NotaSnow Day

I want to start by pointing out, very clearly, that fluorescent lights and I function about the same way in cold weather, i.e. not very well and extremely slow starting. Don’t get me wrong, when I woke up this morning to thunder and lightning and…snow…I was happy about the snow. I like it, it’s pretty, and it makes everything look clean. However, I like it better when the school system agrees with me that school should be cancelled or delayed. I live on a slanted driveway with a steep street and I am a baby.

  

Go ahead, snow-state friends, bring it! I fully admit I don’t like slip sliding away with my kids in the car. No excuses here. The school district did not agree, however and after enough neighbors had soldiered through the slush to clear the street we headed on our merry way.

The kids complained, whined, fussed and tossed a little snow around, but were mostly bummed that they didn’t get to stay home and play in the stuff. I did the Mom thing and told them it was too darn bad, and get in the car.

Warning-Whiner Alert!!!!!!!

Some things that make this notasnow day irritating are:

1.  School is still in session. I actually love the hot-cocoa-jammies-snuggle-under-blankets-with-a-movie time with the kiddos.

2.  The weather should warm up juuuuust enough to melt most of the snow before they get home.

3.  My house is cold, even with the heater at 70 (I told you I am a baby).

4.  The middle child sprained her ankle at gymnastics last night and has it wrapped and can’t run around.

5.  I drove straight to the coffee mecca from school drop off because I am brave when it comes to my caffeine needs and I deserved it for braving the snow. I got there finally to discover I had left my purse at home so I paid for my coffee with dimes. Yup, dimes. Ha! A lesser person would have just gone home, not foraged through the door-side cup holders. But I’m no quitter.

All-Clear, Whiner Alert is over. You may return to normal reading!

Well, I got home from my icy excursion and decided our little neighborhood friends were somewhat worse off than me, seeing as how I really do have a warm house to go into. In Garden Club this month, at the girls’ school, I taught the kids how to make suet balls for the birds to eat in the winter. Not much going on in the ol’ garden right now so we decided to focus on being good hosts to our wildlife buddies.

We mixed Crisco (I opted against lard this time), chunky peanut butter, sugar, oats and yellow cornmeal into a crumbly dough and then rolled it into balls. The kids each took some of them home for their own yards, we put some around the school and I had some left in my big Tupperware bowl. This morning, I scooped some out on top of the snow and also scattered some seed around. The suet is really good to help the omnivorous birds-like bluebirds (yes, they can be carnivorous sometimes) get the fat and protein they miss in the winter. For more on this, go to www.sialis.org. That is sialis with an “S” and it is about bluebirds, not bathtubs…

Ornithology lesson over.

Anywho…as I was scooping out suet, a wind gust hit a tree across the street and the whole thing shivered, like the Whomping Willow in Harry Potter, and snow cascaded down and blew across the yard. It was beautiful. I wish I could show you. I wish the girls had seen it. As I was looking around at the quiet majesty of a winter’s morn, bemoaning that the girls couldn't enjoy it, I had a great thought.

“Self,” I thought, “Why not save some of this for the girls?”

“But self,” I thought, “How?”

I decided to scoop up some snowballs, put them in a big tub and stash them in the freezer. Then, later, when they get home and the snow is all melted, they can have that snowball fight they begged for this morning (they did look really cute all bundled for the weather and wanting to play in it. I didn’t take a picture but here are some from Christmas Day-they pretty much look the same!) Also, after school it won’t be too icy for the wounded one to participate. I am a super-genius. Just wanted to put that out there.

I made a batch of chocolate chip cookies to add to cocoa for a post-fight treat so I’m all set for 4:00. Meanwhile, I am bundled in fleece and blankets, two furry pooches at my feet and coffee by my side and I am happy.

 

I hope you make the most of your notasnow day!

What Snow???

Oklahoma, Where the Wind Comes Sweeping Down the Plains...

What do you do when you have one more day of Christmas break and you have seen all the Redbox/dollar/regular movies acceptable for kids, it is about 40 degrees and grey/cloudy outside, you have a ton of cleaning to do, decorations to put away and thank you notes to write?

Obviously you hop in the car with all the kids and drive north to Oklahoma. Yeah, maybe you don’t, but I do. I can come up with anything to avoid cleaning! This morning I was reading a book on historic day trips from the Dallas area that the hubby gave me for Christmas.

One of them was to Fort Sill and Mt. Scott in Oklahoma, north of Wichita Falls. At this point it was about 11:00 a.m. I decided that we needed to go to a mountain of some sort. Why not? So I looked closer, to the Arbuckle Mountains due north. I landed on Turner Falls, located in Davis, OK. This seemed like an easy road trip, less than two hours and straight.

“Go get in the car, we’re driving to some mountains.”

“What?”

I was met with blank stares and incredulous, gaping mouths.

“Oh just go get in the car. Spontaneous Mommy craziness.”

“Okay.”

I grabbed some snacks, gloves and hats and off we went.

We made it all the way to Gainesville before needing to take a break and grab lunch. Not bad for our crew of ladies. Being the generous, last weekday of break Mommy that I was, I stopped at three different fast-food joints for lunch. Yeah, that doesn’t happen ever, so savor it younglings!

So we soldiered on, over the Red River, past the behemoth casino, through the prairies that gradually gave way to rolling hills and then rocky cliffs.

We started watching for different license plates as we drove. We passed a lot of Texas and Oklahoma, predictably, but then we passed a truck with Alaska on the plate. Pretty far from home.

We saw a ton of Kansas and Nebraska and even a Colorado then the next plate we saw was South Carolina.

“Wow, they drove here all the way from South Carolina,” said the oldest as we passed the car.

South Carolina got that response? Not Alaska? Okie Dokie!

We pulled off the freeway and down the snaking drive to Turner Falls State Park. I forgot how beautiful the Arbuckle Wilderness was. The surroundings were the most barren I had seen them, being winter, but the rocks formations and bare trees mixed well with the dark green evergreens and the occasional white glints of snow.

After the obligatory photo at the entrance to the park, we headed in to see what mischief we could manage.

We paid and forded a couple of small water crossings in the family truckster before stopping to hike the rest of the way to the falls. Let me clarify that “hiking” was a loose definition at this point. They have paved a sidewalk that we walked on most of the way.

We passed the Stone Castle on our way to the falls, the former home of a professor, built in the ‘40’s. It is under semi-renovation and a lot of the structure still needs it. Crumbling cement covers the native stonework on the steps that lead almost vertically up the hillside.

 The castle consists of a main building and several patios and outbuildings connected by more steps. A garage at the top of the hill, about 100 steps up from the main structure, was worth investigating. The problem was, once we got up there, we smelled a skunk. A fresh skunk. Our trip downhill was a little quicker than up.

The girls had a blast climbing in and out of the narrow passageways and dark staircases. They pretended they were prisoners and that the place was haunted. A bit of ice still coated the roof so it was a bit treacherous. Still exciting. And my screaming calves today are proof that we covered every inch of the hundreds of steep steps!

As we got closer to the falls, we were paralleling the river. The crystal-clear water was full of trout. A few guys were fly-fishing at the falls. The girls had fun watching the technique but then almost gagged when they saw one man's line of caught trout and the heads of another man's already-cleaned catch.

“I. Am. Going. To. Be. Sick,” the middle child stammered, clutching my arm.

“I want to go up there,” pointed the oldest. I followed her finger to a cave about 50 feet up, past ice and crumbly rocks.

“No way,” I said. “Not this time.”

The youngest child took off to play on a playground at a picnic area nearby. I think this could be a great place to camp and hike as it warms up a little. We may plan a return trip.

As we walked back to the car, a kingfisher dove down from some trees to get a fish from the steam. It was neat to see such a unique bird and watch it hunt. It was a good day-much better than watching insipid shows featuring whiny kids and predictable plots.

The trip back was faster than the trip up and soon we were back in the great state of Texas, just in time to watch Texas A&M beat OU in the Cottonbowl. Guess we stole their mojo while we were up in Oklahoma! Then again, maybe it was just Johnny Football! Gig 'em!

Merry New Year!

Well, it's over. Let it go-it's done. Just move on. No, not the Cowboys' season. I wouldn't waste a blog post on Jerry Jones if he paid me! I mean 2012. Whether you loved it or hated it, the old year has ended and the new one has begun. Just in time, too, because 2012 was getting so boring!

At any rate, we ended the year together, spending time eating and playing games with friends and family, and started the new year together, eating and playing games as a family. Not a bad end or beginning. Unless you ask the kids who hate black-eyed peas, because we had plenty of those!

Our new year started in characteristic creative style. While preparing the year-launching feast of "Hoppin' John" with aforementioned peas, ham, greens and cornbread croutons, we were each handed an "invitation" from the youngest child. They had been hand-drawn, then photocopied and cut out like tickets.

"4:00 Playroom for my 1 person show. Be prepared to be blown away with laughter." 

I spelled it as you want to read it. Here is a picture of the phonetically-spelled original:

With an invite like that how do you stay away?

So, I cleaned the ham juice off my hands and followed the rest of the family upstairs. We promptly returned to get the invites when we were met at the playroom with a gate and the stern words, "Those invitations were your tickets!"

She collected our tickets, assigned us beanbag seating, saying, "One dollar please. You may have a seat. Phones must be turned off please."

I pled the media angle, pointing out that I was documenting for posterity sake. No dice.

I will try to remember most of it.

We got a second round of: "Phones off!" And even a "Anyone else have a device?" Wow! She tried to take the phone but I pointed out that Broadway shows just request that they be turned off.

She then made her rounds inspecting each ticket. "I have to make sure you didn't cheat and have the right ticket slips."

Like there was a scalper in the foyer, hawking faux tickets to the kid's show!

At this point it was declared that the show would begin. I couldn't take any good pictures due to the media ban. I managed to snag one bad one at the end, but full costume effect was lost at that point. Imagine a seven year-old child in a purple and white ballet leotard, full tutu, high-heel Disney princess shoes, a Madagascar clown wig and a straw safari hat. Got it? Good. That was the rig she had on.

The only pic I was able to take, after most of the costume flew off, before I lost my phone again!

Our promoter/host/ticket-taker/performer began her show. She sat down and announced that she would begin the first of TWELVE Christmas carols to be played on a mini keyboard. NOOOoooooo!!!!!! We negotiated down to three, with an assistant required for a fourth. Whew!

She performed fully-recognizable renditions of all the three solo songs then asked for a volunteer. When only two people raised their hands and she declared, "You know if you don't raise your hand, I'm just going to call on you!"

The middle child immediately put her hand down and was, of course, chosen. She was asked to sing as accompaniment to the keyboard. In no way did the middle child see this as an opportunity to show off. Ha! where's the Looney Tunes cane when you need it?

The song ended and we thought it was done. 

No.

Next came the dancing.

Then we thought it was done. 

No.

Next came comedy hour.

She ended the show with a joke (actually a decent rule to follow). 

"Why did the cow do jumping jacks?"


Why?


"Because she wanted a milkshake!"

Rim shot.

After the show, she announced that she would be signing the invites in the hall if people wanted autographs (the red ink on the back of the invitation in the picture above). Who needs an agent?

We finished dinner and a game of Disney Trivial Pursuit, and watched just enough bowl football. All in all it was a good first day. Dinner and a show? And we didn't even have to decide "drive or take the train?" Priceless!

Happy New Year to you all!