savannah: circus and baby shower

Last Friday we took Hannah and Joseph to their first circus. Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey's "Built to Amaze" tour did not disappoint. Both kids were wide-eyed, and definitely amazed. Joseph's fascination began before the show even started. He (looking through the wrong end of the binoculars) watched the people up in the rafters working with the pulleys and ropes.

Hannah really liked "Electra", the swinging girl. I didn't get a picture of her way up there, but this captures the thrill:

Meme and Gran Gran enjoyed the show as well, and we had great seats.

The most breath-catching act to me has always been the motorcycles inside the cage. At one point there was a woman inside while they were driving around at full speed. Insane.

Intermission allowed Meme to buy exciting toys for the kids. Joseph chose the twirly, light-up wand when the vendor came by our seats, but decided he'd rather have the light-up noise-making gun instead.  The rule was one thing so he was very happy when the nice man let him exchange.

A favorite for all of us was the trapeze act. Or acrobatics, or aerobatics…or whatever you call this:

This guy with two girls (one hanging from her neck) drove a motorcycle on the tightrope right over our heads. It was really impressive when he went up into a headstand.

Now, here's a question: when did the circus go from three rings to one? In all my time explaining the circus and preparing the kids for all that's going to go on, I talked about the three rings with clowns, acrobats and animals. I was surprised (and the kids probably a little confused) when we walked in to see just one ring. Don't get me wrong - there was a lot still going on and a lot to see, just not the chaos and over-stimulation that I remember growing up.

And the animals. In my memory, there were elephants, tigers and lions, seals, dogs, horses and more. I get that with PETA and the like, animal cruelty is a hot topic and has shed light on the training and living conditions of circus animals. So that might be why we only saw a couple of elephants, horses and dogs. Maybe it was due to the theme of the tour. And, truly, that is fine. There is quite a bit of excitement and energy in the place with just the humans involved.

Although we did get a huge kick out of these dogs. They were so cute and absolutely hilarious in their antics.

During the show's finale, confetti rained down over us. These two chickens could not have been more excited. Once it was all over us and the ground, they ran around playing in it and throwing it in the air. We may have been the last people to leave the arena. (Ok, we were asked to leave…)

A great time was had by all, and the children's first circus a huge success. Thank you Meme and Gran Gran for taking us!

The next day, my aunts and cousins hosted a baby shower for my sister-in-law, Crystal, and baby Stella with a "Baby, It's Cold Outside" theme. The shower was held at Wesley Gardens in Savannah - a special place to us and the sight of many family events including weddings, baptisms, parties, showers, and our own wedding-day breakfast. It is a beautiful place filled with happy memories. Baby Stella got some really nice things and Momma Crystal looked beautiful.

We can't wait to meet Stella!

After that we headed back home. It was a short, but very fun trip…

…and a peaceful ride home!

one ice storm later...

I think when I titled the post before last "land of the living" I was foreshadowing. For 57 hours, from Wednesday morning until Friday evening, we were without power. That's a long time without power. With two small children.

It's winter, it's cold outside. No heat means it's cold inside, too. It's dark. No hot showers...and even if you could take one, you'd freeze when you got out. Food spoiled in the refrigerator and freezer. No modern conveniences. Do you realize how much you actually flip light switches and plug things in? I do now: all day long.

Wednesday morning the rain came. We saw transformers blow from inside the house. The temperature stayed below freezing and ice was accumulating on the trees quickly. Ice is heavy. The constant sound of tree limbs cracking and hitting the ground (or roof) is scary. Ice covered everything. Power lines were down everywhere. Tons of trees were uprooted, many falling on houses and cars. "War zone" was used to describe our small town.

But let's focus on the good.

We have great friends. Those with power invited us to spend the night, take hot showers, charge phones, or just simply take a break from the cold. We spent the first night with Deana and Ken and their two girls. We enjoyed a delicious supper, a smorgasbord Deana put together from her fridge. Ironically, their power went out just as we were getting into bed. We stayed anyway. The next morning, Joe and Ken waited 45 minutes at McDonalds to brings us hot coffee and biscuits.

After breakfast, we drove home.

As bad as the damage was around town, other than some big limbs down, our house was fine.

We witnessed a community come together, reaching out through Facebook, people helping each other in any way they could. Electric crews came from out of town. They worked tirelessly.

We hunkered down. And we learned some things.


You can paint just fine with a little natural light...

...The same can be said for doing puzzles...

It can be fun and exciting (and slightly dangerous) to watch ice-covered limbs fall from the trees.

...Apparently little boys nap really long in cold bedrooms with lots of blankets.

He also likes flashlights and lanterns. Really, really, really likes flashlights and lanterns. At least one was always in hand.

You have every reason to not do a thing but sit on the sofa and read (or play cake pops) by the window.

...or pretend to give Mollie a bath and then tuck her inside a blanket.

It's not too bad cooking on the gas grill by lantern-light, using up whatever you can from the fridge (sautéed spinach anyone?).

Camping out in the playroom and cuddling in front of the fire are memories that will last a lifetime. {And though not very comfortably, I realized Joseph can fit in a pack-n-play if absolutely necessary.}

Valentine breakfast by candlelight is fun...and just might become a family tradition.

A completely cleaned-out refrigerator can make you very happy.

You can still look stylish.

Can you see Mollie, her BFF, above?

Our sweet valentine...

...And she made quick work of her box of chocolates.

Eventually, you come home, drive around the neighborhood....get to your house, and see - yes! - there is electricity.

And, in case you ever wondered what was going on, Joseph was always willing to tell you: "the uhyeckchipidy" went off. Thanks for the newsflash Joseph. Electricity...what a wonderful thing.

Throughout this whole process, we stayed positive. Concerned about the children, and a little antsy after 48 hours without power, but generally optimistic. {The one time we lost our positivity was when the alarm system kept going off during the night. After waiting to hear from a technician, Joe disconnected the battery.}

And Hannah and Joseph were fantastic. Kids are resilient like that, you know. They never complained about the dark or the cold. Obviously it's not something we want to do again, but the three days provided us with a lot of time together, and blessings to realize. We are thankful for our safety and the safety of our friends and church family. There are still some we know still without power, so we continue to pray for them and for the crews that have worked so hard to get our little city up and going again.

Ice Storm Pax is in our past, thankfully, but it's not likely to be forgotten.

let it snow

When we see snow in the forecast, we get pretty excited down here in the South. The whole world pretty much stops and it's just together time at home playing. Occasionally we are not prepared, things get chaotic, and we embarrass ourselves on the national news (as happened in Atlanta this time), but quite frankly this is not something the South is used to.

Tuesday night it was suppose to start snowing. Hannah could barely contain her excitement. Alas at 8pm when she went to bed there was no snow...just freezing rain. Joe and I were sitting on the sofa and could hear when the rain turned into sleet. After a while, it got quiet.

We opened the front door to see beautiful snow falling.

This is what the backyard looked liked when we went to bed:

And when we woke up, it looked like this:

And this little girl was speechless.

So we bundled up and headed outside to run around and play.

Pajamas and rain boots are ok, right?

...and socks on Joseph's hands because I couldn't find his gloves?

Hannah did not know what to make of her swing set...

Even Raffie got to enjoy the snow.

Joe taught the kids how to make snowballs and throw them at me. Very nice... But you know what they say about payback right? He got his!

We built snow people.

Bitty's hat for the girl and Joseph's for the boy. Junior mints for eyes. Joe called to my attention that our snow people did not have mouths... Oops. It was cold, is all I can say. Size of the snowman matters not. We were just excited to say we made one...two, actually!

Joseph did some cleaning...

and then we went inside to thaw out. A little while later, we set out for more fun...

And then we decided to go for a little drive to see Sandersville in the snow.

That's our church above... Sandersville UMC.

Hannah and Joseph liked looking at the preschool playground covered in snow.

We spent the rest of our time indoors, looking at the snow periodically from the playroom where we cuddled and played in front of a fire much of the day. {I did do some closet cleaning-out, committed to my goal of organizing and de-cluttering this house.} In the afternoon we made popcorn and watched Lady and the Tramp. It was a really good day. We are thankful for the blessing of a warm house when so many, even in our small town, don't have even that.

School was closed again today. Hopefully (for their sake and mine!) tomorrow they can go back. It's suppose to be 68 degrees on Sunday. Are you kidding me?