The Blizzard of 2016/Winter Storm Jonas has come and gone. I’m still not planning on going anywhere today; waiting for the sun to melt my car out. We were able to walk to school this morning without too much trouble.

Here’s how we spent our weekend snow days:

Made three small batches of cookies: oatmeal snickerdoodles, chocolate chip, and sugar. Gave some to my neighbors who used their snowblower on our sidewalk. I let the kids handle the sugar cookies, and our neighbor friend did a good job rolling them out and cutting them.

Made “chicken soup on crack” (crockpot chicken and dumplings) on Saturday and saved it for Sunday’s dinner. Dinner Saturday night was quesadillas, leftover chicken piccata and mashed potatoes from Friday, chicken nuggets, and applesauce.

Tonight, Monday, we are having spaghetti and meatballs; I am making the gravy now.

Saturday evening after dinner, the boys played outside in the snow in the dark with the next door neighbor kids, who had built a sort of luge (and their parents built a fire). If I hadn’t been so tired I’d have gone out and had a beer by the fire. The snow was a bit much for baby girl, who also has a bad cough. That night we rented “The Martian,” and everyone but my daughter stayed up to watch it. Except for a couple F-bombs, it was kid-appropriate, as it was wholly focused on science and adventure and heroism. Unfortunately I fell asleep right before the ending, which says a lot more about me than the movie. I hope I live to see Earthlings on Mars 🙂

Sunday, my friend took my boys sledding with her kids. Thank you C.! I would have gone if my daughter had been up to it. The storm has brought my husband new business, so he was busy with that. But my daughter and I did go out for a bit to shovel and build some Jabba-the-Hutt-looking snowmen. Then it was laundry, and cooking and pureeing cauliflower. Felt good about that, since I haven’t done that in forever. Hid some in the chicken soup.

I found a few minutes here and there, in between people bursting inside crying because so-and-so threw snow in their face, to read my new library book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver. More on that later! I know I am always saying this about books, but this one could really be the game changer. It is giving me so very much to think about.

It was a nice cozy weekend, and I enjoyed feeling like there was pretty much nothing to do but cook and bake and read.

Backtracking a bit: Friday, I made it to the Y and swam some laps! How great to be in an 86-degree pool, looking at the cold white sky and pale winter sun outside the big windows.

Thursday, I kept my daughter home from school and she and I did a bunch of errands. Bank, pre-storm food shopping, and CVS for prescriptions before lunch. I forgot to buy paper towels, so we had to face the blizzard without any. Which served as a very good reminder that they aren’t that necessary. After lunch, we took the new guinea pigs to the vet because I had noticed one was wheezing. Walked out with an antibiotic, and can now add “administering medicine to small rodents” to my resume. I also got the house back in order and took care of a bunch of PTA administrative stuff.

Wednesday I had a bit of “me” time. Went to the library, then took a stroll down the Avenue and ended up at Clutter. Bought a necklace, contemplated a cool turquoise serving stand… walked out… turned around after one block, went back and bought it. It’s just too cool. I’ll call them the last of my Christmas gifts to myself. At least they are both used!

While downtown, I spied work being done on the new grocery store. McFarlan’s is coming to our avenue and I just can’t wait for it to be ready.

I also got yet another sample of paint for the foyer and sat down and made a list of what exactly needs to be done in there.

This week looks to be not too crazy. Might get some long-term to-do items taken care of… might start working on the foyer. Definitely will finish the book and will be writing about that.