This crazy weather!

Yesterday was low 50's! Awesome, totally not complaining! Last night it was SUPER windy! This morning was 40's... which is great........except in the next 8 hrs we are supposed to be at -33 degrees with wind chill... that is a HUGE drop in tempeture in such a short amount of time. By 10am they are talking snow to start... this storm moving in has even pushed the schools to let out 2 hours early (due to weather). We are on a weather alert from 9am-9pm! Hopefully it all passes by, but it makes me a little nervous with such drastic changes!

On a good note, if it does snow I can test my new tires out!

Weekend fun.

We had some friends over Friday night, I am helping them plan a trip to Disney in December and it is all pretty new to them. So the kid's had fun with their kiddo's! It was a late night... like 10:30 and the kids didn't even eat dinner till 10pm (I know bad mom-- lol). I did get my new tires on Friday night, so that was a big + in my book (it's the small things that make me happy-lol)!


Saturday was kind of a loaf around the house day... Mason went with me to run a few errands and wash the vehicle (ugh the salt and dirt is horrible!). I took the kids to the library in the afternoon to pick out movies and books... Lauren found some great ones that she can read on her own- really well. (Did I mention that last week we received her testing scores for midyear and she is 4th in the class (out of 20 students)- she scored a 157 out of 183-- very good!)

I made a great dinner that night and Lauren and Paul made dessert-- homemade cookies!

Sunday, we headed to church and the kids to Sunday School... Lauren went with Paul to the grocery store while Mason and I took a nap (I was so tired!). The kids had a fun play day at the house. And from this pic you can see, they really do love each other... actually a few moments before would have been a better pic-- Mason was snuggled up on top of Lauren... it was that snuggling that made me run for my camera!

Last night I went with some girlfriends to Juno! It was a good movie. I had really wanted to see Bucket List, so now I need to get to that one too! I also wanted to see 27 Dresses, but will wait till it comes out on DVD.

Now it is back to school and back to work for the week!

OMG-- the tire story continues.. for the good!

I won't bore you all with the details... but give your the short version, called dealership, not much help, found my tire info in with all my "Stuff" in glove compartment... turns out I have a really good brand of tires, just a base level, which as it turns out most car manufactures put on their vehilces.. they are a high proformance tire but low mileage- at 25 k mileage... they are more of an all season type tire, which is great many months out of the year but not in the winter... and since it is a 25k tire, I have actually gotten a good life out of it since I am at 22k something... so back to the good news the tire manufacture rep can tell I am not happy with the tire and offers me replacement tires same brand different model... and get this they are offer them to me at 75% off... sounded to good to be true... so I ordered the tires online at a the Tire Rack... I got a off/on road tire-- more like a truck tire... so it is will preform awesome in the winter... but it will have possibly more road noise... which I don't drive with my windows down so it won't be an issue... and also a bit more stiff of a ride... but my concern is the winter time... that is the reason I bought an AWD/4x4 SUV... to get around!

I get my new tires on Wed... delivered to my door! Total out of pocket cost will now be $130.78 for all 4 tires! I didn't even have to pay tax on it! The cheapest I found them before was $540 and it ranged up to $687.... so to say the least I am thrilled! That I got a deal... not that they had to be replaced. Had I found my paperwork a few months ago it would have been free replacement, but the same exact tire... I like this much better! Well worth the $130!

Oh and stunned

Is anyone else completely stunned by the death of Heath Ledger? Not sure why I am so interested or compelled to hear about what happened, I am just so shocked!

Cold is COLD!

Me: "It's gonna be a cold one today, bundle up, I will pick you up at the bus stop this afternoon."
L: "How cold is cold?"
Me: "It is really cold, right now it is 5 degrees, means everything is frozen like the freeze food"
L: "Above or below?"
Me: lol! How does she know that!?!
Me: "It is 5 degrees above zero, but the wind chill makes it -13degrees, so it is really col, dangerously cold"
L: "Oh great (sarcastic- where does she get that??!) means we don't get to go outside for recess today."
Me:"Yep, it is that cold!"

Atleast they have school today, no delays, no cancellation... we have a windchill advisory till tomorrow at noon. We are supposed to get another inch or two (it is lightly snowing right now) by night, but the temps are set to drop and the wind is set to pick up, so my guess we will have a delay tomorrow... which means Mason will not have preschool again! (ticked!) It amazes me that in the country of America we can have such drastic weather differences... how can it be 70 (LYNN!!!!) in FL, and -13 here in IA! That is insane! When we left for Disney last month we left in an ice storm with temps below 0, and landed where it was 68 at night! lol! Hard to fathom!

Ahhhh... the snow did stop-- this morning!

It did finally stop sometime early this morning... I know it was done at 5:33am because I was woke up to the phone ringing, and while grabbing the phone I peaked out my bedroom window... oh the phone call-- it was my Mom telling me school is cancelled! Oh joy (drip, drip, that is scarism you hear)! So I snuggle in bed a few minutes more and since I can't fall back to sleep and would have been getting up at 6:10 anyways I get up... DH takes Lauren to my Mom's... and I took M to daycare where he will not have preschool, but can still be with his friends!

Oh and it is supposed to start snowing again later today with another few inches by tomorrow! Yippee! Did I mention it can stop now?!

Pictures as promised!

Here are some pics from skating... a little blurry-- I think my camera got switched to manual and since they were "action" shots didn't turn out so great...

The pose, before hitting the rink!

Out on the rink... doing it herself! Yeah!

A few rounds with Mom!

A good time was sure had... it still makes me smile to think about it! I am so glad we tried it!

A little vent...

I must vent for a moment, now that I have a free moment.

My SUV will be 2 yrs old in May, and I have 22,000 miles on it now... this is not the vent... here it comes... I need new tires already! WTH? A few oil changes ago they mentioned it... and a few weeks ago, I got stuck in a drift in the driveway (yes the driveway, it was deep) and DH was cursing the tires at the moment! So I thought today with a few moments free to call around... not only do I need new tires... they cost a pretty penny... the range is anywhere from $540 to $687-- holy moly! Why so pricey? As it turns out the "luxury" model that I have a bigger and wider tire (this happened to me two vehicles ago with my Pontiac, it had special low profile tires). And they have to order them in... so I bit the bullet and had them ordered. I did talk to the dealership today for a quote ($687, can you believe that, they don't even stock them)-- but after discussing with DH he said I need to call them and find out why the tires I have were only able to get 20,000 miles-- they should have been 50.000 miles... is there something that is causing it-- as I do get my tires rotated every other oil change! And I take good care of them.

Needless to say next week I will have new tires on... and possibly will get some resolution from dealership.

OH and I am totally jealous-- my mom is in the market for a new vehicle and she is looking at the new Enclave! LOVE THEM! They came out after I bought my vehicle-- but I seriously would love to trade my in on one, or an Acadia! Both sharpe! Maybe next year... although DH is getting a new truck this fall so my guess is probably one more year before a new vehicle for me... that and my SUV will still be under warrantee till 2011-- but I won't have it that long... I shouldn't be counting the days on my SUV I do love it and it has been nothing but great aside from the tires! I just love those new Buicks! Oh well my Mom will get one and I usually drive when we go someplace anyways so I will get to drive it from time to time! That will hold me over... plus they are new models and they always say never buy a new model in the first few years of production!

Ok vent officially over! And pocketbook officially ticked! Gosh I could have spent that $540 a totally more fun way!

Let it snow, Let it snow, Let it STOP!

What a great day to be off work and out of school-- I didn't even know snow was forecasted, so when Mr. Mason came into my room this morning bight and early at 7:07am, I thought hmmm it is so foggy out... got up to get some breakfast on the table and sit by the fireplace to warm up, and I noticed, not fog, just a fine snow (this looking out the back with no way to gauge how much snow jsut fell, ontop of all the other snow we have). Wander over to the front door and look out, crap there is like 3 inches. We eat some breakfast and pull on THE GEAR to head out into the tundra! I snowblowed, the kids grabbed the sleds for a bit and then Mason grabbed his shovle. Since we are all budled up I thought good time to run to the grocery store, the post office (at a drug store, not the real post office, they are accepting mail, just no pick up today), and to Micheal's to look for some faux dried flowers (of which i found none, but did fine a prelite xmas tree). Anywho, the newly falling snow really put my SUV to work... it was slick out in spots and deep in spots (drifting-- we also have lovely high winds and low temps- great combo). Head back home a whopping hour later, to have to snowblow the drive off again... in we go, un-bundle, into the dryer with it all, head down stairs to put away the last of the holdiay/winter decor and get the home back to normal, as well as clean up the storage room in which I had been just adding things to throughout the winter... (oh we also had a bite to eat in there for lunch, I didn't let the kids starve-- they wouldn't let me, they literally have hollow legs I swear) so now it is 3pm and another 3 inches has fallen so I just went and cleared driveway again for teh last time as DH is on his way home from work (City employee working in MLK day? strange I know!) and he can take over from here. So in totally I think we have about 8inches so far since sometime early morning till now, and it is STILL snowing! So to that I say "STOP". I love snow, I love the way it looks and covers all the ugly ground of winter... but enough!!! Either that or let the wind and wind chills go away so we can atleast enjoy it and be outside for longer than 30 minutes.

Wipeout!

No we didn't really wipeout, but for any of you who went roller skating as a child/teen will remember the song "Wipeout" and the wistle-blowing squat/stand-up routine! Lauren did so well she was even trying it! Thankfully I didn't fall, not even once-- which was my big(only) concern. Lauren did great for her first time skating... it took the first half-hour to get comfortable on her skates to the point that she didn't fall... she was a trooper, not a wimper not a wine, not a break... she just kept on trying! After the first half hour she stayed up a little wobbly, but she held onto me and did great... she did get a few laps in on her own without falling, and even dared to do the backward skate - with me holding her hands... I even did a backwards skate and totally impressed Lauren (and myself). It was quite the workout... and tomorrow my back muscle are totally going to ache... it was a workout for them to be holding onto Lauren and keeping her up at times.



All in all it was so much fun... we have monthly all-school skates and we will totally be hitting the one in Feb!



I didn't take Mason, Paul was called into work... and I knew I could take to new skaters with me and me on skates for the first time in 10-15 years! I would like to take him sometime, but I need to get Lauren skating on her own before the attempt!

I will post some pics tomorrow, ahhh it brings such a smile to my face to think about the night... what a blast!

LOL... google finds the funniest things!

I wanted to google the name of this blog to see what would come up (I am a nervous Nelly about what info really gets out to the public) but I forgot the "my" before my email addy, so it brought up a link to my old blog with my addy in it, and not all the posts, just a really old one-- and not the first one (a bit strange) but it was from 2005 and it was me rambling how I joined Cur ves and needed to loose 14.5 pounds! lol! I so remember it... what is funny to me is that I was chatting about L and M--- L would be the age M is now... wow what a difference 3 yrs makes! She is so grown up. I really noticed it tonight b/c of several things; I was dusting off the tv which houses some pics that haven't been updated over the years... one was of L when she was 2.5 yrs old... she looks like L but with baby fat and so young! Hard to imagine her like that... and the other thing was she was reading me a book, which she does daily/nightly, but I noticed tonight it was not an easy reader... and she was doing awesome, she really can READ.

Need a little luck!

Wish me luck this weekend... we are going to try roller skating with the kiddo's! I need to bring along a few extra blankets for cushion on the ole' rear I think!

Our church is having a family skate party on Sunday night... the kids have never been and Paul and I haven't been in 15+ yrs... although he thinks he still is going to have the skills with the two-step, backwards skate, and 4 corners! We will see who is still standing, and my guess is it won't be the two of us!

The weather is up to it's old tricks again too... yesterday Mother Earth dropped 4 inches of the white stuff... doesn't sound back, except it was super slick under the snow, and it is well below 0 out and so windy- the kids were set to have winter fun day at school, but it has been cancelled because winter is to cold right now!

This weekend I am taking down the last of the holiday decor-- all that is left is down stairs, which we haven't been hanging out much... but I promise to get my lazy butt to pack it all up. My other goals for the weekend are to figure out something for above my 1 cabinet in the kitchen, it just isn't working for me, and if my DH will go for it I would like to paint a wall in my DR the same red as our entry... he hasn't been to gung-ho about my idea, but I am hoping to catch him at a good moment or a I-don't-care moment! It will take all of like and hour to paint! So it isn't much of a project, so small I could wait till the kiddo's are asleep and do it and surprise them! (I know great surprise right! Just what they have always wanted I am sure!)

I am in a rut with my house... I want to paint and rearrange the whole thing! I get bored way too easily! But I am running out of ideas!;(

Well I am off to a great start with this first day of this blog... 2 posts in 1 day... I am sure I will not keep up the momentum, but I hope to get atleast once a week!

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