January

January was one long bitter cold month.  We spent most of the month couped up in our house.  We had lots of no school days or delayed starts because of the cold.  Leila and Grey's winter vacation was extended due to the freezing cold.  Anytime we needed to go anywhere we had to completely cover ourselves, no skin exposed.  Trying to bundle up 3 kids is a chore so most days we stayed in and only ventured out to go grocery shopping, get kids to school or get Leila to gymnastics. We couldn't even enjoy all the snow we were getting it was just to cold to be outside.   Its pretty sad when we are excited to see a 20 degree day in the forecast.   We also had some trouble with the water line to our fridge,  if the temperature drops into the negatives it freezes and I can't figure out a way to prevent it, I can't leave it dripping and its connected to all the water in our kitchen so I can't turn the line off.  Luckily the line hasn't broken it thaws out when the temperature rises.  Unfortunately we had some other trouble with it and thought the pipe broke (which it hadn't) but we had leaking water,  after all  the  stress we ended up with a  unneeded hole in our basement ceiling and a new connection to the fridge.  

Over New Years we all got sick and were pretty miserable.  Lots of movies and cuddling on the couch.

We did venture over to our neighbors house on New Years Eve for snacks and I'm  pretty sure my kids didn't even make it to 9 o'clock, they crashed out on the couch.  

The kids spent lots of time sitting by the fire reading ad playing games.  I'm so thankfully for our fireplace we had it running most of the month of January.  

These two boys get to spend a lot of time together and seem to finally be enjoying each others company.  I find them cuddled together a lot!  We actually moved their rooms all around.  Leila is now in her own bedroom and loving it.  The boys cant get into her things and she can stay up late reading and it doesn't bug anyone.  The boys are now together in the big room.  At first they were bugging each other and keeping one another up but now they are pretty good about just going to sleep.  

Leila celebrated the 100th day of school.  They got to dress up like they were 100 years old and the participate in a bunch of 100 themed activities.  She has been talking about this day for months and had so much fun!  I was lucky enough to be volunteering that day at school and got to help with some of the activities and see all the kids dressed up.  

 The bus stop is so very cold in the morning, thankfully her bus driver is almost always on time and so we are only out there for a minute or two.  

They boys found entertainment playing hockey with a roll of wrapping paper.  They keep asking if they can ride bikes or set up their soccer net.  Occasionally I let them bring their bikes inside to ride and every Friday we go to the church and ride bikes and scooters in the gym.  Little boys just have to many wiggles for a cold Iowa winter.  

One morning Greydon wasn't feeling well and was watching cartoons on the couch, when I came downstairs Asher had climbed up and was cuddling a sleeping Greydon.  They really are sweet brothers some of the time.  

I'm sure there is more we did during the month but it is all kind of a big blur or cabin fever.