Winter's Welcome

One of the very best things about being in the educational field in Michigan: SNOW DAYS!! Granted, these days have to be tacked onto the end of the year, but there's just something wonderful about getting an extra day off for what would have been the last day of school before break. Of course since I'm only a sub, this means no pay for me...but I'm OK with that.

Michigan is getting pelted today. We've already had about 3-4" since 4:00 a.m. and as I look out my window right now, I can see a steady snowfall covering the tracks the dogs have made. Even Eastern closed campus today, which NEVER happens. You can imagine my surprise when I checked my email this morning and saw this message: "Eastern Michigan University is closed today (Friday, Dec. 19) due to the weather." Another weird thing happened today too. We were listening to the weather channel this morning for updates and the local emergency broadcast cut in with a message, "The Ann Arbor area is at a stage yellow winter weather alert level," which was followed by information about the hazardous roads and extra driving time. This is just weird. I've lived in Michigan for over 15 years and not once have I heard such a message. I think the big concern is the ice because it really does complicate things...but still, an emergency alert message for a snow storm??

So of course I had to take a few pictures this morning. Unfortunately I don't have my good camera because I left my battery charger in MD and both my batteries have since died, but my camera phone does OK with enough light.

Winter has certainly made herself welcome, even before she's technically supposed to be here. She's even sitting in our chairs:


The weight of the snow and ice caused our bushes to spread out so you can barely see the path to our front door. Of course this is pre-shoveling.

Even Santa, who normally enjoys a rather sheltered existence under the porch received his fair share of snow with this storm.


And last but not least, the dogs have to be mentioned. Ditto has always liked the snow, she scampers right our into it and begins the work of making tracks through the yard. Sometimes she even sticks her nose into the snow and makes a wuffling sound like she's snorting. It's always funny to me that her normally white-looking coat doesn't quite look white next to the snow.


And then there's Dinah with the short legs and low, low body. She does not enjoy the snow. She stands at the door and gives me an imploring look when I make her go outside. This morning her legs basically disappeared in the snow, which was pretty darn funny, poor dog!

Winding Down

My semester officially ended today, which is a tremendous relief! I'm hoping I ended up with all A's, but there are two classes that are hanging in the balance between A's and B's. More than anything I am happy it's over. This was one very hectic semester and I made it through in one piece. What a nice thought that I don't even have to think about school again until next year!

Christmas is only nine days away! We went and got our tree this past weekend, which was a lot of fun. For once we weren't the ones having a family tiff.

As we were cutting our tree down there was a family walking around near us. They were going back and forth about which tree to get and then the teenage daughter said to the mother, "why are you acting like this," at which point the mother said, "I'm sick of you guys picking on me...no one gives a crap anymore" and then she started crying. Around that time, the father walked over to the pair and said, "will you guys cut it out, this is bullshit!" I felt kind of sorry for them and was happy we weren't experiencing that kind of stress. Our tree is huge this year but with the use of our handy tools, cutting it down was a piece of cake.
On our way out we passed a father and son who had come to the conclusion they had the wrong saw blade. We could tell they were getting frustrated so we offered to let them use our blade. The father was coaching his son all through the process of cutting the tree. He kept calling him "buddy," which was truly adorable." With the right blade, they had their tree cut in about five minutes and all seemed happy.

This is such a busy time of year for us. We have my niece's 2nd birthday on Dec. 20th, a Christmas party on Dec. 21st, Christmas itself, which is also Michael's birthday, our big family Christmas on Dec. 28th, and then our wedding anniversary on Dec. 29th! With all that (and then some) on the to-do list, I can see that next year will be here in no time...bring it on!

Light up the Night

Here are the photos I promised in my previous blog entry of our little home all lit up for Christmas! I woke up at 6:45 this morning to let the dog out. When I saw that the snow was up to her belly I decided to get dressed and go take some photos. It was cold but exhilarating and fun too...and I think the photos were worth it!

And so this is Christmas...

Well...December 13 has come and gone and Christmas is officially underway at our house now. Michael spent a majority of his time yesterday and today lighting up our little house. It looks great and I'll be posting some photos of the finished design when I have some time to take a timed exposure. Besides...we're supposed to get a big snow storm tomorrow night so it will be even prettier then. We've had a good couple of days...it's always a treat for me when it's finally time to get out our Christmas decorations, sort of a pre-Christmas Christmas! This year the wait was not nearly as long as it normally seems since I've been so busy with school. Hard to believe Christmas is only {nearly} ten days away!









































































I had a hard time with the tree this year, cutting it down made me feel really sad. I'm not sure why but my awareness of the tree's sacrifice on behalf of our annual tradition is much greater this year than it normally is. It's not that I don't typically think about what happens to trees at Christmas time because I do but this year was much more difficult for me for some reason. I stood there for a while and seriously thought about not having a tree this year. Now I'm nothing if not a traditionalist and I value our Christmas traditions in particular, so this is saying something. I actually came close to walking away but in the end we said a prayer of thanks and we still cut the tree down. Who knows...maybe my feelings are telling me it's time to make some changes? Maybe in future years we will decide to give up the tradition of a live tree? I guess part of the struggle for me has to do with the fact we are cutting down our own trees now. Sad to say but it's a lot easier to not consider a tree as a living entity--and to justify the desire for the smell of a live tree for Christmas when you don't see its growing place among all the other pines. But all that aside - I have made my peace with our decision and I've spent the better part of my time these past couple of days decorating the tree. Good times.