Snow Envy - Can it be?

This post is in honor of my friends on the West Side of the state!  This has been an interesting winter for us here in Spokane.  For most of this winter season so far, we have not had very much snow.  We are talking a dusting here and there, and no White Christmas.  Hard to believe that as it seems we have had a white Christmas every year that we have been in Spokane.

Earlier this week, the weather man was predicting snow, but each morning we would wake up with nothing.  Oddly enough my friends on the west side were getting pummeled with the white stuff.  Friends and family were posting their snow pictures, commenting that they were stuck at work, all school districts had cancelled, Alaska Airlines was even cancelling flights... And then it happened - Blizzard in Spokane! 

I am strangely happy that it has finally blanketed our town with snow.  I have even helped with the shovelling a little, even though I am not as efficient as Justin, I felt that the effort was what matters.  We have about 8 inches of snow here and school is cancelled, therefore creating a work at home day for me.  Great to get some of my bigger projects for work complete when I can concentrate without the hubub and distraction of my office. 

I think the reason that I like the snow this year is it didn't arrive at Thanksgiving!  I guess I like to ease into the winter white.  Well we have eased this year!  Caden was out playing in the snow in the backyard today.  When he came in, he had a pitcher of snow.  I asked him what he would be doing with that and he let me know he would like to take it to his room.  I explained that it would melt and he couldn't do that.  It took some convincing, but he finally left it outside.  How fun to see the imagination of an almost five year old and the snow!

So as I write this, the snow plow has just created a huge berm at the end of our driveway, and I need to get it relocated.  Not complaining, because winter has arrived!

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Our tree is decorated!

Our tree is officially decorated!  Our lights didn't work this year so we got new LED lights which are very bright and vibrant.  We had fun getting the tree at greendbluff again.  Thankfully it wasn't snowy when we were up there and we didn't have to bring a sled.

I always like to see what ornaments we put on the tree.  Justin's ornament's are still in the original packaging from each year that he got the ornament.  Mine are wrapped in tissue paper and caden's are too.  Everyone's are separated and we pick which ones we like and add them to the tree.  It makes our tree look different every year. 

This weekend I made christmas cookies with my mom.  It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas....  Well, it has for a while actually.  :)

Merry Christmas!

Last weekend we got out the christmas decorations.  After Justin and I got married, I started collecting nutcrackers at Christmas time.  It seems like each year I have bought one or two.  This year I let Caden pick one to buy.  He picked the one in the red on the right. 

He also added a different hat and was walking around the house with it.  I let him know that they were for decoration.  It sure made me know how Clara felt in the nutcracker when her brother broke her nutcracker prince.  :)  I think we dodged a bullet on our nutcrackers breaking, but it sure was funny to see him play with the nutcracker.

I also bought some santa's last year, so they are mixed in with the nutcrackers.  :)

What's new with us?

 I love Black Friday!  No joke!  I love to find the deals and I love to see what I can find!  I was able to get pretty much all of my Christmas shopping done this year which is good since it seems I have no extra time!  I did two major shopping trips this year.  One in the middle of the night and a second one (with Caden) at 9am.  We didn't score the $150 tablet like my sister did, but we did pretty well.  We also just made a cyber monday purchase on Sunday night, so we are getting deals all over the place.

One thing I have noticed this year is it seems everyone wants to get in the Christmas spirit early.  I see a lot more people decorating this year, and the lights are going up on a lot of houses.  Even our neighbor Griffin put up Christmas lights.  We got our tree this weekend and it is a very fat tree.  It is taking up about 1/3 of our family room.  I am sure I will post a picture soon, but it is a funny fat tree.  We decorated our house for Christmas today.  We got out the decorations and went to town.  Caden was so excited and running around the house "helping."  The other thing we were able to do was fix some decorations.  We bought stocking hangers 2 years ago that you can put pictures in.  Well, they still say photo here... so we added our photos this year. 

Tomorrow night is our office Christmas dinner.  It is not even December yet!  I guess that is one of the many reasons why christmas is moving quick this year, we are doing things earlier this year. 

We also have not gotten hit with the snow yet.  Last year at the end of November we had a ton of snow!  Not this year!  So far, minimal snow, and none has stayed!  I am sure I will pay for that, but excited for now!

Caden helped me wrap some of the presents on Saturday night.  As soon as we finished he asked if Dad could open his presents in the morning.  I told him he would have to wait until Christmas.  He asked me to show him on the calendar when that would be.  You know it's a long ways away when you have to turn the page...

Trick or Treating with the boys!

We had a festive group to go trick or treating this year.  We invited our neighbors over and a friend that I work with who has 2 boys.  Keegan was a monster, Gavin was a monkey, Caden was a cowboy and Bruce was a chicken.  Bruce had light up shoes on, so when he walked, his chicken feet lit up.  It was pretty funny.  All four boys hit up the neighborhood for treats.  Justin was the only guy with us moms, and our neighbor's sister was visiting too.  My friend let justin know his costume could be the guy from sister wives as everyone we walk by keeps commenting how cute his boys are.  So funny! 

We only had a few tricks, including a kid walking around pretending to be a zombie, and  house that was handing out air fresheners and construction paper.  That house also had a karaoke machine and they were chanting Halloween sayings out their door.  It was a pretty funny scene, but I guess you had to be there.  

Caden's bucket broke, so he ended up using a grocery sack.  It worked out well for him, he got a ton of candy.  We filled up his batman lunch box and now every night when he eats a good dinner, he can pick a treat from the batman box.  Looks like he will have enough candy to last through Christmas!

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween to all!  I didn't get my costume totally organized, so I am a festive mom!  Caden is a cowboy.  Justin got to be a scary guy! 

He actually wore the mask for a while, but when we went to the first house, he scared the people.  He apologized and realized it would be better if he wore the mask on top of his head.