Santa Float

 Every year the Firefighters at Station 95 take Santa Claus out to visit the children and collect food for the food bank. This year was no exception. Though we have already sat on Santa's lap many times already, they couldn't resist seeing him again last night and getting a candy cane.

No one cried this year, this is a break in Christmas tradition.

Engine 95 - This is the engine from my station, looking beautiful as always. 

This is how...

Jeff has a snowball fight.
(sorry the video looks a little fuzzy, I shot it from inside the house in front of the screen)

Snow fun

We just keep getting more and more snow. Every time I look outside it is snowing. It is snow right now as I type this. Even more of a reason for me to not go anywhere with a new baby. Mason and Cooper sure are enjoying it though. I don't think Jeff is enjoying is quite as much, having to clear the driveway and all, but having a snow blower does make it a bit more bearable. After snow blowing today, all three went in the back yard to try to build a snowman. The snow wasn't wet enough for that. But they made the best of it anyway.

Mason and Jeff buried Cooper in the snow.

Then they made snow angels.

The finished product of Jeff's snow angel.

Snow!

Snow is not my favorite thing, but it sure is one of Mason and Cooper's favorite things! The odd thing about it though is that their way of playing in the snow is shoveling it. They, epically Mason, get REALLY mad at Jeff if he shovels without them. Mason and Cooper shoveled the driveway while Jeff snow-blowed it this morning. Well, Cooper did until he fell face first into the swell, poor kid. Shiloh and I were still all snugly warm in bed during all this. (Now that's the way to enjoy the snow, from inside the warm house). Once Jeff and Mason came in from doing the driveway, Mason wanted to shovel the back, we promised him that he could do it when he got home from school, so as soon as he was done with his lunch, out he went, shovel in hand.

sNOw

Well the inevitable has happened.

We have snow.

I don't know the exact amount, but I would say we got between 3-4". Mason was so excited this morning when he woke up. Not excited to play in it, but to shovel it. Is that weird?

He couldn't help me shovel the driveway though, because he had preschool this morning, so he asked me to save some snow for him to shovel. I told him I'd save the back patio for him, which he was SO excited about.

While Mason was at preschool, Cooper and I shoveled the driveway, or should I say I shoveled and Cooper whined about being cold and wanting to go in, so he went in. He told me NOT to lock him in. I told him I wouldn't, and had a feeling that I needed to grab a key. So I did and went back out to finish. When I was done I found the door locked, and Cooper screaming inside about the door being locked.

Aww now doesn't that just bring back wonderful memories of Cooper locking me out before?

Yup.

Luckily I had a key.

Will he ever learnOur back yard.

My little man!

Can you see how excited he is about shoveling? I can. He hardy ever smiles in pictures, but he was here because of being able to shovel.

I caught him eating the snow.

Seriously?

We woke up today to find snow on the ground. I am not just talking a scuff of snow. We easily had 4-6 inches. Some places of Spokane didn't get any snow while others got maybe 2 inches. Nope not us!
OK Mother Nature, don't you think you have dumped more than enough snow on poor Spokane for one season? Cant' we just have Spring already? Oh and one more thing, Mother Nature, today is April 13th NOT January 13th. Turn your calendar a couple months forward and bring on the sun shine! Thanks!

More unwelcomed snow

Between last Thursday and Friday, we got close to 28" on snow. From Saturday night to Sunday night we got an additional 6". Yesterday we got about another 1". On the news they said we would not be getting any snow today, but would be having another storm Wednesday and Thursday that is expected to bring an additional 5-8" plus snow on Saturday and Sunday. Hooray! No snow Today! Nope, guess again! It has been snowing since I got up today. Luckily it's just some light flurries, so not much is accumulating, but still. Do we really need any more snow? I think not. OK mother nature you can give good ol' Spokane a break for...um...let's see...maybe a year....or two.

If it weren't for all my family living in Spokane, I would move somewhere where the weather stays above zero in the winter and below ninety degrees in the summer. Thankfully though, Jeff was able to find a snow blower on Craig's list, so at least we (I mean I) am not out there shoveling the snow!

Honestly

Dominoes

Last night Mason was getting REALLY cranky. I'm sure it was because he had been cooped up in the house all day. So we got out our Domino set and I showed him how to make a "Domino reaction". Mason LOVED it. He even played with the dominoes this morning and entertained himself pretty good for over an hour while I went out and dug our driveway out after the plows came by and put two feet of packed snow on the driveway.Setting up his dominoes.
My turn.

Mason got a hold of the camera

26" and counting

The snow began to fall yesterday morning around 9:00 and has not stopped. I have lost count of how many times Jeff and I have shoveled our driveway, but it really doesn't matter because our street is covered by the 26" of snow that has fallen in the last 26 hours or so.

I just took this picture from the middle of our street. You can't tell where our property stops and the street begins.

This is our back yard. The fence at the back of our property is 6 feet tall.

We are due to still get an additional 2-4" today and more snow on Sunday and possibly more on Saturday as well!

After being outside for just a few minutes, Mason and I came inside to enjoy some hot chocolate and a "Pirouette" (which is a Chocolate Fudge rolled wafer). Yummy!