snow/sick days are sometimes the good ones

Look at me! Writing again after just a few days. It's all these fun snowy pictures that happened the other day, and I just had to show you. We had a snow/sick Tuesday this week and hooked up our old VCR (horrid eye sore that it is) so we could watch Lion King and Jungle Book and all those special warm feelings classics. As Paisley listened in awe to her first "AAAHHHSAVENYAA," Brian and I cried confused tears of happiness/sadness as Rafikki held up baby Simba, and we reveled in the strange sensation of showing her such a favorite childhood film while not being children anymore ourselves and ALL THE FEELINGS.

Ok I was the only one who cried those tears. Brian just looked at me, a startled look on his face.

And then Paisley only lasted about 3 more minutes into the movie before she went on to play with her opposites puzzle but ALL THAT ASIDE.

It was magical.

As the day went on and I looked at the piles of snow climbing outside our windows I thought to myself, "If I was a REALLY good mom I would take my daughter outside to play in what will likely be the last large snow fall of the year."

PLEASE GOD LET IT BE THE LAST BIG SNOW FALL OF THE YEAR.

So we ventured out into the snowy mounds even though I couldn't find my snow pants and Paisley had the time of her life while I watched and took pictures and the hubs shoveled the driveway, despite feeling sick. Brave, strong fellow that he is.

MY NAME IS PAISLEY AND I LOVE SNOW

is the caption for the last picture.

In case you were unsure.

Instagram Dump - Take 6

I'm posting a bunch of Instagram pics today, some dating all the way to last spring! Ah, spring, when will you grace us with your warmer days and soggy grass? Oh, it's silly of me to wish for spring when it's barely the end of January. Although we HAVE been having some spring-like weather around these parts as of late, as far as Minnesota goes in the least. After several weeks of negative temperatures, our recent days in the twenties and the thirties have been giving people a spring in their step! The other day I saw someone in a winter jacket and shorts which, well, is just about the most Minnesota-ey a person can get in my opinion.

In other news, Brian has been practicing his Scottish accent while reading Frog and Toad to Paisley, which she thinks it the funniest thing ever to happen in her short life, which pleases him immensely and boosts his comedic confidence to the greatest of heights, as you might imagine.

Also, when Paisley walked by me today in the living room she said. "Imma be back."

Hashtag thuglyfe.

And so. Here are a few snippets of our life from the past several, several, several months. Spring to winter, old house to new house, Columbia Heights kitchen tile to Cloquet kitchen tile, and so forth!

Season's Greetings!

It's that best time of the year again, isn't it? The season of appetizers, stockings, twinkling lights, vast arrays of cookies, listening to Tran Siberian orchestra on repeat for an entire month, laying around on the couch for days at a time with your family members the weekend after Christmas. The tree at our house fell down a total of three times, two of the times were on top of our own dear Paisley. Luckily she was never hurt, and would only shout in surprise from underneath the tree, "OH NO! Christmas tree fall down AGAIN!!!"

Our Christmas has been lovely. We've been spending time with family, playing new games, eating too much food, watching It's a Wonderful Life, and fighting over who gets to snuggle with my mom's new kitten.

And so here we are, Merry Christmas from us! Here's a few pictures of our festivities. If you were wondering where Paisley got her extremely adorable Christmas outfit, my own dear mother made it. Including the little black velvet jacket!



And here's the Christmas post from last year! Fuzzy memories, and the like.

Thanksgiving with the Pointses

In my true, regular, Liz Points fashion I am just now posting our Thanksgiving pictures. Since Christmas is a week away. Being timely is my extremely large talent! It was a very special Thanksgiving this year, as Brian's brother and his wife and family were on leave from Japan. We hadn't seen them in two years!!! And Paisley got to meet her one year old cousin, Cally, which was amazing and adorable. She calls her CAH-EEE, and still asks about her every day.

We of course had to get some snow pictures, since those are the best types. The brothers took turns tossing their children in the air, and Grandpa made multiple trips up and down the driveway with the sled.

If you are getting a little bit of a deja vu feeling, it's because there were Thanksgiving with the Pointses snow pictures last year too! Which I also posted several weeks after the fact in true, regular, Liz Points fashion.

And here's all of us! It's a framer.

my christmas candles are still locked up tight

And so winter has arrived, with much to do. Six inches of it! Paisley was absolutely thrilled, a little more thrilled than myself, but that's usually what being a toddler is all about. Being thrilled about things that create work for your parents. And while the plus side of our new place is that there is about 60% less snow for us to shovel than our last place (or should I say, for the hubs to shovel), the downside is that we only have a small, old, one car garage with no garage door opener and a tiny driveway on a horrible slope that makes it hard to dig our two cars out of and get them out of the driveway without a good push.

And despite it all, despite the slippery roads and the necessity to give yourself twice as much travel time to your snowy destination, despite the mitten-less fingers that freeze as you scrape windows and buckle seat buckles, I'm not feeling quite as put out about it as I usually am. Instead I'm feeling a little bit...cozy? Dare I say...even a little bit Christmas-y? I am typically one to give an absolute strong "NO" to any type of Christmas ANYTHING before Thanksgiving is over, but this year I'm having a hard time not turning on the Christmas music. I'm trying to find the strength to turn on my chai tea Scentsy instead of pulling out my Christmas tree candles. After playing out in the snow yesterday we came in and started our fireplace and made hot chocolate and cuddled in blankets on the couch, and I was wishing that we had our stockings hung from the mantel with care. Christmas cookies, I want to eat all of you. What's happening to me? What is this place?

Here's Paisley's expression when the snow first started falling on Monday. Maybe it's the pure joy and glee of my child that makes me a little less of a snow grinch this year?

Well all I can say is that hopefully these cozy feelings last, because I'll bet my bottom dollar that we won't be seeing anything but white on the ground until April.

Here's a story.

Look! I managed to cut all of the snow out of this photo. We can pretend spring is here, even though there's another snow storm scheduled for tomorrow and Friday.

Whatever, I'm over it. Do what you want, Mother Nature!! You're dead to me.

Just kidding! Love you so much, you're sweet, send more spring pleeeeaaaaseee

So guess what. On Saturday I lost a pizza. A huge take-n-bake supreme pizza from Aldi. Huge! Delicious. And it was sad, sad! 

Here's how it went. The toddler and I were headed to Aldi for some canned tomatoes, and I spotted some hip looking teenagers walking out with one of those awesome looking pizzas. "What a great idea for lunch, Paisley!" I said, clearly influenced by their carefree pizza plans. I mean, I probably said that, as I was wrestling her stiff toddler legs into the cart.

A few minutes later we made our way back to the parking lot with a can of diced tomatoes and a huge pizza, which I put on top of the car so I could strap Paisley into her car seat. 

I thought to myself, "Don't forget the pizza on the top of your car."

"OK self!" I chuckled.

Then we drove home.

As I pulled into the garage a couple minutes later I realized that the pizza was not in my front seat, and that I had indeed forgotten it on top of my car mere seconds after reminding myself not to.

And I sat there in disbelief.

Then I got out and looked on top of the car. There was no pizza there.

"Mama?" Paisley called from the back seat.

I didn't answer her as I realized what had happened, and as I asked myself the question: am I the type of person who will drive up and down the streets looking for a lost pizza, or am I the kind to slink silently into my house and never breathe a word of this event to anyone?

Obviously I decided that I was the first type of person, and announced to Paisley that we were going to keep driving for a little bit. Luckily she was fine with that. Not that she had any say in the matter. Pizza is pizza! So we started slowly retracing our ride home from Aldi. Luckily we had taken the back roads and not the highway. I tensely scanned the road, longing for delicious melted cheese and raised crust to stuff in my mouth. 

And then, I saw the box! Quickly I pulled over and leaped out of the car, only to realize something was dreadfully wrong. The cardboard box was indeed there in the middle of the street, but the pizza, which had been wrapped in plastic, was gone.

Gone!

"Wait, what?" I mumbled to myself. Maybe it had flown out of the box into some unsuspecting yard. I drove up and down the street a couple of times, searching with pleading eyes, but it was to no avail.

Someone had come across a pizza in the middle of the street and they had asked themselves the question: am I the type of person who will take a random supreme pizza out of it's box from the road and feed it to my family? 

And obviously the answer to that question was a quick yes. I say quick because it couldn't have been more than two minutes that that pizza sat there. We live very close to Aldi. 

Not that I can blame them. Those pizza snatchers. That was a good pizza.

I'M ASSUMING.

Obviously after my forgetfulness I did NOT deserve to go back to Aldi and spend ANOTHER six dollars on a huge supreme delicious cheesy pizza. And so we drove home as I swallowed the lump in my throat, reminding myself that it was ridiculous to almost cry at the thought of having the leftover casserole in our fridge for lunch. After all, the hubs didn't even know my brilliant Aldi-pizza-for-lunch plan and so he would never know the difference if I just handed him some re-heated hot dish without a word on the subject.

But, as I'm an over-sharer in every sense of the word, I disclosed every single detail of the entire fiasco to him when the baby girl and I got home. 

As I just did in this post.

He looked a little disappointed. 

BUT he ate the hot dish without complaint like the good, kind husband that he is.

What a champ.

The end!

Maybe if I just pretend spring is here it will really happen?

These pictures are from a few days ago, when I decided to take Paisley out on a walk. The sun had been out all week and snow piles everywhere were melting away! Our alley behind our house was no longer a terrifying snow fortress. The week had been a busy one and we hadn't gotten outside much but I kept reminding myself that FRIDAY I had off, and we could go on the LONGEST of walks that we wanted!

Imagine our luck when Friday rolled around and the sun was hidden away, the wind was out, and the temperature had sank back down to below freezing. Frown face.

"No matter!" I declared determinedly. We would still go on our walk.

And go on a walk we did. It included slipping through mud, getting the stroller stuck on ice ruts, trudging through knee deep snow to get to the swings at the park, getting slush and snow and ice in my rain boots (my snow boots clearly would have been the better option), swinging, loosing Paisley's boots numerous times along the way (toddler boots!! come on!!!), trying to keep the little girl from eating the dark mud splashed onto her mittens, and snapping a few pics along the way.

I guess I tried to force things a little bit. But we still had a good time! Paisley maybe a little bit more so than her mother, who's feet were frozen in slush but who's upper body was sweating from carrying a 22 pound kid through knee deep snow.

And of course, as we stumbled back into the house and started stripping off our wet clothes, I saw the sun starting to peak out from behind the clouds.

"Just our luck, Paisley!" I cried.

"Cookie!" she said.

Today it's snowing again. Frown face! Spring come quick!

Snow dayz

Last week we had a couple gorgeous, warm, spring-like days. And by gorgeous, warm and spring-like I mean above 32 degrees Fahrenheit. So the little girl and I put on our boots and snow pants and hats and mittens and coats, and the hubs put on a baseball cap and tennis shoes, and we all headed outside to enjoy the fresh, hopeful air.

It was wonderful.

Then the next day we got like ten more inches of snow and this week we are in the midst of another polar vortex of below zero days so...it's exciting. And by exciting I mean BLAAAAAAHHHH. The people on the radio this morning said that this is the coldest winter we've had in thirty years WHICH MEANS that this is the coldest winter of my lifetime.

That's crazy stuff, man. That's big, and I should be like WOAH, history.

But instead I'm just doing my very best to ignore that it's happening.

Instagram Dump - Take 5

It's been so long since I've shared my instagram photos here that we have pictures from before the snow fell this past fall. Who can remember such a time? Surely not me. But these pictures give me evidence  that life does exist beyond the six feet piles of snow that surround my driveway and make trying to pull out into the street a somewhat stress inducing experience.