All in all we ended up with about 10 inches or so, I would guess. This morning, we got another 3 or 4 inches. It is very beautiful. I do not mind it much, but I AM counting the days til spring. This place is so beautiful in the spring and summer. I cannot wait!

We have real grass here! I cannot wait to be able to run around in the yard with no shoes on!!
The grass in FL is prickly and hard and WEIRD. Won't miss that!!

Missing my brother today. He has chosen to remove himself from our lives and we do not really know why. It is a bummer.. today is his birthday. Happy Birthday Bro.. I miss you...

It snowed a little bit today. ;)

That would be M using her sled as a shovel. That child was determined to build a fort. I need to find one of those block igloo maker things so we can make a REAL fort the next time we get a good snow. *sigh* I love her. :)

Where do I begin? Ugh.

These are the stairs leading down to where we park. Or, leading from where we park up to the house. :P

In this photo, you can see the rock wall in major disarray, the gutter hanging off of the back of the house, the un-tilled garden mess to the left there. A few things that you cannot see, are the toppled-over grape arbor which causes me GREAT distress. I do NOT want to lose that thing. The stairs are crumbling and need massive repair. The windows need replacing...

The yard needs LOTS of work. I think we are just going to clear it all out, turn up the dirt, and leave it til fall, then I will plant some bulbs and leave it be. The house itself needs a good power wash. Too bad that whore sold our pressure washer. Grr.

I am not sure HOW the grape arbor is going to get fixed. It is not something that T and I can handle.. we have NO idea what we are doing. The garden just needs to be tilled and raked over, we can burn all of the crap in there. I guess I need to do some gardening research because I have no idea when to plant what. LOL.

Of course, we do not have a tiller, so that should be interesting.

The sheds down back need to go as well. One is about to fall down, the other is in ok condition, but will look odd as heck once the other one is torn down. (can you say BONFIRES?)

I am starting to feel overwhelmed. T says he will help with all of this stuff, but really? I do not see it happening. *sigh*

p.s. Notice that a few windows are open? LOL. It was 45 degrees that day. We were having a heat wave! :)

These are some of our neighbors. They are a quiet bunch. Thankfully, we do not ever see them. *grin*

This cemetery is very old, mostly Civil War era, although it is peppered with souls departed from later dates. What always struck me as odd about this place, is it's... haphazardness. There is no rhyme or reason to the plots and to the layout of the place.

I can see how it has sunken in spots over the years. The hill on one side is far more drastic now than it was when I was 8. And on the back end by the river, well, there are several missing graves from the flooding and the embankment giving way. I will have to go take some photos of the grave stones along the edge where I am pretty sure the occupants no longer rest in peace.

It was a creepy place to me as a child, not so much now. I often wonder about all of those people. Who were they? Where did they live? Were they happy? What did they look like? Although some of the graves have photos on them of the departed and THAT is creepy.. even though I often wonder these things.. More photos to come, when it is not buried under a foot of snow.

That is an icicle that is hanging off of the front porch roof. It goes all the way to the ground. I am starting to get concerned because it is causing the gutter a lot of stress. We tried to break it, whacking at it with random stuff before it got this big, and we could not make even the slightest dent in it. I am thinking of running a garden hose from the bathroom sink, out through the window to the roof, and just let the hot water flow. LOL. I am not sure what else to do. At this rate, it will still be there in June.

Notice that the Christmas lights are still up. That is only because they are encased in ice. Next year, they get hung underneath the overhang! It is making me crazy that we cannot get them down. Argh.

I had really wanted to study today, but that did not happen. That frustrates me. I have to run to Kingwood today. Don't wanna. Gotta clean the apt. downstairs too. Wonder how long its been since those walls were washed? LOL. Pea is much better today. Cough is minimal. No fevers.. She is driving me crazy and mad that there was no school today.

I am hoping that after I get her on the bus tomorrow, I can get downstairs and at least get the kitchen scrubbed down. Then, the next day I will do the bathroom, and so on. I will save the floors for last.

Wednesday, Sears is coming out to give us an estimate on installing heating and AC. We won't be able to do anything for awhile, but we at least need to know what in the heck we are looking at here. This place also needs an electrical overhaul, so I am looking into some electricians as well. And windows. Man, this place needs new windows.

Clearly, I need to hit the lotto. *sigh*

M woke me up at 4 a.m. this morning. She did not feel good. She had no fever, no cough, nada. I got her a drink and we snuggled on the couch. She fell back to sleep. I did for about 15 minutes, because then my neighbor was outside shoveling. He does this every time there is accumulation. He is well into his 80s, so it is impressive that he can get out there and do what he does. He has a HUGE driveway. He and his wife rarely go out. So WHY the need to shovel it at 4:30 a.m. is beyond me. What really sucks is when he breaks out the snowblower before 6 a.m.

He also has an awful cough. He often sounds like he is going to heave a lung right there in the driveway. It is hard to listen to. Ugh.

Anyway, M woke up again around 7:15 and asked for some juice. She still complained of not feeling good. She says nothing hurts and she has no fever, but now she has an icky cough. And I went up to snooze after T got up at 8, and I wake with full sinuses and a runny nose and watery eyes.

WHERE did this come from? We have been hermits for a week now!

Annnyway. It is snowing. Again. Heavily. And we have to head out because we are out of milk and butter and eggs and a few other things...

Until next time....

The snow has been unrelenting. It sure is pretty though. M went out to play today. The two things that she REALLY wanted to do? Sled and build a fort. Neither of which she was able to do. She plunked her sled down, and promptly sank into the deep snow. She tried and tried again, to no avail.

I told her that it was just too deep. So she decided to move on to fort building. That did not fare well either, as the snow was very light and powder-like. This made for a very unhappy Pea.
*sigh*

She got mad at me because I could not make the snow better for her to make a fort. Ugh. All I could do was bring her inside and give her cake and hot chocolate. Then we read some books, painted, played a game or two and made dinner. We were outside for about an hour and it tuckered her out.

I really wish that she would sleep in. But I am sure that she will be waking me up around 7 a.m., so it is off to dreamland for me!!

Ok, so I slacked for a few days. There is not much to photograph when you are stuck in the house.
It started snowing again yesterday afternoon. T and I were in the next town over. We got home in just enough time to get M off of the bus. I had some laundry to do so I kept sweeping my way down stairs. When I awoke this morning, I was sorta shocked at how much accumulation there was.

For the first time since yesterday, it has stopped snowing. I need to go out and shovel now.

Here is what I awoke to this morning, around 7 a.m.




And this, was taken just about 10 minutes ago out the kitchen window. It has gone from near white out conditions to just a few rogue flurries here and there.





People keep asking me if I am ready to go back to FL yet. I love it here. I always have. I spent my life in a climate just like this. I had only spent 12 years in FL. Sure, it is nice to not have to deal with the snow. But I have always loved it. When I was in FL and would see everyone complaining about the snow and the cold, I was always a bit jealous, as I really missed it!

Anyway, I have to go shovel....

Someone needs to teach this kid of mine what SLEEPING IN means. Seven a.m. and she was waking me up. Grrrr. The first two things she asked for was cake and to go outside and play in the snow, neither of which are going to happen until after lunch. LOL.

There is a LOT of snow out there. I am only shoveling to the apartment downstairs and that is IT. It is still coming down hard. Sometimes, I cannot see the top of the mountain! I am hoping my neighbor comes by on his 4 wheeler to plow the sidewalk like he did the other day. That saved me some work!

I can smell the cake. I hope that I can wait til after lunch! Hahaa!!
I have some pics on my camera, but I just do not feel like dealing with it right now. I think I am gonna go plop on the couch. I will wake T at 8:30 and then I think I am making waffles for breakfast. mmmm.
I have to get the pics off of the camera before we go outside. I do not have a memory card yet and it can only hold 10 photos without the card.

Awrighty then, to the couch I go!

Wherever you are Daddy, I love you, and I miss you terribly. Happy Birthday! M and I are making a cake this afternoon in your honor!

Two pictures today.

I needed to run to town today to get some things at Wally World. M was outside playing. I had been shoveling the back stairs (ugh) and the sun came out and there were big puffy clouds in the sky.
So, I shoveled. And it damned near killed me. So I said to T "let her play for a bit, I am running to the store."

I got into the car, and drove down the road and through our teensy little town. As I got the the road to head on out of town, I could not believe what I was seeing... I went from sunshine, to this in about 2.5 minutes..



UNREAL. You can barely see the mountain just across the river. It was coming down all heavy and crazy. I thought about turning around and heading home and then decided just to suck it up and go on. It was just a squall, and moved along rather quickly though, thankfully.

This second picture was taken yesterday as we played out in the snow. M had decided that she wanted to build a fort. So she marched on past us, went to the porch upstairs and came back down dragging the shovel behind her. T and I were laughing so hard. She was so determined to shovel some snow. We ended up being the shovelers, giving her a rather large mound of snow with which to forge her a fort. I LOVE her determination. She does not let ANYONE tell her that she cannot do something. :)

I have been antsy and unsettled for about a week or so now. I just cannot seem to get into any sort of routine. It is making me slightly crazy. So I decided to sign up over at Flylady. The first thing they have you do is shine your sink.

I scrubbed this thing until my arms were all jelly-like. It still needs to be scoured some more in certain spots, but it is okay. As FLY Lady says, it is perfectionism that often leads us to where we are, feeling overwhelmed and under-inspired.

I took charge today. I shined my sink. I cleaned out under the sink for a spot to hold my dishpan and drainer. I cleaned the counters and cleared the clutter.







I hope to create some good, life-long habits. I would like to live a life that doesn't always leave me feeling like I HAVE to clean this or that RIGHT now, and if I don't that means I am an awful and lazy wife and mom. I need to clear my MIND of it's clutter as well, and stop putting myself down all the time.

I love watching her love the magic of snow....

Sometimes a mug of hot chocolate with cool whip just makes everything better.

The intersection of streets where we live...

M has to have a blanket at all times. She is not specific, usually, about which one as long as she has one. So the one that she has been toting around for the last 2 weeks was gross. I tried to take it from her the other day to wash it and she was having no part of it. I had all of her other blankies out so she could choose one, and she flat out told me that she wanted her filthy, nasty blankie. Greaaat.

Last night, after she was asleep, I snuck in to her room and took that nasty thing and put it in the wash. I replaced it with a nice clean blanket and called it a night. This morning we were watching Clifford the Big Red Dog together before going out to the bus when she exclaims "HEY! Mommy! This does NOT look like my nasty, filthy blanket!!"

I am so glad that I didn't have to pee, because I would have busted RIGHT THERE. I REALLY had to work at not cracking up. I gently ignored her and said "Oh LOOK M, they are roller skating!" She didn't budge. She stood there, blanket in hand, staring me down. She repeated that the blankie in hand was NOT her gross blankie. I again said "Look! Roller skating!"

She narrowed her eyes at me. I grabbed her and asked for a hug. She obliged and we started talking about roller skating, and off to school she went with her nice clean blankie!

Crisis averted. For now. :)

This morning, I remembered my hat, AND my camera. It was a bit warmer this morning. I think I remembered seeing it on my phone, it was 29 this morning, as opposed to yesterday's 18. I waited a bit longer this morning before taking M out to wait for the bus. As soon as we walked up, the bus came around the corner. She looked at me and said "Good one Mom!" Hah. I snagged a quick kiss and hug and off she went... And I stood there like a dolt watching the bus drive off.

I grabbed my camera out of my pocket, aimed and snapped. This is not exactly what I had hoped this photo would be LOL as the bus was too far away and about to round a corner, and I did not have time to zoom. I love this camera though. I like how it captures colors as they are. The lights on our porch are yellow. I hate them. LOL. But to see what a warm glow it gives off makes me hate on them a bit less. Not sure what the deal is with the orbs or dust speckles or whatever you want to call them. Call me silly, but I would like to think that maybe my dad and nan and aunt were watching the bus take my baby to school with me. Cheesy. I know.. *sigh*

So, not exactly what any real photographer would even call a good shot, it is what it is. And years from now when I look at it, I will remember this morning as it was.

As you know, most of our belongings sat in storage for over a year. Moving in here was like Christmas. I found things that I had forgotten all about. One of them, was my beloved pepper mill.
So when I found it, I shouted with far too much glee, and ran out to buy fresh peppercorns.

Oh I was so happy! And even happier that something as simple as having my pepper mill made me so happy! You see? Lots of happiness going on over here. I peppered my eggs, and my meatloaf and my turkey sammich! Glee, I tell you.

Then, about a week into it, I was peppering some steaks, and it happened.


Evidence:



One of my beloved pepper mill's little handles snapped under the massive strength of my hand. *grin*

......

*gasp*

It REALLY pissed me off!! Have to run into town tomorrow. Wally World better have these things. That last one I had bought at Target, and there is not a Target around these parts. I GUESS it could wait til next week when I take T to the VA. There is a Target in Clarksburg...

Either way, it WILL be mine.. oh yes... *rubs hands together in an evil manner*

This was the sunset taken on New Years Eve. I wish I had a clear view, but as you can see, that is not the case. So this is as good as it gets. LOL.





I remember looking out the window at the setting sun, and thinking "This is the last sunset of 2010.." So I ran out to snap a pic. Because the sun was RIGHT in front of me, it glared and I ended up with that weird lens flair. I liked it though, and thought that the pic came out pretty gnarly.. so.. there you go.

That photo a day thing? I had originally wanted that to be a photo that I took THAT DAY. Of course, I never specified that, so.. well... ppllbbbpppttt.

I think I stepped outside ONCE today and that was just to toss out a bag of trash. Today was spent cleaning and putting away all of the Christmas stuff, and CLEANING. Oh and more cleaning.

The more I cleaned, the more M trashed the place. That child is SO ready to go back to school. Her normal bed time is around 7:15 to 7:30 p.m. Tonight, knowing she had school tomorrow, she was heading up to her bedroom at 6:30! Woo.

Her playroom is still a disaster area. But my foyer, kitchen, bath, living room and the bedrooms are ALL CLEAN. I have 2 loads of laundry to finish up tomorrow and the kitchen floor needs washing and then I am DONE. For a whole day! LOL

So, the photo of the day is not going to be one that I took today because I never got out. At least I am posting SOMETHING.. in a few minutes...I don't want to just post a pic for the sake of posting a pic. I want it to be something of meaning.

BBL.

We were watching the Gators football game earlier today. There was a commercial on for visit tampa bay. T and I just looked at each other, and he says "How did they make it look so nice?"

LMAO.

I love FL, but left there with a seething hatred of Tampa. When I think Tampa, I think run down, drug infested, gang-ridden craphole. Ugh. I was amazed at the commercial and how beautiful and clean Tampa looked. I mean, it is not ALL bad. But most of it? Crap. Bah.

And with that, I am off to eat. I am starving.... See yah tomorrow.

One of the things I have always loved about this place, is how the fog comes up off of the river. I used to love sitting outside in the early mornings with my coffee, watching the bands of fog rise and lift slowly towards the sky.

I had seen links and comments in regard to the latest post over at Hyperbole and a Half for awhile now, and I had been meaning to get over there to read it.

I am in tears over here. I can barely type. I have a photo and and another post coming later, but for now, GO READ if you have not already.

Oh.. my sides. They hurt...