Today is the first day above freezing since Christmas. It's been a brutal couple weeks that have taken me back to that February three years ago that was so cold for the entire month that it literally left me a bit traumatized. There's little worse than completely dreading going outside your house, because it just makes average daily life that much more difficult to face. I have enough hermit qualities without adding fear of the bitter cold to the list of things keeping me indoors. Between the constant cold and the near-constant snow, we have at least a foot of snow on the ground, which seems low considering how it did seem to snow for days on end. But we had enough wind to blow it around that some areas are extra deep and some are extra shallow. Jacob and I were chiseling up two-inch-thick slabs of ice from our driveway yesterday that have built up for the last three weeks or so. It was still bitterly cold yesterday, but for some reason that stuff was coming right up. Today it's finally in the mid-30s (it felt like the mid-40s when I was out this morning--the only upside of consistently cold weather) and you could already tell that the remaining snow was condensing and whatever was disturbed was turning into total slush. Lovely. The plow came through and cleared out our road, but now we have a heavy load of crap at the bottom of the driveway...but since it's going to be warmer in two days, there's no sense shoveling it now. Ironically, it was still snowing this morning in the midst of all the melting, but by later in the week it will almost hit 50, so who knows what kind of mess we'll be dealing with then.
The Bills lost their playoff game yesterday, which was a bummer but not entirely unexpected. It was a defensive showdown and the Bills' no-show offense was helped along by a couple bad calls by the referees. It was sad, but I'm still glad we had a little moment, and hopefully next year they'll come back stronger. Or, if nothing else, we're no longer the team with the longest playoff drought. During the game I managed to take down the Christmas tree, which was on the heels of de-Christmasing the rest of the house on Saturday. Part of me felt like it was a little early (usually I aim for the 10th, but with the weekend falling as it did, next weekend felt too late), but part of me was just ready to get back to normal. Between different seating arrangements, toy storage, and the daunting task of putting everything away, I just felt like it had to happen ASAP. Normally the house feels empty afterward, but since I started saving most of my snowmen for January decorating, it's not so bad. And I love the little $4 string of icicle lights I bought from Aldi last month. They look really cute on the fireplace mantel. They strangely help. I have a few final things to get back to normal or finish putting away, but I'm thankful I got so much done.
Tomorrow night is Carter's first night of soccer. We signed him up for the same program that Jacob did when he was four, ironically in the same time period Jacob did it. His was on Thursdays and Carter's is on Tuesdays (at the same time as Jacob's lacrosse practice--score!), but the last day is February 13...just one day away from five years to the day of Jacob's last session on Valentine's Day...less than 24 hours before I was in the hospital in labor! Funny little full circle moment. We're interested to see how he does. He's generally better socially than Jacob was, I think--at least as far as sports go, since Jacob was rather particular about that and most kids didn't really understand that--but he also tends to want to quit things when he's not doing well, so we'll see. Of course, when we went to find Jacob's shin guards, we're one sleeve short and his tiny little cleats are nowhere to be found. Sneakers will be fine for Carter, I think, but we did have to shell out a few bucks for some new shin guards. Darn it. Fingers crossed this is the thing that gets him into sports so he and Jacob can bond a little more over that.
On Wednesday we go for Jacob's quarterly med check-in. We should be officially getting him set up for a little bonus dose of medicine in the evenings, which we've been testing out (with the doctor's OK) with leftover medicine since our last big blow-up in early December. It's worked pretty well, and when he missed a few doses because we needed to stretch out what we had left, I could definitely tell the difference. I don't like being reliant on the medicine, but I honestly just hope it's just something to get us through until true maturity helps him manage this stuff better on his own. That might be wishful thinking, but I have to keep that hope for now. We still have a lot to work through, but I'm happy he's managing well at school and things have been a bit more tolerable at home. We still have our moments, but most of the time we get through.
Carter is a loving handful as usual and we're currently fighting a major screen time battle with him. He has taken to electronics like Jacob took to sports, so it's a constant fight to limit his time and still keep him happily occupied. I think sometimes he forgets he has real toys, so we often have to redirect him to those, and when we do, he plays just fine. But eventually he wants to come back to a screen. On one hand I get it--I spend a lot of time in front of screens because it's how I decompress. But he's a kid and should be maximizing his creative time while he's still a kid. It doesn't help that Craig loves watching TV and the screens are one thing that keep the kids away from each other. So, we're still working through enforceable limits. But in less than six weeks he will turn five and my baby won't be my baby anymore! I'm trying to ignore the winter weather by planning his birthday--picking presents, setting a party date, and trying to find a cake that suits him. How are we here already?!
I had a little moment of sadness when I noticed that my annual blog posts fell under 100 for the first time ever in 2017. I've been on a bit of a decline for the past few years, and I suppose that's just a natural evolution. That I've kept this going this long is actually pretty amazing, as most of the bloggers I've followed since I started this one have come and gone since. The kids are getting older, so there are fewer adorable baby pictures and more second thoughts about sharing every little detail. I can only rehash our issues with the kids so many times before this gets more boring than it usually is, and most of the big stuff has already been covered at least once, if not twice. Most of what I do now is either to vent, work through some thoughts, or to document stuff so I remember it down the road. Parenthood is such a blur sometimes and I feel like I'd be lost without this blog and my thousands of photos to refresh and trigger memories. So...I keep going.
Right now I'm living for my day off next Monday with Jacob and another day I'll take with Carter hopefully the following week. Work has cooled down a bit from the end of the year, but a very stressful period is coming up and without having had an extended break in ages, I think I'm getting a little burned out. This time of year always gets me a bit as two out of three years I had some time off (first for maternity leave, then when I lost my job), and while I don't need to relive either of those scenarios, sometimes I get a little wistful for quiet days in the house snuggled on the couch. Hopefully we can make the most of those days off, and hopefully I can sneak in a few solid vacation days for myself before I have to start taking time off for lacrosse tournaments. Seems a lifetime away right now, but I have a feeling it'll be here before we know it.
All right, time for bed. More soon...
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