Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow

Sticky Bun Riseth

7:40

It's 7:30 and Marisa is happily playing backgammon with her father, up early despite the fact that school has been cancelled for the day because of snow, about three inches.  It is a winter wonderland out, tree branches frosted with a wet snow, roads still white, no plows out yet.  It looks like a lazy day, as everyone will most likely be home. After all, it snowed a couple of inches.

Yesterday, as I mentioned, was a two hour school delay because of ice.  So, I played chauffeur in the morning, taking Ramiro to the train at 7:45, Mitchell to school at 9:00, Marisa to the bus at 9:25.  It was milder than I expected and roads were fine, just wet because the trucks had been out early morning.  Beth also was out for the morning at her workshop, so it was just Evie and me for most of the morning.  We did our usual, cleaning up the kitchen, trying to figure out what we should do for dinner since Marisa had Irish dancing at 7:00 in Stamford.  The last two weeks, we would drop her off and go out for dinner.  That sounded good, so we didn't worry about dinner, thinking that the rest of the family could have leftovers or take out, whichever they liked.

Dough Arisin'

The major effort of the morning and afternoon was Evie making her famous 'sticky buns,' 36 of them, three glorious trays of dough, sugar, and cinnamon.  While I did up the dishes, Evie put together the dough, let it rise for a couple of hours, then divided the dough into thirds, rolled each into a rectangle, brushed with melted butter, sprinkled with cinnamon sugar, rolled jellyroll fashion and cut into 12 rolls.  She then let them rise again for a couple of hours, waiting till about 1:30 before baking them, so they would be warm when Marisa and Mitch came home from school.  Of course, I had to try a couple, just to make sure they were up to snuff. They were.  The kids went crazy when they saw them sitting on the counter, begged for more of course, then settled in to do their homework in their bedrooms, despite the sugar high.  During the afternoon, I watched the Kansas/West Virginia game I had DVRed, a great comeback by Kansas to win in overtime.

Falling Pond Water

And I read some, took a short nap, then took Cody out for the second walk of the day.  He seemed to be limping in the morning, but was fine during the afternoon walk.  I worry about his paws, on the snow, ice, and asphalt, especially since he had not walked much before we got here a month ago.  But he is fine, always anxious to go for a walk.

Marisa In The Morning

Marisa worked diligently on her homework for at least an hour and a half (we know not to bother her) and when finished, begged her Mom to skip Irish Dancing.  It worked, so none of us had to go out in the night.  Rami was not getting home till 7:45, so we decided to have Chinese Take Out for dinner, ordered it so Mitchell could pick it up on his way to get Rami at the train station.  It was nice for Evie and Beth to have a night off from cooking dinner.  We ate around the coffee table in the sunroom, watching The Middle, one of Marisa's favorite shows.  After she went to bed, the four of us watched Better Call Saul, which I still am not taken with, then another episode of House of Cards, Season Two.  We were in bed just before 11:00, everyone hoping for a snow day so the kids and adults could sleep in. It worked.

We had some excitement early, when Marisa and Ramiro got up.  There were squirrels in the bird cage, ravaging the sun flower seeds, so Marisa took a video of them.  Then, Cody went outside, cornered about the squirrel on the pole, then chased it through at least a foot of snow, into the bushes.  It was hilarious to watch the two of them.  That was our excitement for the morning so far.

It's now 8:30, Evie, Beth, and Mitchell are still sleeping.  I am finishing my blog and Marisa and Rami are playing a video game on the Xbox.  And it's still snowing out.