these are the trees down the east side of the yard . . . .
jerry took this picture, and i'm so proud of his creative photography! he's really branching out in his interests! this is our front porch looking straight north into the trees across the road. this was a little later, so the sun was up and it was brighter out.
same tree out the kitchen door, but it looks more fabulous with more light shining on it. as i was cropping pictures and stuff, i asked jerry what was that blob on the picture. i figured there was a dot of moisture on the lens or something, but when i zoomed in we saw that it's a beautiful redbird flying over the tree. i feel like i should "touch that out" for the picture to be more pleasing to the eye, but then i think "if that redbird was out flying today, he deserves to be in the picture!"
the last couple of days have been marvelous, starting w/ ice coming late on wednesday and into thursday morning. then late thursday afternoon, the snow started falling, but once it started -- it flat-out got with it! we had 10" of snow by friday morning, w/ drifts up to 2 ft deep. all that on top of about 1" of ice, so travel was practically at a standstill here. the main roads got cleared off quickly and town was clear -- but that's nowhere near where we are.
we were just trapped at home for the last 3 days, and it was wonderful. jerry and i stayed home from work and scott stayed home from school. we could've gotten out in case of emergency, but sometimes it's just nice and peaceful to just "be home". i absolutely love being trapped at home in situations like this. i love to cook. we spend lots of family time watching movies and playing games. it's better than vacation, b/c at least we're not all exhausted when it's over!
jerry had to make a grocery store/pharmacy run today, though, and found out that once he hit the main roads everything was just fine. it's still a little slick here and there, but nothing like it is still at our house!
scott fell on the smaller drift sount of where jerry parks his car.
when they recovered from sledding, then they decided that they should throw snowballs. that was easier said than done, though, as this snow was still too dry to pack a good snowball -- but it was good enough to get so-so snowballs. after pelting each other a few times, they turned on jerry and plastered him good. he was standing there griping about how they got his clothes all wet and he had been so careful to not get wet already . . . . . as he took his sweatshirt off to shake the snow off of it. uh-oh -- that just made him a better target -- a jerry w/ no shirt on. so they pelted him again. he had a few choice names for "the pups" as he was coming in the back door. fortunately, they were kind enough to not pelt me b/c i was taking pictures and i might hurt them!
they came in the house and thawed for a while and snacked until their body temperature and blood sugar levels were back up to normal, and then they needed something else to do. the conversation sounded something like this . . .
"what do you want to do?"
"i don't know. what do you want to do?"
"oh, i have an idea!"
"oh yeah? what's that?"
"let's shoot something!"
"yeah, that sounds cool. get the guns out!"
(loose translation, of course, but you get the picture!)
so, a few minutes after getting bundled up, this is what our back porch looked like. jacob had snow-shoveled a place to set up his lawn chair where he could "sit and shoot" in comfort. how redneck is this???
while scott was standing at the corner of the house, ready to get the jump on anything before jacob had time to level his gun.
throw in a few games of lethal and agressive monopoly, a couple of movies, some food -- and that pretty much sums up the day for us on friday. jerry was just knocking them dead at monopoly, though, so it just got that much more dangerous and competitive.
the weather was too bad to go to school or work, but just right for some great family time and fun together.
it wasn't long before scott was tired and cold and ready for his turn to try and kill jacob, so they switched places. now jacob is the potential victim.
looks like they are stopped here -- negotiating, probably. or planning some better way to carry out this long form of fun/torture.
scott looks like he's saying, "now what was that?"
here's a long range shot taken from about 300 yards away. they drove all over that field at speeds topping the high teens. scott swears he was only going about 17 at the fastest, but i'm sure he meant 70 (seventy instead of seventeen). as if that old "slur the syllables together" will fool mom!
i don't know how many miles they sledded this morning, but they sure had fun and they were definitely worn out after that escapade. someone flying over our place would probably be sure that we were the victim of a ufo and crop circles, but it was nothing more than the boys having a little fun.
joleen and jeff were working on the porch.
jerry was on the ground next to the porch, untangling the lights.
raven was pretty much right where the action was as long as it was interesting. here she is checking out what makes the deer move like that, and she wasn't real certain if she liked that or not.
she had a nap on the way down from kansas city, but i think she would've slept much longer if given the opportunity. it had been a long and tiring weekend filled w/ fun times and great memories, but she was a tired little girl.
when things got boring where the adults were, raven headed out to play in the rocks of the driveway. i know . . . poor little girl doesn't have any toys or any friends! yeah, whatever! she just likes to play in the dirt, in the gravel, in the grain -- she's a farm girl.
