Back to the Frozen Tundra

It's been a while...I'm so bad at blogging...oh well!  Working on it...

As many of you probably know, it is ABSOLUTELY FREEZING here!  There are not even words to describe how cold it is.  It is literally painful.    Just take a gander for yourself:

Yes.  It is THAT cold.  I spent the last few days in the Pacific Northwest and it was a bit of a challenge to muster up the courage to come back.   This year I got a down-filled coat for Christmas that goes almost to my knees, gloves, and winter boots.  BEST CHRISTMAS PRESENTS I HAVE EVER RECEIVED! Who knew that a coat could actually keep you somewhat warm in the cold winters of Wisconsin.  I had no idea until I put that lovely thing on in December.  Last year I was in pain for the first ten minutes of my commute every morning because it was so cold.  Now I just bundle up like an eskimo and waddle over to my car, all fashion sense thrown to the wind.

But on a lighter note, school has been cancelled!  This is the second time this month that I have had two days off of school due to cold weather.  Luckily our school has three flex days built into the school year for cancellations like this.  I have had six days cancelled in the past year!  That's five days more than any snow days I ever had in Utah.  I vaguely remember one day being cancelled when was I was a wee little one at Layton Elementary.  Last year there was a snow day because of a crazy snow storm (yes, the same snow storm that cancelled our flight out for our first Christmas together...no biggie...) and one day due to a "bomb threat" (although we found out later that it was a bomb threat only in the loosest terms, but better safe than sorry).  This year year we've had four days in the past month due to extreme cold temperatures.  We will have to make up one day, so the kids are going to come to school as normal in March on a day that was going to  be a professional development day.  Hopefully there are no more cancellations or they will have to extend the school year out into the summer. And we all know that that will end up being the teachers being there (in somewhat grumpy moods) and only a select few students whose parents forced them to be there (more grumpy moods) and those who can't live without school (keep in mind that these students are a definite minority).

In my time off, I have been able to get A LOT of work done, which has been so nice.  It's helped me to feel a lot more on top of things and feel less stressed.  I've also cleaned, done laundry, written letters, thought about blogging and not doing it, thought about exercising and laughing, baking 104 cookies (note to self: never, ever double the snickerdoodle recipe), eating cookies with milk, reading, and waiting for the mailman to come (it's my favorite time of day--I LOVE getting mail, even if it's just the ads).  However, by far the best thing we've done is this little experiment while in the midst of our cold weather "polar vortex":

Yes, that is boiling water that I threw up in the air, and not a drop of liquid water hit the ground!  It all turned to snow or something light and fluffy and airy!  We're such nerds and as Ty pointed out later, lucky no 3rd degree burns ensued from said experiment!

We like things to be interesting here, and this weather sure keeps us on our toes, especially when we have to sleep with several windows cracked due to our carbon monoxide detector going off last night and the firemen having to come and check our house to make sure we didn't die in our sleep.  Needless to say with temperatures of -16 last night with windchill temperatures reaching -50, our house was a wee bit cold this morning when we woke up.  Always an adventure!  And as a side note, I have seen a lot of tall people in my life, but one of those firemen who came over last night was like Andre the Giant reincarnated!  He was GIGANTIC!  I'm pretty sure my jaw dropped mid-sentence when he walked in.  Ty had to remind me that it's not polite to stare.

So, we have an extra bedroom for anyone who wants to come out and experience this "polar vortex" first hand!  Our last winter here is definitely going to be memorable!