Cole Campout

In mid-March we decided to have a family campout. Unfortunately we couldn't find a campsite that was available. Apparently many local camping locations have closed because of Covid. Seems counterproductive to me as camping is an outdoor activity and thus safer than many other activities, but oh well. In the end we settled on camping at the Caldwells' house. This ended up having the benefit of flushing toilets and Timothy sleeping in the house instead of in the tent with us. Everybody had a great time.

 

Early March

In early March we learned that Miss Margie, our neighbor from Houston, had been put on hospice. We had planned to go see her once covid was under control, but waiting was no longer an option. We drove down on a Saturday and visited with her for a while. She was so happy to see us and to get to meet Timothy. 

We stayed in a hotel that night. We actually had to have two hotel rooms because of our group size. One room had Timothy, Leona, and Collin and the other room was Clara, Leona, and me. Timothy was an absolute maniac. I thought he was going to rip the curtains down and at one point he licked the tv remote. Moral of the story, never cage a wild animal.  The next morning we went to a park with the Dykes and got to hang out with them for a bit before going to church in the Memorial Park Ward. It was so nice to see so many people who we love.

Zoo trip with the Coles, and look at that sweet sister and brother. 💗

Donut run.

The girls busted out the face paint. I'm pretty sure that Eliza painted Clara's owl face. Clara painted Leona's panda face and Leona and Clara painted their own arms and hands.

 

Leona's Procedure

Leona had an endoscopy on March 2nd to make sure that Celiac wasn't causing her chronic stomachaches. Thankfully that was not the case. She was a trooper throughout and got a vanilla milkshake to eat for breakfast on the way home.

 

Snowpacalypse Part 2

Around 2am on February 15th our power went out. We weren't overly concerned at first because we'd been told to expect rolling blackouts. However after a while we were concerned. While we had two periods of 45 minutes of power in the middle the power finally permanently came back on 60 hours later at 2 pm. on the 17th. 

In the meantime we stayed warm with lots of layers and our gas fireplace. The kids all slept together in Timothy's room under lots of blankets.  They were super sad that we wouldn't let them go play out in the fresh new layer of snow, but with no way to warm back up again later we didn't want to risk it.  The temperature outside was in the single digits. In our house the lowest it got, according to the meat thermometer we used to check, was 43 degrees. It was pretty brisk. 

On Tuesday we went over to Gma and Gpa Cole's house to shower, since they never lost power, but we came home pretty quickly since we wanted to be home in the event that the power came back on and the pipes burst. On Wednesday we went over to Aunt Lana and Uncle Tutu's house to warm up and play with the baby chicks who had chosen the coldest days of the decade to hatch. The kids and Collin also had an intense Nerf battle that got them so warmed up they were down to shorts and t-shirts for a while. Honestly the kids seemed more bothered by being bored and not being allowed to play in the snow than they were by the lack of electricity and cold.

Unfortunately what we had feared would happen did happen. At about 7pm on Wednesday Eliza got up from the table to go to the bathroom. She yelled for us to come over because it sounded like it was raining in our bedroom. Collin and I raced and opened the bedroom door to discover sheets of water cascading from the ceiling and 2 inches of standing water on the carpet. 

We had a brigade of neighbors, ward members, and family at our house as soon as they could get here with shop vacs and towels. The water was turned off at the street. The carpet was ripped out of the bedroom and closet. Our furniture got moved out to the front of the house along with closet contents that couldn't risk getting wet.  In the melee I slipped on the water and hurt my hand badly. We were afraid that it was broken but a trip to the ER the next day revealed that it wasn't (although as I type this 7 months later my hand still hurts). 

At one point Collin and Matthew were up in the attic cleaning up water logged insulation in an attempt to relieve the soaking ceiling of the extra weight. Gpa Cole was below cleaning up water in the master bathroom. He heard a crack and jumped into the closet just as a whole panel of soggy sheetrock crashed down where he had been standing only a moment before. After that everybody cleared out of the attic and master area to leave the rest of the clean up for the professionals.

 

Valentine's Day

We didn't know it at the time, but our annual Valentine's Day Fondue party was our last heated meal for a while. 

After a conversation from Aunt Tara about how in Canada they have syrup huts Collin ate some snow with maple syrup on it in her honor.

 

Snowpacalypse- the Texas Edition

Leona claimed tat in addition to the tooth fairy coming the snow fairy came and gave her a snow ticket. All she had to do was touch the snow ticket and the snow came. I have to say that she does have a fair amount of evidence to corroborate her story.

It snowed! The kids were thrilled. They all accused me of being a liar. "You said it never snows in Texas!" I told them to enjoy this while they could, because it isn't likely to happen again next year. Unfortunately we didn't have any sledding equipment so they used a cardboard box and took turns being the horse pulling the sled. 

 

Early February

I have to say that I did not anticipate making yet another puff paint outfit for Leona. She specifically asked for one for her birthday- leopard print as always, but in Panda colors- so I had to give the people what they want. Part of me thinks, "Wow, I can't believe that she's already had me make three of these." and the other part of me thinks, "I'm going to need to buy more than one bottle of paint when I make the leopard puff paint suit that I send with her on her mission."

A note that Leona wrote for me while we waited to go into her check-up. "You are ?____? and stinky. Smelly like stinky cheese." Charming.

 

Leona is 7!

For some reason I have multiple shots of Leona opening her scooter, but none of any other gifts. Oh well.

Yet another famous Leona selfie.

Leona had a panda themed birthday party with cousins, but since it was her "golden birthday" we had gold accents to go along with the black and white. We played several fun games. The first was a make a panda with crepe paper team game. The next was a variation on the "Thanksgiving Game" that Mr. Parker the PE teacher from Parkwood elementary had the kids play only the week of Thanksgiving. To be honest I still do not quite understand all of the details of the game, but we altered it to be pandas trying to get all the bamboo before the zookeepers captured them and took them to the zoo. It was a BIG hit. Too bad Mr. Parker doesn't know about his legacy. It was nerve wracking watching the kids run with bamboo sticks- they were short. I'm not sure if that makes them more or less likely to poke an eye out. We also did a pin the bow on the panda game because my kids don't feel like they've had a party unless there is some variation on that theme.

Leona is still such a joy to be around. She has always been a fun and quirky girl. Lots of personality and spunk. She is such an intelligent girl with lots of creative ideas, and also really in tune with the Spirit. I love her so much and am so glad that she came to our family.