I'm still behind on emails, thank you notes, work, etc.  Oh, and blogging!  Well I'm addressing that last one right now so that's progress.

Having a 2 year old and a 5 year old always produces a little pre-trip anxiety.  I worry well in advance of leaving about what the plane ride experience is going to be and I don't really sleep at all the night before.  But we have been amazingly lucky and seem to have produced some good travelers.  This trip was no exception.  We had to wake them up at 4:45 in the morning on the day we left, drive to the airport, check our bags, get through security, consume some breakfast and then endure the 2 1/2 hour flight to Denver.  Both kids were complete angels during the entire trip.  We loaded them up with books and movies and they were happy as can be.  

When we arrived at my parent's house in Arvada, we were all a bit tired to say the least (mostly Mommy).  But we discovered that Santa had visited and my parents had managed to wait to open anything until we arrived.  We weren't planning to have our Christmas until the following day when my brother would come over.  But we decided to go ahead and open our stockings because it is oh so hard to wait.

After resting for a bit, Dave and I left the kids with Grandma & Poppa and headed out to meet up with my brother to attend the Colorado Avalanche game.  We are lucky enough to live next door (in Washington) to a former Avalanche player/coach who was able to hook us up with some really great seats for the game.  We had some delicious pizza at Mellow Mushroom beforehand.  And to top it off, the Avs won the game so it was a fun night!  

The following day we had our Christmas.  Presents, presents and more presents.  We were spoiled as always!

Unfortunately it didn't snow while we were in town, but there was still some snow on the ground from a previous storm.  So our little snow-deprived Seattle-ites were able to play in it a little bit before it all melted away.

On New Year's Eve, Dave and I once again left the kids with Grandma & Poppa to head out on the town.  This time it was to have dinner with my best friend Andrea, her husband Max and our other friends Chad & Marcie at Carmine's, a delicious Italian restaurant in the Wash Park area.  

Us before heading out

Getting ready to ring in the New Year

Party Animal

Unfortunately our fun night out started to go downhill before we even got to dinner as Dave quickly started coming down with the flu.  By the time dinner was over, he had a fever and was shivering uncontrollably.  So we had to say our farewells and head back home.  The kids were already in bed and my parents followed shortly after we got home. So I stayed up by myself and watched Ryan Seacrest ring in 2012 on TV.  Ah well, at least I got a good dinner out of it!

Dave spent much of the rest of the trip in bed.  But did manage to make it out one evening for a low key dinner at Max and Andrea's house.  Max is an excellent chef and he made us red beans and rice followed by amazing chocolate souffles.  The best part was having a chance to get our kids together for a play date.  They have a son who is 2 months older than Jack and then a 10 month old daughter.  The kids had lots of fun!

Me with baby Georgia

Jack and Jackson playing hockey

Max and Georgia on her new pony

Kate, Jackson & Jack

Me and Andrea (not the best picture)

The masterpiece souffle

During our trip, we also had fun visiting with Uncle Josh, eating at our favorite restaurants and just relaxing for a bit.  We also visited the train museum which was great fun.  I'll blog about that separately as this post has gotten completely too long!