Who needs winter anyway?

Typically, one of my favorite things about living in Kansas is we get to experience 4 completely different seasons. Well ... this year, winter has hardly shown up. We had 2 days of very light snow, that quickly melted. The weather has been uncharacteristically warm, and sunny, and pleasant. By this time of year, I'm normally wearing my pajamas inside out, sleeping with a spoon under my pillow and doing all kind of praying for snow days. Not this year! If our district doesn't use any snow days, the students' last day is May 24th! Can you believe it? That would mean that my summer would actually start before Memorial Day. I don't remember the last time that happened!

Minnie and I've been enjoying many, many trips to the dog park this winter. Today, I rushed home from work so we could get a nice walk in at the park before dark. It was a beautiful day! See for yourself:

65 degrees. At 6:00pm. On February 22nd. I approve.

The sun makes everything look pretty out there.

Can you see the dogs in this one?

She's one happy girl!

A striped sunset through the trees.

I need your help. No more wishing we'd get some snow this winter. Keep crossing your fingers for more days exactly like today!

Did you think I forgot about you?

Clearly, I rarely have/make time for this blog anymore. How in the world did I post something more than just a picture for 365 days in a row my first year here? Some days I can easily post my picture on The View Across Town and other days I'm running around my house with my iPhone taking pictures of things at 11:30pm.

To share a little bit more of what I have been doing ... this post will serve as a way to catch up through photos. Here are some of my 2nd favorites from the first few weeks of 2012 that weren't picked for the other blog. Enjoy!

A visit to Park Place on January 1st for a post-holidays family brunch.

And then a family dinner that night at Molly & Erik's. This little one went around the entire table taking dessert orders (with the short-order cook, Molly, in the kitchen). She did a great job! Her reward was her own bowl of ice cream with a Girl Scout cookie on the side (that she didn't know existed until this night).

The first day back to work was tough, but I did get to go out to lunch with my fabulous teammates! Have you been to Unforked yet? It's awesome!

Playing around with the new iPhone lenses I got for Christmas from Mom. I love this macro shot.

A profile shot of my silly schnoodle.

I love my Instagram app more and more each day. This was a quick shot I took when out walking Minners.

Looking at her Momma!

Staying up too late on a school night. It's always hard to get back in bedtime routine after a break from school.

I like this one because I love to take pictures like this of the sky with beautiful clouds. Here is the same scene ... in a paint by numbers kind of way :)

We FINALLY got a little bit of snow. It didn't last long, not that I'm complaining. It's always very pretty ... but walking a dog in the snow is one of my least favorite parts of winter.

A new "portrait" taken against my favorite piece of art in my condo. Jill says it makes for the perfect photo studio background.

Wearing flip flops. In January. In Kansas. Love it! See? I told you the snow didn't last long.

A perfect day to head to the dog park. We've been close to 10 times this "winter".

Here is a photograph that's very close to the painting 5 pictures up. Such a great day to be outside!

I hope to get back to sharing things on this blog more often. I realize I may have lost many of my regular readers since it's been a while. Keep coming back ... you never know what I'll post next!

It started again

I took Minnie out this morning & was thinking to myself that it was nice to see that most the snow had melted in my development. There were still the original piles from the snow plows from the Christmas Eve storm, but we could see most of the grass, which was nice.

Then, I went inside for a few hours and when I left again ... snow. Lots of it. I know most of the country has snow, too, but I'm worried about the fact that I may never want to see snow again. Not this week. Not next month. Next Winter? Probably not.

I did get out to see friends for Valentine's brunch before the snow really covered the roads. I'm thankful I have another day off from school tomorrow, because that lets me get some things done before I have to face the snow.

I hope everyone is driving safe, if they really need to be out on the roads! If you can, bundle up ... stay warm, INSIDE ... and curl up to watch some Olympics! I know I am!

Winter Break Review

I was feeling bad that I hadn't posted in a while, but I didn't really know how to sum up what had been going on since the beginning of my Winter Break. So ... here it is in pictures. I have a few more days of break, so any additional pictures, you'll just have to check out my photo blog. I've decided to continue with it for year two. I really enjoyed doing that blog since it was simple & quick. I also felt that it was a great way to work on my photography skills. My goal for this year is to save up enough money (ha!) to treat myself to a fancy digital SLR camera.

Here we go!

Part of my Christmas decor. I love the way my condo looks with all my decorations up. Last year I took it all down by January 7th. I'm hoping to put it all away by the time I go back to work next week.

This pic pretty much sums up Christmas morning. Ellen wanting to get her hands on all the presents & Minnie looking flustered and running around.

The cute moss terrarium that Molly & I made for Mom and Ann. They were doing so well the first week and now they seem to have some yucky mold growing in them. I will read into some quick fixes ... but the best fix may just be starting over from scratch. They are so darn cute, I hate to see them do poorly.

I came home on Christmas night to find this lovely leak in my living room. After FREAKING out & using my fancy ear-to-wall detective skills, I realized that it was snow/roof related ... not pipes/bathroom related. It continued to drip pretty steadily for 4 days. Now it has stopped, but the plaster on the ceiling fell off & the ceiling is stained much more than what this picture shows. The HOA workmen say they'll be out in a few weeks to fix. Hopefully this will, in fact, be covered by my HOA dues!

It snowed ... and snowed .. and snowed ... AND SNOWED! I'm not sure when I've ever seen this much snow in Kansas City! I don't think Minnie has even been alive when there has been this much snow. It's NOT fun walking her in the bitter cold, but at least she'll go out!
The crew at the Wagner's annual Cookie Decorating Party. It was the 20th (or was it the 21st?) year of the party ... so it was 1989-themed. A fun time was had by all ... unfortunately we were missing some due to snow, family & plumbing disasters!

My cookie this year! I normally just do one cookie. I earned the 2nd Runner Up prize with this snow globe. It took me close to an hour ... well worth it!

Look! It's a Snuggie! You can even knit when you are wearing it. Mitz & I were so cold, we both wrapped up in the Snuggie that Adam & Jill got at their family gift exchange.

We spent a lot of our break playing Wii. Big Brain Academy is always good for a laugh! I call this girl on the right, "angry, unicorn, gap-teeth" when I'm trying to remember what the characters look like! :)

Becca & Charlotte playing at the girls' gift exchange. Charlotte is so funny when you put a camera on her. She blinks & smiles right when she sees the flash!

It was so nice to get together for our gift exchange. Thanks to Megan & Emilie for cooking up a wonderful dinner. Love you girls!

The other way that we spent our Christmas break. A rare picture of me that Jilly took. Mitzi realized that she hadn't played Guitar Hero since she moved last March. We missed it ... but I could do without playing Van Halen GH.

Jilly & Adam rocking out to 80's Guitar Hero.

On the 31st, I actually went up to school to work for a few hours. I gave up after 3 hours when I couldn't feel my fingers to type. The temperature was anywhere from 60-64 degrees while we were up there! Brrrr!

Went later that day to play with Ellen. This was the first time I'd seen her have a bath in the big tub & not the kitchen sink. She LOVES to play with her toys & move around constantly (probably to stay warm)! Look at those lashes!

And ... here we are. A new year!

Crossing my fingers!

The snow FINALLY decided to show up tonight! Every teacher I know is crossing her fingers, jumping & and down, wearing her PJs inside out, sleeping with a fork under her pillow and saying the hopeful chants for a snow day tomorrow!

I don't want to get too excited, because last night I stayed up too late (thinking we would have the day off today) and I was dragging ALL day! The snow really is pretty ... I just don't want to have to drive in it and get up early to walk Minnie before work in it.

Okay, enough whining. I'll just leave you with a few nice pictures I took tonight. I hope you are all staying warm!

During & after strange Spring snowstorm

If you are in Kansas City and were here last weekend, then you would know about the giant snow storm that came out of nowhere on Saturday. Well, I watch the weather religiously every morning, so it wasn't really out of nowhere. BUT, it was strange, especially after we've already had some wonderful 60-80 degree weather this Spring!

The rain started on Friday and went right into Saturday morning. Then, about the time I had to start running errands, the heavy sleet started and eventually the heavy snow came. It was a perfect teachable moment for us since we had to do some last-minute prep for our Science Assessment this week. All the precipitation changes allowed me to review the temperature that water (rain) will freeze ... and then melt!

Here are a few pictures I took on Saturday and then on Sunday as everything was melting just about 24 hours later! My favorite made it onto The View Across Town on Saturday ... oh, and Sunday!

During the big snow storm! At this point, I was home for the day. I had driven the kids I was babysitting all over town, and when my car barely made it up their driveway, I knew there would be no more driving for me.

Check out these GIANT snowflakes or snow clusters on my arm!

Love this one. You can really tell how hard it is snowing!

The patio chair. By the time the snow stopped, the amount of snow on top had doubled!

See those giant flakes falling?

The ice that was already on all the branches when the snow started. This is why there were TONS of fallen branches & trees all over the neighborhood.


The day after! Most everything had melted 24 hours later.

I like the colors in this one. Hopefully those pretty leaves weren't too damaged in the ice.

I wish this photo had caught all the ice that was falling off the branches on me as I took this one!

A bit of snow & ice still piled up.

The driveway. I bribed the boys to do some shoveling so we could get out & about that day. I think if I had waited just a few hours, it might have melted on it's own. Shhhh ... don't tell the boys that did 2 hours of shoveling! I helped them for about 20 minutes and my back & shoulders are still sore!

Anyone else get some great pics of the snow?

2 Hour Family Brunch in Photos

Sadly, I was only sitting at one end of the table and didn't get shots of everyone and everything that was going on. Thanks, Aunt Susan, for inviting us all to another FABULOUS brunch at Cafe Sebastienne at the Kemper Art Museum. We always love going there & having a chance to catch up with family!


Giant icicle on the outside of the museum. It was probably 5-6 feet long!

Just one of the many pieces of artwork in the restaurant.

This skylight was completely covered with snow and ice when we got there. Most of it had melted by the time we left two hours later.

Grumpy Ellen, all bundled up to brave the cold. She was NOT happy about her too-small hat! She still looks cute, though!

Happy girl, now that she's out of the car seat.

Kate, at the other end of the table, making funny faces. I started making faces right back at her and she caught me! Then, I got her to smile!

Molls & Ellen. Ellen is wearing a cute, pink curly bow that actually managed part of her Conan O'Brien-like faux-hawk!

Aunt Susan with Lindy. She brought Band-Aids for the kids. It was entertainment for HOURS! Most of us ended up with band-aids all over our hands, arms, and clothes. Lindy was SUPER excited when Susan told her she could take home the band-aids with her!

Laura & Eva. Cute as ever!

Kate, Phillip, Erik & Uncle Phil. I missed my chance to talk to them, as I was at the other end of our table for 15! Talking about KU sports, I'm sure!

Lindy, trying to give Dad a Sponge-Bob band-aid for his head. Too funny!

Someone was pooped & couldn't keep her eyes open for her bottle ... then they stayed open when they should have been closed!

My Cafe Benny: poached eggs on crab cakes, roasted potatoes and lemon Hollandaise. I was dreaming about ordering this last night. It is to die for! I might have eaten too much, because I promptly came home and took a nappy :)

My little shadow when we are at family events: Lindy! We had LOTS of fun playing beauty shop & giving each other "tattoo" band-aids!

Thanks again, Aunt Susan! It was tons of fun! We missed Caroline, Eric & soon-to-be-here baby, Jill & Aurora!