January 2010 Archives

Well, the snowfall ended about dinnertime last night, though the wind continued to blow. What was the final snowfall? Hard to say, as I didn’t measure last night. But when I went this morning to start shoveling things off, we had over 12 inches on the ground. That’s about the same as the snowstorm in December.

The boys still had some fun stomping through the deeper snow this morning, though it was a bit intimidating at times for Sean and Daniel. It was deep enough to definitely drop some snow down into my boots when I had to wander out into it. The boys and Kellie helped with some of the snow shoveling, though help may be a bit strong of a word for what the twins did. A video in the picture album below shows you how they helped there.

(I’m trying out a new photo album style. This one allows YouTube videos to be played within the slide show. Let me know what you think.)

The sun continues to shine today, even if the temperature is barely above freezing. The driveway, cars, and sidewalk are nicely cleared and melted, but the neighborhood roads still await a plowing. School for tomorrow has already been canceled. This is actually the first canceled school day of the year, as the last snowfall arrived after winter break started. I’m guessing Kellie and I won’t get canceled work days, however.

Yup, we’re getting socked by another snowstorm this winter. This is our third significant snow, though only the second one I’d call major. But having two major snowfalls in Richmond in one winter is out of the ordinary. The snow started overnight, but was relatively light. However, shortly after 8am, the intensity kicked up, and it has not let up since. In fact, it may be snowing even harder now, with more wind, too.

We ventured out into the snow around 10am this morning, and we already had 5 inches of snow at that point. The kids had fun stomping around in the snow — even Sean and Daniel stepped right into it. I shoveled the driveway off for a first cut, knowing more would come later, and the kids had fun wiping snow off the cars. They had fun catching snowflakes on the tongue. Unfortunately, this snow is fine and powdery, not good enough for snowballs or snowmen. But the kids were out in the snow for almost 45 minutes, enough to get just wet enough.

As I write this entry, not quite 4 hours after coming inside, I can barely see any evidence of what I shoveled on the front walkway. We’ve had that much more snow fall and get blown around. We also cannot see any tracks in the yard where Kellie and the kids walked around. And this storm isn’t over yet. Total snowfall could be interesting for this one.

Wow, I am so far behind in my notes, it’s not funny. Let’s see what kind of stuff I can get out during January. Not sure how much I’ll catch up, but I will certainly try.

Like the fact that we had another dusting of snow this winter. This one occurred just over a week ago, on January 8th. This was 3 weeks after the previous snow — AND WE STILL HAD SNOW LEFT FROM THAT PREVIOUS SNOWFALL! How crazy is that? And this wasn’t snow that was in shade most of the day. This was snow by the mailbox, where some extra had been shoveled but where it was also exposed to sun pretty much from sun up to sundown.

Yes, that’s how cold the last 3 weeks had been, barely getting above freezing. I won’t get into that. (I should note that the freezing and below temperatures finally broke a few days ago, getting near 60 this weekend. Finally, some more normal temperature variations.)

Anyway, back to the story. We got just a dusting of snow. It wasn’t even enough to cancel school — just a 2-hour delayed opening. But the roads were slick underfoot. I could feel the slippery ice as I walked down the street to take that photo.

It was a nice, peaceful view to wake up to.

Yes, the kids are growing up, so they’re wanting to see movies in the movie theater. With Sean and Daniel now being 3 years old, they can almost sit through a movie in the theater. So we’ve taken them with us to see a couple of movies recently.

Today, we saw Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel. OK, not the best quality movie in the world. And we hadn’t seen the original until this morning (we rented it). But the kids had fun with it, and it kept their attention. The second one felt a bit more forced, and the music just didn’t do it for me (the classics they remade for the original were better, if one can call them that). But this was for the kids, so it was a moderate hit. Still, if you can divert them from spending the money on this one in the theater, do it. (And the original was better than this one.)

Last month, we saw Fantastic Mr. Fox. Personally, I don’t see what the hubbub was about. I actually found myself rather bored by the story. Sean and Daniel certainly weren’t into it as much. We actually went to this one as part of an after-school activity with Will’s second grade class, as they had read the story in school. I have not read the book, so maybe there is more depth in there than was shown in the movie. But the movie didn’t invest me in the fate of the characters, despite me not knowing what was going to happen, so I felt rather let down on the experience. I guess it means different things to different people. (Personally, I think the Hollywood hype, given who was involved in the project, has invested a certain aura-you-should-not-question to the project.)

Anybody with any other kid movie recommendations? We’ve heard good things about The Princess And The Frog.