More Snow!

As if 4-5" wasn't exciting for us....we followed that up with 8-9" the next week! This shut almost our whole area down for three days and even Noah got to stay home a little later each morning. I know everyone makes fun of how we get out of school for what northerners see as a little bit of snow....but for a beach area that hardly ever gets snow and has no equipment to deal with it, this a big deal. The kids had a great time playing outside and enjoying the sled and more snow than they have ever seen and I enjoyed some down time at home with them :)

Snow Days!

I realize 4-5" to our northern friends and family members doesn't sound like much...but to people from Virginia Beach it's enough for three days out of school and lots of excitement! I'm pretty sure the kids were more excited about the snow on Tuesday night than they were about Santa coming on Christmas Eve. We got a pretty good amount of snow Tuesday night and ended up with Wednesday and Thursday out of school because of super icy roads and really low temperatures. We were up, dressed, fed, and outside by 7:30am on Wednesday morning because of all the anticipation. We ended up playing outside 3 separate times with movies and hot chocolate in between to warm up. 

Thursday morning we slept a little later and then I sent the kids out to play (where I could easily see them) while I kept warm and got some work done. 

**Side note - I know a lot of people think teachers are lazy and get off easy when we have bad weather days, but we still have work to do and it is much harder to get it done at home! We will have to make this time up and all of the things that I needed to get done by Monday for the end of the semester still have to get done from home!!

The kids ended up playing outside for almost 2 hours before I finally made them come in for lunch. In the afternoon we went to see the new movie "The Nut Job" to get out of the house for a little while. Today (Friday) we are home again. It was already scheduled to be a teacher work day so the kids did not have school and they decided to offer teachers the incentive to work from home. They have done this in the past to help with morale. I think they planned on offering it anyway but since the roads are still icy in a lot of places it was nice for teachers to have the choice to go in or not. 

They are calling for more snow tomorrow and next week so we'll see how it plays out. For now we are enjoying our lazy mornings and playing in the snow that can't melt since it can't seem to get out of the 20s around here.

2014 New Year's Resolutions

I love the start of a new year and making resolutions. I make big ones and little ones. I give some things up and I make goals to either do new things or do something better. I'm pretty good at sticking with them for most of the year if not longer. This year I had a much harder time coming up with my goals. Here's what we have for now - I say for now because I think you should always be updating and changing your goals, not just at the start of a new year!

• No soda and no candy - okay I know this one may seem a little silly but I'm not good at the "in moderation" concept so I have to give things up completely when I want to cut back on them.
• More quality time with the kids - they need our attention more and frequently our attention goes to work, school, chores, dinner, etc...when the kids are awake we focus on them as much as possible!
• Planning further in advance at work - I have gotten so comfortable so I don't always have my plans done as far in advance as I should making my days a little more stressful than they need to be. This is one way to make my life a little easier :)
• Finish cleaning out the rest of the closets, cabinets, drawers, and the attic....we have been doing some major purging around here and it needs to continue until we've been through everything.
• Get back to the gym/running - I haven't been too hard on myself on this one because of trying to finish up classes and save money, but this is something I need to do for myself and that's important too.
• Focus on our relationship with each other - Noah working nights has been challenging for us but we are back on a normal schedule for now and we are working on getting back in sync.

We'll see how we do with these and come up with more as we go. I'd really like to send more holiday cards with pictures of the kids and organize more parts of our lives. I'd like to make monthly goals a part of our family and something we all work on together. I'll keep you posted on our progress! 

What resolutions have you made for 2014???

2013 Year In Review

2013 was certainly a great year for us. While we spent half the year with the challenge of Noah being on night shift, we had a lot of highlights......

Our first family trip to Disney World

Tanner playing Beast, dancing with Princess Belle, and kissing Pocahontas 

 

Izzy's Cinderella makeover and then meeting Cinderella in her castle

Our First Cruise

 

Teacher of the Year

Noah's 30th Birthday

Starting Kindergarten and Preschool

 

10 years together

 

My student becoming a National DECA Officer

• Noah's promotion to supervisor
• Completing residency 
• Passing Ph.D. Comprehensive exams

2014......you have a lot to live up to!!!

Christmas Break

Noah's parents, his cousin, and his grandmother were in town for a long weekend after Christmas. We had a great time hanging out with them and catching up. We love our time with them and the kids always have a blast! On Saturday we went to the Casemate Museum at Ft Monroe in Hampton. It was pretty cool and everyone found something interesting. We played a lot of cards, ate yummy food, watched movies, and went bowling on the rainy Sunday. Overall it was a great visit :)

A Very Merry Christmas

This Christmas was spent at home celebrating with friends and family. We were able to relax and be productive so I felt great at the end of winter break! The only downfall this year was the yucky cold we all managed to pass around....but we fought through it and enjoyed all of our time together!! We built gingerbread houses with Gigi and Auntie, celebrated Christmas day with Grandma, Granddaddy, Aunt Amy, Uncle Ray, Uncle Matt, Rowan, Gigi and Auntie Ann, and then Mimi, Papa and Noah's cousin Gaige came to visit the day after Christmas! We had the best time catching up with everyone and the kids are so lucky to have so many wonderful people in their lives. We got lots of great gifts and Santa was certainly generous this year :)

Very Very Thankful!

Our Thanksgiving found us following our normally traditions once again this year...something I just love. I love that we are giving our children traditions that they will be able to look forward to and share with their children. This year we added some new things as well. We spent Thanksgiving watching the parade and packing up for "the vacation house" also known as the timeshare in Williamsburg. We had Thanksgiving dinner at my parent's house with my brother Matthew and Auntie Ann and then we all jumped in the car and headed to Williamsburg to share the long weekend together and relax. 

We got some Black Friday shopping in, enjoyed the outlets, played lots of card games, did arts and crafts, and visited the Yankee Candle factory store where we saw Santa! We had a great time!!

This Thanksgiving weekend led up to my oral exams for my Ph.D. This was the final part of my comprehensive exams which is the end of the degree and means you are done with course work. Once you complete the exams you are declared a Ph.D. candidate and are allowed to work on your dissertation. Everyone failed the exams in the spring and I struggled through the written so I was just a little stressed out :) The oral exams were very difficult and I had to send in more information but I ended up passing so I am very relieved to have this hurdle behind me!

The kids had a blast and I think we all enjoyed spending time together. We look forward to this weekend every year and I'm sure we will enjoy it for years to come!