Snow is Fun, Until You're Done

  A few days ago we had our first snowstorm. I have to admit, when I first saw the white blanket of powder that surrounded me, I was excited. For one, Loren's classes would be cancelled and two, we could finally take Lydia sledding! After the 30 minutes it took to get all our snow gear on, we headed out to our hill. I guess the nice thing about Virginia is you don't have to travel far to find a hill. We discovered we have a great one in our own yard. Lydia had a total blast! She kept saying, "fun!" And "weee!" and cried big tears when we finally came inside. 

  The excitement of snow has worn off extremely fast. We got another storm two days later that dumped around two feet of the stuff. The whole of Lexington was snowed in. Our car was completely buried! Church was cancelled for the second week in a row and Loren spent the day shoveling till his back broke. A couple days later an intense cold front set in- high of six degrees and low of -25. It was truly miserable. So what's a cooped up toddler and mom supposed to do in the house all day? Well, that's where Pinterest comes in handy. Seriously, what did moms do before Pinterest?? This was our stuff-small-things-down-a-paper-towel-roll game. 

Here's our sensory bin. It feels so cool to say that. She probably played with this for an hour, sorting and feeling things. I give it three stars out of three! Just wish everything would have stayed on the towel instead of flung all over the house.

  What kid wouldn't like some ooey gooey slime? Lydia, apparently. I was really excited about this slime- it only took 2 ingredients and wasn't overly messy. When I sat it in front of Lydia, she just stared at it then looked at me with a face that said, "OK... You want me to actually touch it?"  It took a few minutes of me showing her how to squish and mash it before she tentatively poked it with her finger. That's as far as she'd go and I was ready to give it up when dad came to the rescue. He got her to not only grab the stuff but actually play with it. Thank goodness for dads!

Every once in a while she'd pretend to eat it, just to get a great reaction from us. Side note, it's actually edible!

  Lydia has transitioned from two naps to one now. Her vocabulary is exploding! I can't believe some of the things she says sometimes. The other day as we were leaving Clint and Michelle's, she said, "bye-bye. See you guys." Loren and I almost fell down the stairs we were so shocked. She's also learning to count to five. I feel like this is one of the most fun stages of life. Lydia is so loving and fun. She makes me laugh everyday! One of my favorite things she does is hug me around the neck. Then we put our heads together and stare in each other's eyes till one of us laughs. It's usually her :) She's a sweetheart.

  Loren has been working an insane amount of hours on his note for law review. The final product comes close to 70 pages. He has worked SO hard on it and I can't wait so see how it's received. I'm so proud of all he's doing. It's been hard but I know it'll pay off. We're having a hard time believing spring break is next week. We had better get some serious change of the weather before then! That means the semester is half over. Time never slows down. We hope you all have a great week and remember that we love you! Thanks for all the love and support.