1771 Hey Baby it’s cold outside!

Saucy Scale: 9

Oh sure, when you are trapped in the house all day, the falling snow looks lovely.  When you decide to bundle up the kids and venture out in the minivan, however…we’ll just say that it quickly loses its charms.

Since the majority of my holiday shopping happened via the interweb, I was in need of a few boxes – in order to wrap them nicely (Lord knows I wasn’t going to pay upwards of $4.50 per item for giftwrapping!).  I had intended on running into a few stores to request boxes today, but it is no small task to unload my Monkey Children in order to run into a store.  I asked my daddy if he’d tag along to keep the boys entertained while I ran in and out of stores.  He did me one better…he ran out and got me the exact boxes that I needed and then he met us for lunch at Panera!

I expected Panera to be crazy-busy given that it is a wastoid holiday work-week.  But the place was nearly deserted – the snow probably played a big role in that, I suppose.

The snowy roads were indeed The Suck.  The other drivers never cease to amaze me.  They either drive as if they think their car is a huge commercial snowplow or as pathetic as if they’ve never seen snow, let alone driven in it before.  Either way, I fear that someone else’s poor winter driving skills will cause us to be in an accident one of these days.  You fish-tailers need a few lessons in turning.  If the rest of us can manage to make a turn without losing control of our tires…then you should be able to pull it off too.  I’m just sayin’.

One of my better finds was a drive-thru dry cleaner.  Today was the perfect day to pick-up TBU’s dress shirts!

Gus has an obsession with snow.  Which snow is edible and which colors of snow are not edible, actually.  He talked about finding some clean snow the entire ride home.  So, I indulged him.  I took him to a nice, big pile of fluffy white snow in our front yard & showed him how to scooped some off the very top clean layers.  When I turned my back, he was falling face first into the pile.  Once he realized he was not only wet, but cold as well, he was freaking out!  It would’ve been adorable, except I still had to get him into the house (and out of his wet boots so that he wouldn’t slip and fall on the slick kitchen floor) & get a screaming Mattson out of his carseat.  So it was just a pain.  So much for helping him create a nice happy memory of eating snow in the front yard.

My Nurse Practitioner instructed me not to carry Mattson around any longer.  Yeah, try explaining that rule to your needy toddler!  I’m even pondering getting a 2nd changing table for the Family Room.  Once I get my boys up the stairs (w/o carrying Mattson), I’m huffing & puffing… then I still need to chase them down and coerce them into whichever task we’ve come up to do.  (I swear, it’s like herding cats!)  Picking up Mattson to get him up on the changing table is a job in itself for mama. 

I don’t want to waste a lot of money on another changing table, though.  I know that in theory it might be smart to have it once the twins arrive, but we’ve always used that space for our Pack N Play – which can be used as both a napping location & it has a "changing table" attachment for new babies (aka lightweights).  I wish it were sturdy enough to hold Mattson right now! 

We’ll see.  I don’t care what it looks like, I just want something inexpensive to get the job done.  I saw brand-new ones listed for $89.  I’m willing to look at used ones from the consignment store (since I can clean and sanitize the heck out of it), but it would have to be substantially less than the price of a new one.  Know what I mean?

My belly is super hard now.  These kids flip around and punch constantly.  I must not be aware of my own belly dimensions, b/c I run into stuff all the time.  I just think I’ve got more belly clearance than actually exists!

My actual stomach capacity is shrinking.  (Nice juxtaposition, really.)  My eyes are always bigger than my stomach.  Our fridge is full of my half-eaten meals.  Very annoying – b/c the leftovers almost never sound good to me later.

Oh goodness.  Time to wrap this up for nap-time!

5 Things That Make Me Happy:

1. A nice warm house on a very snowy day
2. Teaching our kids about the REAL meaning of Christmas
3. Swedish tree ornaments – our family tradition to get a new ornament for each child every year
4. Teaching Gus the ins and outs of finding nice, clean, edible snow in the front yard
5. Mattson’s unrestrained enthusiasm for life!  La Chaim, little boy!