January

January 2014 in Indiana broke all kinds of records for cold negative temperatures and snowfall. School was cancelled several days. Even Purdue cancelled for 3 days. Universities RARELY cancel class so this was a big deal. Our January was spent like this:

We shoveled a lot of snow.

We got about this much snow every week, and it never melted in between so it's really piling up on our grass.

Dallin and Connor love playing in the snow and we've found that sand toys (shovels, pails, etc) also make great snow toys.

And then sometimes I just give them a spoon and cup from the kitchen. Equally as fun.

 One time after shoveling, Mckay used the snow to cover our big green electric box and cable box in the front yard, and he made a cool sculpture out of it.

Connor was amazed.

It was a snow train!

Mckay wins best Dad of the year award.

We've spent a lot of time indoors and I'm running out of fun activities for the kids. We've done Play-doh a lot. 

I'm not good at selfies so I had Connor take a picture of me and Dallin.

We're working on his photography skills.

 Dallin's picture-taking was a little better.

We've also done a lot of art projects. Sometime they are as structured as using glitter glue and making cards for people. And then sometimes I just let the kids cut up junk mail with "fancy" scrapbook scissors.

Dallin and Connor still manage to get a little exercise while being trapped indoors.

Connor is saying "Come on Tookie." I don't know how he came up with it or why he's calling Dallin "Tookie." Connor is entering a fun stage where he makes up words. We never experienced that with Dallin.

You might also be wondering what Dallin and Connor were carrying in that video. That would be foam insulation tubes for water pipes (which they played with like pool noodles or light sabers). These frigid temperatures (-13 degress F was the coldest in January) are causing our water pipes to freeze. Luckily, the pipes are plastic so they don"t burst, they expand with the ice. But having no hot water (or any water at all) in the winter really stinks. We've been spending a lot of time here in the garage:

Running a space heater on the pipes for a while usually does the trick. And hopefully the foam insulation will help, because waking up to take a shower or make breakfast only to find no water comes out is not fun. It's happened about 10 times now. I'm SO ready for spring.

Other fun thing we've been up to:

 The Denver Broncos made it to the Super Bowl. (Yes, I know this was actually in February.) We don't really watch football, but we're fans of all things from Denver, so we had to show our support.

Conveniently, orange and blue happen to be the only nail polish colors I own...

Connor really didn't want to wear this adult size orange shirt. We made him keep it on for a picture, but it was ripped off seconds later.

Too bad the Broncos didn't win the Super Bowl. There's always next year!

We're hoping February is a warmer month. Even just above freezing would be welcome. I'm working on some Valentine's decorations to brighten things up. I'll let you see them all when I'm done.

Any guesses as to what I'm making?