Daddy's Girl

What is this white FLUFFY stuff...?!

You know, snow in our part of Texas is generally either slushy or icy. It's so wet it won't stick or it's like a snow cone and just makes a hard mound. So, what was this stuff we woke up to this morning?!? It fluttered. It floated. It fleetly fleed, it flew... (sorry, song burst forth...) The kids got to go to school late, so of course they were up hooping and hollaring well before they ever get dragged out of bed on a regular school morning. And I was SO looking forward to a bit of a sleep-in. Heavens no! I had to get the camera out. I'm not sure if the kids enjoyed it more or if Heidi was having the most fun.











When it first started coming down (the floating stuff, not the sleet that we got first) last night, Heidi tentatively stepped out on the back porch. Things kept touching her head and back. She was very confused. The last time we'd had anything like this was the day we brought her home last February. She wasn't so sure about being outside last night. But, this morning was a totally different story.







Heidi was like a jack rabbit hopping all over the backyard. Actually, I think maybe she looked a bit more like a deer. There was a gracefulness to the hops.

The kids tried to build a snowman, but someone was always counteracting the progress with a snowball in the head or face or something. They were completely wet and white when I finally got them in the door for more breakfast than they probably eat in a week. I even let them have hot chocolate on a school morning.















Ok, this one's a bit jack-rabbity.
























A winter wonderland: The birdhouse Pawpaw built, the day lilies peaking through the snow, the untouched front yard, the red leaf maple blooms on our new tree and my favorite - the bradford pear blooms. I worried how the snow would affect all this pre-spring blooming, but by the afternoon everything looked just as before.

So, yesterday, in the freezing rain, I was planting a few more violas on my front porch. Here you can see the violas (winter) mixed with geraniums (summer) and some other little white flower that I really like but have no idea what it's called - I'm sure it's a summer thing, too, since that's when I planted it last year. Everything is perfectly happy together on our porch.

This new little viola got a bit of snow.

Now, here's a picture of a REAL Texas snowman. The kids scraped together every bit of snow/ice they could find on the north side of the house where it hadn't melted yet. This was the snowcone consistency "snow". They packed this little snow guy together and held their breath until I got a picture of it. Notice the viola petal buttons on the little man.

Run, Heidi, Run!

Which one's bigger... tongue or ears...



Heidi loves her squeaky football.




















I can't wait for green grass! Won't be long now. Well, maybe, anyway. You know Texas... 30 degrees one day and 80 degrees the next. I was planting flowers on my front porch in the freezing rain this morning. Sometimes Texas weather is nice. Sometimes Texas weather means a line of prescription meds lined up across the kitchen counter.

Some of Dad's Handiwork

Mom had been looking for some sort of "game table" for the family room for some time now. E-bay had stuff every now and then at somewhat reasonable prices, but not being the ambitious auction-type person, well, E-bay's just scary! So, then came the e-mail saying that they needed to move out all these tables from the church. They were neat tables - a bit beat up due to so much use and abuse, but they didn't store well and the room they were in was being renovated and the tables would no longer be needed in there. After much searching, it was decided that there really wasn't a good place for them to be used or stored so they would just give them away. Too bad they couldn't sell them. I'd have bought one!
As it was, I got to take one home. I was so excited. And Dad said he'd get it all cleaned up and looking good as new. And a couple of months later, that he did. He stripped it and used tongue oil on the top. The legs were obviously a different wood, so he had to use a stain there to get the color about even with the top. And it's so cool to have it in the family room now. At the moment it's covered in a 1000 piece puzzle (and some dust), but I don't have any pictures of that.