I'm a chiropractic convert

For years I've had lower back pain and have been treated by a variety of folks, but mainly surgeons and PT's. I feel pain, go to the surgeon, he gives me a shot, then I get PT and then go about my life for a while. Then, a year, maybe two, or even three passes, and I feel pain again, go to the surgeon, get a shot, and you get the drift. Well, this time, the first time since we've moved to DC I have been referred to a chiropractor. While my mom went to one when I was younger, the thought never really crossed my mind. The surgeon always gave me my shot, the PT showed me new exercises and stretches, and the pain slowly went away. The problem with that approach was that nothing was ever fixed, and the pain would come and go in between and I had no remedy other than Advil and bed rest. Well, like I said, I'm a chiropractic convert. If I could bring my chiropractor home and feed him I would (he's already got a home and I assume he's well fed). If I could give him my firstborn I would (he's already got kids I believe). But this man relieves my pain. And the best part is that he does so whenever it hurts, without any Cortisone shots in my back (sounds worse when I put it that way, doesn't it). Now, the original problem with my back is a congenital defect and will never go away, but now when that little pain creeps up, I'm not laid out for a week writhing in pain and popping pills. It's a manageable pain. And the best part is that so far, whenever those little pains creep up, I can walk in, get an adjustment, and walk out pain free. There are times when the pain is more significant or I have to wait a day or three due to my schedule, but no more chronic pain that knocks me off my game, and no more heavy meds or shots to control the pain. Since I started going to the chiropractor seven month or so ago, I've taken Advil exactly ONCE for lower back pain. Considering I used to put the Advil executives' kids through college, that's a significant improvement. So yes, I'm a chiropractic convert and will now shout that from the rooftops to anyone that will listen.

Thinking of Mom

I've run across an old friend, been helping to organize a blood drive, and have watched the kids do some new and cool things this week and it's making me think of my mom. So, I'm sharing a few pictures from the last time the boys saw her in July of 2006, shortly before she passed away.

Mimi & Max

Mimi & Sam

Mimi & Ian

We miss you and we love you!

Eric Whitacre's Virtual Choir - 'Lux Aurumque'

Now this is truly putting the internet to good use. A feat like this pre-internet would have meant a handful of these folks coming together to sing. No way that all 150+ of them could have made it, and no way it would have sounded so impressive - so very impressive.

TAFC 00 Spring 2010 Soccer

Max's Soccer Team:

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

Sharing Some Zoo Love!

The National Zoo's Guppy Gala is coming up in mid-May and I have some tickets to give way! You can read more and enter to win your tickets HERE. Hope to see you at the zoo soon!

Spring Soccer is upon us!

Once again it's time to break our the cleats, don the shin guards, and play some soccer. Well, for me it's all about lounging comfortably and not getting sunburned. But these boys really leave it all on the field! Here are a few pics from the first weekend of Spring outdoor soccer:

Cheeky Octopus

Revenge of the Octopus

by Mike Krumboltz

21 hours ago

A few days ago, an ornery octopus stole a diver's video camera off the coast of New Zealand. What followed was a harrowing and hilarious adventure that resulted in some incredibly awesome video.

We first spotted the story at Very Short List. The video, which you can watch below, begins innocently enough. Local diver Victor Huang is shooting video with his new underwater camera. (Cue the "Jaws" music.)

Suddenly, a mischievous octopus appears out of nowhere, and clings to the $700 camera. Mr. Huang holds on for as long as he can, but the mighty mollusk wins the tug of war and swims off with Huang's new toy.

Most folks would chalk this up to incredibly bad luck and let the octopus win, but Mr. Huang pursued the creature. After a five minute chase, he managed to wrestle his camera back, with the help of his spear gun. Huang used the gun to wedge the camera away from the eight-armed thief.

But it wasn't over yet. The octopus liked playing with the spear gun and refused to let go. According an article from New Zealand Stuff, "Mr. Huang then swam around with the octopus on his speargun, saying the tentacled sea creature seemed to enjoy the ride."

Amazingly, the robbery, chase, and recovery were all captured on video. Mr. Huang never got a chance to turn off his gadget before the octopus "borrowed it." And Huang holds no grudge. He feels the octopus never intended to hurt him. "I honestly believe that it saw the bright blue digital camera and went ‘oh I need that’, you know?"

Huang posted the three minute clip on the Web and the video has quickly gone viral. In just a few days, the clip has garnered close to a million views on YouTube. It's easy to see why. The struggle, vivid colors, and knowledge that it all turned out OK (even the camera survived), make this a must-see.

From: http://buzz.yahoo.com/buzzlog/93590

Playing with Filters

I've had this desire to mess with filters for digital images for a while now, but never really sat down to do it. Well, I downloaded an app for my iPhone and now I have access to about eight cool filters. Check these out:

Easy and pretty darn cool if you ask me. Now to figure out how to do this with my computer and loads more images!

The wings of my little angel

Well, like most kids, she's not always an angel (ask Tom about their trip to Chick Fil A on Wednesday). But she is precious, and here's proof:

Happy Wednesday!

Happy Wednesday from us!

White House Easter Egg Roll 2010

bout a billion years ago I became interested in politics. Then about four years ago we moved just about as close as we could stomach to the Nation's Capital. Not bad if you ask me. But I've never actually been to the White House. Never. Not once. Guess I'm not as much of a wonk as I thought.

The White House Easter Egg Roll never really crossed my radar because we would have had to wait in line a la FSU Football tickets when we were students, and that's just not something I was interested in doing. Some friends did wait in line in years past, but it wasn't for me. Last year I even blogged thanking the President for the opportunity to get tickets - one which we really didn't have up until then. I think that someone must have read that note - this year we got tickets. But instead of jumping up and down with joy and telling the kids, I thought I'd torture them a bit. Well, it turned out that it was more torture for me than it was for them (who knew that keeping this secret would be so hard???!!!). But they figured out that we were doing something special on April 5, that it was after school, we were taking the Metro into town, and then it took them 20 Questions plus a bunch of folks walking past with bags clearly labelled White House Easter Egg Roll before they figured it out. That's when I started to get excited. First, we had snacks on the lawn:

Then we waited in line, in almost 90 degree weather. It felt like it was forever, and it felt like the worst heat ever. Our blood has really thickened some since we moved here and we were sweating.

But the line eventually started moving, we were scanned, greeted, banded, given cold drinks, and shuffled back into a second line. And when that line started moving I found myself on the grounds of the White House's South lawn - a truly magical place. There were bunnies, people with water, eggs, more people with water, some Sesame Street folks on stage, even more people with water, and of course, people. Loads of people squeezed into what was seemingly a tight space, then spread out and while we waited in a short line here or there, they were all short. We were busy dying eggs, hunting for eggs, playing soccer, and planting seeds that we missed DJ Lance from Yo Gabba Gabba. Lucy still caught a glimpse and I was happy - he's one of her favorites.

We did also get to hear (and see) Justin Beiber, but no one in my family cared. The boys eventually ran off to play football and Lucy and I wandered through the forest of costumes characters. Duck from Word World, Dora the Explorer, Clifford the Big Red Dog, June from Little Einsteins, and then this big dog. Now, Lucy saw Dora and June, recognized them both, but tried to LEAP out of her stroller to hug the big dog. It turned out that it was Spot. (Guess he's almost as old as I am now!). Then we moved on to the actual Egg Roll.

Problem was, it was close to closing time, the volunteers were tired, and they were trying to get everyone through before they closed. One volunteer snapped at us for taking pictures and holding up the line (for a split second - how often do you get THAT close to the White House anyway?).

A second volunteer left Ian standing by himself while his brothers rolled their eggs. He didn't seem to mind but my perfect photo op was gone. And then there's the whole issue of the Egg Roll. I guess after seeing it on TV and fantasizing about what it would be, well, it wasn't quite what I imagined. Those little girls in their little Easter dresses must be SOOO much smaller and more delicate than my boys. Ian launched his egg prematurely and had to run after it once they got going. Max nearly nailed a volunteer in the eye with his egg, and Sam, well, Sam had fun too.

But for me, the best part of the day was when we were walking out, four hours after we started our grand adventure that led us literally to the back door of the White House, and Max asked "Mom, can we come back next year?"

Enjoy the rest of the pics:

Make your own free digital photo album

Farewell Texas Stadium!

It was the home to America's Team for most of my life. It was where the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders got their start, and where Tom Landry made his mark. And now, it's a big pile of rubble. But oh, it looked cool from the inside as it came down.

Definitely check this video out. And on the same note, can't wait to take the kids to a Cowboys game in their new, super sweet stadium. ;)

Texas Stadium 360 degree Implosion from the inside: http://www.dallascowboys.com/farewell/Texas_Stadium_Implosion.cfm

Oh happy day. Not.

I'm not generally one to judge other people who hang out at the grocery store at the odd hours that I do, but tonight I just can't keep this to myself. I was at the local grocery store, walking out at about 11pm. I noticed that there was a lady in the car next to me just sitting there waiting. As I unloaded my oodles of bags from my cart, two girls that appeared to be her daughters walked up to the car. The older one was high school aged - younger, but probably around 14 or 15 or so. The younger one was about 4 or 5 tops. I had seen them in the store enjoying themselves and picking out their groceries. But what I saw outside the store really made me wonder - why the heck was this woman at the store at this hour, and why wasn't she minding her kids? First off, she yelled at the older girl for taking so long in the store. She SAT IN THE CAR while the girl took her preschool aged sister into the grocery at 10:30 at night. Then, she hollered at the older girl and the younger girl started crying that they forgot something. Now, whining and fussing, not tolerable in my book, but hey, it's 10:30 at night and she was 4, so we'll give her a pass on that. But what the mom did nest was incomprehensible. She told the older girl to go back in and grab the one thing that they were missing so that the little girl would be quiet. The older girl complained that she was tired, that they really didn't need whatever it was that the mom was about to send her back in for, etc. She sat there while the mom called her all kinds of rude names - right to her daughter. And then, she told the older girl to take the younger girl out of the car, crying, and back into the store so she could pick out what it was that she wanted. I was stunned. Here it was, 11pm, and she was sending this little girl, clearly exhausted, back into the store while she sat there in the car.

So, while I don't normally judge folks I meet at the store at the odd hours that I go, I am judging this woman and she'll never win the Mother of the Year award. What is so critical (that a 15 year old can buy) that you have to drag your kids to the store crying at 11pm to buy? And why on earth would the mom send the girls in by themselves to do the shopping? Granted the older one is pretty independent, but still, 11pm at night, crying 4 year old, mom sitting in the car - this just doesn't sit right with me.

Max just learned another life lesson

My oldest, who is now 9, learned some hard life lesson last weekend on the soccer field. Max learned that sometimes kids are just mean. And that some kids will do anything to win.

Max plays travel soccer, but he also plays on a recreational team in the winter that he's played with for the past three years. This is a great group of kids who really love the sport, some of whom are more proficient soccer players, and some of whom haven't been playing as long. But on this team it doesn't matter - they are all teammates and they enjoy playing the game together.

Indoor soccer is a fast paced, fun game that really relies on foot skills. It's a fun game to play and a fun game to watch. In this winter league you run across all kinds of teams. Some are pre-travel teams and destroy their opponents, and some teams are put together by the league. There are also a whole variety of teams in between. Our team happens to be on of the teams organized by the league. Our kids play soccer in various leagues all over Northern Virginia. These kids met one another on the field three years ago and haven't looked back since. Outside of winter soccer, they don't really see each other. A few kids plan in leagues together, but not the team as a whole.

Last week we faced a team that plays together indoors and outdoors. We have played them before this winter, and they were really rough. They were so rough that the referee had to warn the kids to stop pushing, tripping, and slide tackling. He even threatened them with a card at one time, and actually pulled a yellow card on the coach. He was a great ref and kept the game safe and moving along. Tom (he's the coach of this indoor team) wrote a note to the league complimenting the referee for handling this terrible game so well.

Going in we knew they'd be rough. I'm sure the kids remembered playing them as it was only a few weeks earlier that we met on the field. Tom coached his usual way - told them to ignore the roughness and play good soccer, and for the most part the kids did. Then, mid-way through the game Max got kicked in the thigh by a player that had been going head to head with him most of the game. It was an accident, but it set up a play later on that taught Max this lesson. He was out of the game briefly but went back in and scored a goal or two. Then he scored a few more and the other kids started getting rough. A few more goals scored by our team and even more roughness from them. They were pushing, body checking, and slide tackling, and while the referee was doing what he could to keep the game under control, he wasn't aware of all of it (Refs, unlike Moms, don't have eyes in the back of their heads). The kids on the other team weren't being coached to play better soccer but some wild form of cage fighting, and one of the parents on the team was even telling their kids to throw elbows. Tom took the time at the half to tell the kids NOT to retaliate. And for the most part they didn't. But clearly the other team was frustrated. Their "star" player was being shut down by not just Max, but several of our players, and had yet to score a goal in the second half. All of the kids were getting tired, and so this other player hit Max with the one move that he wasn't expecting - he called him a name. This player did the only thing he could think of that might knock his opponent out - he called him a "freak."

Max, who is a very nice kid, was completely taken off guard by this. It really threw him for a loop, and he took a bit to recover from it. He's never really encountered a really mean kid before, and here he runs into one on the soccer field. So now he understands that sometimes kids are just mean. And mean kids, well, sometimes they do bad things for their own gain. He also learned that he best way to deal with this is to beat kids like that on the field. Scoring goals is the one thing that a kid like that just can't handle, so next time he runs into a mean kid on the field, hopefully he'll remember this lesson.

I'm Mad STAY AWAY!

Found on the boys' door one day a few weeks back:

Ahhhh, kids growing up. Max had apparently had enough. Enough of his brothers, enough of his sister, and enough of just about everything else. A few days later the sign came down and was never to be seen again. And life moved on.

Talking Carl

In case you've never heard of him, Talking Carl is THE man. He is one of Lucy's favorite buddies, fits in my back pocket, and cost a whopping $.99. Talking Carl is an app for the iPhone. If you are lucky enough to met Carl, he is very polite, a good conversationalist, and he's ticklish too:

Talking Carl we love you!

Love Cake/Love Sci-Fi

They're watching Plan 9 from Outer Space
Originally uploaded by DVDTracker

Two of my favorite things (cake and Sci-Fi if you haven't figured it out already)! Be sure to click through all of the pictures to see all of your favorite Sci-Fi characters, robots, and ships in sugar! And it all took place in Austin, TX. We knew that place was cool but I had no idea that they were Alien Film Festival cool!

Landing Zone

Funny thing is, I wasn't even surprised to see it there.

(And no snarky comments about the chandelier - it's a rental folks - not our taste at all.)

Happy St. Patty's Day!

To celebrate the day, I thought I'd share a giggle with you. Might not be something you want to look at with kids, but then again they are cupcakes. Regular cupcakes, on sale at a regular grocery store. But they gave me the giggles before and they've done it once again. Cake Wrecks has come through BIG TIME on this one:

You can see the rest here. Looks like there are some Happy, HAPPY Irishmen out there today!

Fashionista

Lucy picked out her own clothes today!

She is our future fashionista! NOT!

Decorating with Balloons

The night before Ian and Sam's birthday party we blew up a bunch of balloons. But these were going to be used for a game - so no helium. I though, because I dig stuff like this, that it would be cool to stick them all to the ceiling.

So the boys got going:

And then Dad joined in:

And eventually we ended up with this:

Sledding?

In case you are wondering, you really can still sled a full month after the snow has fallen (at least if you are Sam, Lucy, and Ian):

So what DO they feed you in prison?

The other day in the car we jumped right from "Why doesn't that bus smell as bad as the rest," to "Can kids go to jail," then right to "What do they feed you in jail?" Yeah. Fantastic. And my answers? "Well, I don't know - it's cleaner fuel but you need to ask your Dad," and "Yes, but they have to do something really bad, and even then they go to a special kids jail called juvenile corrections." Then the food. "I guess it's like school food but worse." I'd never even thought of that, and here my kids were wondering about it. Then again the asked me about God and sex in a Walmart parking lot at a very early age. Sigh...

This Too Shall Pass

Definitely peek at this one - it's incredible:

Snow and Birthdays and Elections, OH MY! (Part 1)

Sorry for being MIA. Between the massive amounts of snow that we got in February, two very special birthdays, and an important election, I was swamped. But, I'm back! First, the snow. Unless you live under a rock you know that DC got dumped on three or four times this winter (I'm losing track). We received 60"+ of snow, depending on who you ask it might be over 70". Anyway, LOTS of snow. This is where I'd post a cute video montage of the boys sledding, Lucy eating the snow, Tom digging us out, everyone in their cute snowsuits, and so on, but no. All you get right now are a few pictures:

This is what we ended up with AFTER the Wednesday blizzard that I mention here. And we didn't get 5" as predicted, we got another foot of snow. So we were once again stuck in. Good thing I had a friend drive me to the store right before that big blizzard. I hiked out to the closest plowed out street, she drive me to the store, then we loaded the groceries onto a sled and I hiked back home, dragging my haul behind me:

And that was about day 5 of being trapped on our street. Then, the plows came:

This is the street in front of our house the first day that we had to go back to school (the Tuesday following the Wed blizzard). This was after the 9 days of being TRAPPED inside the house. We clearly weren't trapped - we did get outside - but we were not plowed out until the Friday after the snow storm's second go round. But when the plows did come through, they barely cleared a path wide enough for one car to get through. A school bus got stuck on our street that fist day even. I think one more day of plows coming through before we sent the kids off to school would have been helpful. It took them a full 5 days to come through again and widen the road and get the 4" layer of ice pack off of it. My poor van is in desperate need of an alignment now.

So that's the snow, and we survived. No ER trips, no big gripe fests, and children that were, in all honesty, completely behaved the entire time. I think the thought of living in close quarters with a mom they have driven insane was too much of a threat.

Part 2 coming soon!

"Is he died?"

Much to my delight, the Muppets have done it again:

World's Worst Valentine

Not only did I get my sweetie a Valentine, but I failed to get my kids set up properly for their Valentine's parties. But, honestly, I'm not losing sweat over it this time. So be it. After a tinge of guilt I've let it go.

You see, after the worlds worst snowfall/school closings/DC in the midst of a panic I assumed that we'd write Valentine's Day off completely. Any other year I'd sit with the boys as they addressed some form of store bought valentines (all this crafty artsy in me and the kids always want the store bought - KILLS me), and we'd have them ready for their party. Well, this year they were snowbound on the day of their party, so nothing doing on that end. But we were also snowbound the week before their party, so that too ruled out the acquisition of said store bought Valentine's. The failure on my part comes in when we look at all the free time we have had over the past 10 days, all the craft stuff that I have here, and my complete and utter lack of motivation to do anything. But more on that later.

So, the kids all head back to school, and yesterday, much to my surprise, the boys came home with a bag full of Valentine's from their classmates. After a bit of questioning as to how the ENTIRE rest of the class knew to bring their stuff in, they both told me, in the smallest voices possible, that they knew on Tuesday and just didn't bother to tell me. So I guess I'm not the only one who isn't losing sweat over it.

Now I just need to figure out how to repackage these Xmas cards and gift cards and get them to their teachers as we missed the last three days of school before winter break too!

Holding my vacuum hostage

Stuck at home for days and days, one would think that house cleaning would be a top priority. I mean, you are living in the place and there's not a whole lot else you can do to hide from any messes that are made. Not me though. Apparently when I'M stuck inside I order cleaning products online, knowing that a bigger storm is arriving, and laugh to myself as they are held hostage by the shipping company:

ALEXANDRIA, VA, US 02/12/2010 7:22 P.M. EMERGENCY CONDITIONS BEYOND UPS' CONTROL
02/12/2010 12:00 P.M. ADVERSE WEATHER CONDITIONS / DELIVERY RESCHEDULED
02/12/2010 12:00 P.M. ADVERSE WEATHER CONDITIONS / DELIVERY RESCHEDULED
02/12/2010 4:14 A.M. OUT FOR DELIVERY
ALEXANDRIA, VA, US 02/11/2010 12:00 P.M. ADVERSE WEATHER CONDITIONS / DELIVERY RESCHEDULED
ALEXANDRIA, VA, US 02/09/2010 6:57 P.M. EMERGENCY CONDITIONS BEYOND UPS' CONTROL
02/09/2010 4:36 A.M. OUT FOR DELIVERY
HARRISBURG, PA, US 02/09/2010 1:11 A.M. DEPARTURE SCAN
ALEXANDRIA, VA, US 02/09/2010 12:01 A.M. ARRIVAL SCAN
HARRISBURG, PA, US 02/08/2010 8:15 P.M. ORIGIN SCAN
US 02/08/2010 5:36 P.M. BILLING INFORMATION RECEIVED

At some point, though, UPS will realize that our street has finally been plowed and will bring me my new little vacuum. And don't worry - we have two full size vacuums - I'm getting this one so that the boys can clean up after their messy selves. THAT'S the part that is driving me nuts about being stuck inside. As they get bigger their messes do as well, and I figure now is as good of a time as any to teach them to clean up after themselves - ALL the time.

I'm on a horse

This has to be one of the best commercials ever. This is by no means an endorsement of Old Spice, but you HAVE to check this out:



This man has everything a woman wants - including two tickets to the thing I love...

SNuhOW!

What is this - storm #3? I'm beginning to lose track. More of the lovely white stuff - this time coming at us from every direction. It's "Blizzard like conditions" and we are once again getting pounded. Fun times!

At some point we will have to dig out again. The snow crept all the way up to our front door this time - no place to step out and snap photos. Then again I didn't really want to open my front door and let all of that stuff in. (And look at that poor little bush out front. I fear it's not the only one we lost.)

We were finally plowed out last night - right before this round started. Can't imagine when it will happen again. We were stuck for 5 days, and here we are looking at probably at least 3-4 more.

You're kidding, right?

From weather.com:

Farther east, light snow has already reached the Baltimore-Washington area. Snow will be on the increase through the evening and overnight and will spread northeastward as a new storm forms along the North Carolina coast.

That storm lifts northward and will grow rapidly stronger overnight and Wednesday bringing heavy snow and strong winds from northern Virginia through southern New England.

The combination of the heavy snow and wind gusts over 50 mph will produce blizzard conditions at times in the Washington, D.C., to Boston corridor. Some gusts over southeast New England may reach 60 mph.

Snow accumulations of 12 to 18 inches may prevail from northern Virginia through southern New England.

At some point this joke has to be funny. Not so much right now. Northern Virginia really is the south, at least on my block. But looking out my front window you'd believe otherwise:

Sam and Lucy

Today's post is brought to you by the letter "S." S is for snow, and S is for shoveling and S is for school being cancelled. And S is for sigh...

Sam

Lucy

Guess it IS Snowmaggeddon after all

A few weeks back, during what was one of the bigger storms that the Washington DC area has ever seen, I said in a blog post over at DC Metro Moms that I guess it wasn't Snowmageddon after all. Well, today President Obama called this storm Snowmageddon.

Guess it really IS Snowmageddon:

We are at about 18" and counting, and it's still snowing. Our little baseball bat is almost completely buried due to drifts.

The Baseball Bat

At some point in the last few months Virginia was lifted up and placed in Minnesota. Yes, we live in the land of snow now. This past week the boys went to school for a total of TWO days. Monday was a holiday, then we were snowed out both Wednesday and Friday - from two separate storms. You see, this winter we have had in the DC area 24" of snow. Our average for this area is about 15". Already we are over that average, we have snow sitting on the ground, and they are forecasting between 20-30" of snow today and tomorrow. Yes, we might get 2.5 FEET of snow. This is still DC, right? Crazy. Anyway, instead of a yardstick, which we broke measuring the last snow, we are using a handy dandy plastic baseball bat. The kids certainly can't use it indoors over the next few days, and hopefully it's tall enough. So far this is what we have:

First at about 11am this morning:

Then at about 7pm:

And now at midnight:

And apparently it will be snowing between 1-3" per hour over the next few hours. I'm wondering what we'll wake up to in the morning. Will we be able to even tell where the driveway is? Will we be able to get out to play tomorrow? Will it stop snowing at all tomorrow, or continue all day as they are predicting? Well, I can tell you that we will be able to find the driveway, thanks to Facebook and a fantastic hubby. My friends on Facebook (and one via e-mail) mentioned that they were shoveling or had shoveled several times today. You see, we snow deprived folks have to take our cues form our surroundings as far as functioning in conditions like this. So when I see that loads of other DC folks are shoveling, well, I send my hubby out. So he's out there right now trying to remove the 6-9" of snow that's fallen thus far:

And they are predicting another storm that will arrive next week, on top of the bazillion inches of snow that we have now. Wild, loads of fun, and makes for great sled runs. More from the bat tomorrow!

SNOW Again!

Is it a good idea for the sled driver to close his eyes? And does the passenger even care?

After sledding for a bit, Sam mastered the art of SNOWBOARDING down the hill!

Lucy was doing her part to "help" the boys build their snow castles.

And Max finally got up on the snowboard (and hit the ground a few seconds later!).

Lucy's Big Boots

Lucy loves her shoes. If she could she'd wear shoes all the time. She loves her snow boots the most, but this time she grabbed her big brother Max's boots and went running. So, we helped her get them on and this was the result: