Aunt Lorraine

I don't know where to start.

I know it has been a seriously long time since I've blogged.

Until tonight it has also been a really long time since I talked to my parents or my sister Debbie.

I don't know where I am mentally.

On one hand I feel better than I've felt in a long, long time. I feel like me. I feel happy and confident and not depressed.

You would think that's a good thing.

But the days that I feel the best....I feel the worst.

Doesn't make sense, does it?

Christmas was great. For Christmas I planned a series of trips for the family. Link got a trip to Dublin with me in January. Hannah got a trip to Paris and London with me in February. Jake got a trip with the whole family to Niagara Falls in April.

I was happy. I was excited for our travels. I had actually paid for almost all of Christmas with the debit card and not the credit card.

And yet.

I cut.

I cut myself on Christmas. Two long slashes along my arm.

Why?

I don't know.

It had been one of the happiest days I've had in a long time.

But I did.

And then a few days later I was curled up in the fetal position afraid to take care of my kids while Link was at work.

Then New Years Eve came along.

Once again, it was a good day. We had Lincoln's brother and sister-in-law over. There was good food, a few drinks, and a fun time playing cards.

But the night ended in tears, a lot of cutting, and me in the treehouse by myself praying to a God I don't necessarily believe in.

I think about this blog all the time.

I have notes all over my desk about funny conversations that I've had with the kids. About things that are happening at work or at home.

And yet, I don't care.

I don't want to blog.

For a long time this blog was very enjoyable for me. I loved the fact that it's a diary of my kids' childhood.

And maybe that's why right now I don't want to record what is happening.

I'm happy and yet apparently I'm miserable. Maybe subconsciously I don't want to record what is happening in my life right now.

If I have learned nothing else over the past year, I've learned that depression is not something you can control or even understand.

And apparently it's not something I can conquer.

At least not yet. But I'm going to keep trying.

So, what does this have to do with Aunt Lorraine?

I don't know.

I was reading a book tonight and it made me think of her. How she lives in a very, very, VERY small town in Iowa and lives a fairly simple life with Uncle Bob. She is always warm and welcoming and even if you drop by without a moment's notice she'll lay out a spread of food like she has been expecting your visit for months.

She symbolizes home. And comfort. And family.

And whatever it was that I was reading earlier that triggered my memories of her got me to blog tonight about my problems.

I guess, in that way, she still symbolizes home, and comfort, and family.

And that's what I need to hold onto.

OMG....This kid NEVER shuts up

Jake talks.

A lot.

And I mean a LOT.

The other day he fell asleep in the car on the way to Kristen's soccer game. When he first woke up he started babbling incoherent sentences. I wasn't even sure he was speaking English. All we knew was that he was awake and therefore he had to be making noise.

Have I mentioned he talks a lot?

Since I walked in the door about an hour ago Jake hasn't been quiet for more than about 10 seconds at a time. He's either talking about school or Dinosaur Train or orange water (OJ mixed with water) or balloons. Seriously, he just talks.

And talks.

Jake: Today, on the bus ride home, it was REALLY quiet today.

Me: Oh yeah?

Link: Why, were you asleep?

(laughter from me, Link, and Hannah)

Hannah: I know! Let's play the quiet game!

(Lincoln, Hannah and I immediately stop talking.)

Jake: HOLD ON! HOLD ON! HOLD ON! Ready? Uno, dos, tres....

(silence for approximately 20 seconds)

Jake: (as he bites into his taco and starts chewing) Num, num, num, num

(The 3 of us burst into laughter again.)

Hannah: You should blog about that. I might blog about that. That is definitely blogworthy.

God bless single mothers (and fathers)

Yesterday was a rough day with Jake being sick. He started throwing up around 5:30 a.m. and by noon I had lost track of how many times he had gotten sick. Lincoln flew back from Virginia that morning and went straight to work so he didn't get home until almost 7 p.m. and I was on my own all day with a sick, feverish, miserable 5-year old. Jake and I did great all day but by the time Lincoln walked in the door I was ready to hand him off and go upstairs for a rest.

I don't know how single parents do it. I also don't know how people do it without family close by. We're lucky enough that Lincoln's parents live right around the corner from us and they could come pick up Hannah for me so that she could catch the bus without me having to bundle up Jake and take him out in the cold. Hannah gets on and off the bus at their house so it's not like she would just be at the bottom of the driveway and I could watch out the window. They also brought her home for me at the end of the day. Simple things like that - getting the healthy kid to the bus without disturbing the sick kid - would be so much harder without them living nearby.

Luckily Jake is feeling much better today. He slept fine last night and woke up asking for something to eat and drink this morning so we took him to Grandma and Grandpa's today. I never received a phone call that he had relapsed so hopefully we're all set with him. Now if we can just keep Hannah from getting sick.....

A great family and a great foundation

My father has 7 siblings and even figuring in one bachelor and one nun I still have 22 cousins on my dad's side of the family. It's a fairly big family but we've always been fairly close. I'm pretty sure that most Easters and Christmas Eves at Grandma Lentz's house had a majority - if not all - of us under one roof. Sure there is a huge age gap. The oldest grandchild is in his 40's and the youngest is 13 but, with the exception of the youngest five grandchildren, we all know each other fairly well even if we don't see each other all that often anymore. And it's not that we don't know those younger five, it's just that we didn't have as much time with them before the family started moving all over the country. We used to all be primarily living in Iowa and Illinois. Nowadays, just figuring in the 25 grandchildren on the Lentz side we cover states from Arizona to Massachusetts and Florida to Washington State and a heck of lot of other states in between. Most of Lincoln's family is confined to Massachusetts and Vermont and we see them less than we see mine. In fact, until Nate's funeral in December I had only met 2 of his cousins.

But this is what amazes me about my family. We're close in a way you wouldn't imagine. Do we talk to each other every day and know exactly what is going on in every one's life? No. But we know about the major events like weddings, births, and deaths. And we make sure to celebrate them - or mourn them - as a family.

This year we have two major family events. My cousin Rachel, the youngest of all the grandchildren, had her bat mitzvah in January and all the aunts and uncles, and a good number of the cousins, flew out to New Mexico to help her celebrate. This June my aunt, Sister Bonnie, is celebrating her Golden Jubilee (50 years as a nun) and it sounds like almost all of the cousins will be making it back as well as all of Sister's siblings. I'm flying back alone with both kids for 48 hours even though it means early morning flights that Jake will most likely throw up on. My cousin Brenda is flying in Saturday afternoon for the party and will turn around and fly back to North Carolina the next day.

In this day in age, when everyone is so busy and money is tight and we're spread from coast to coast, I am impressed at what a tight family I have. I am incredibly blessed and I know that all of the credit for creating this tight-knit family rests on my Dad and his siblings. All of them have shown us the meaning of family and it is obviously something that each and every one of us have learned through watching Grandma and Grandpa and their eight wonderful children. Thank you Linus, Charlotte, John, Sister, Dad, Rose, Mike and Joe for giving me such a great foundation.

(And no, I'm not discounting Mom's side of the family. They're pretty freaking awesome too but I only have three cousins on that side so it's not nearly as impressive.) BIG SMILE!

The Iowa Touch

My aunt Bonnie - better known as Sister Bonnie - is celebrating her Golden Jubilee (50 years as a nun) this June. Mom and Dad sent out the party information yesterday which included the hotel room stuff. I called the hotel this morning to book one of the rooms from the block and had a nice chat with the guy at the hotel. While I was doing all of this Lincoln was in the next room with the kids.

Me: Okay, I got the hotel room reserved for Iowa.

Link: You're already booking our Iowa trip for next summer?

Me: No, this is just for Sister Bonnie's jubilee weekend in June. I wanted to make sure we got a room in the hotel block.

Link: It sounded like you were talking to a friend in there.

Me: Well, it is a hotel in small town Iowa. Same thing.

Nate

Yesterday morning Lincoln's brother Nathan passed away. Nate was 41 years old and had been dealing with some health issues but this was still fairly unexpected. He was alone when he died and since it was an "unattended" death they are performing an autopsy. Hopefully we will know more in a few days.

Please keep Lincoln and his family in your thoughts and prayers during this very difficult time.

One year later

A year ago today my father called me at work to tell me that my Uncle Linus had died in a car accident. A few days later I was driving to his wake and a song came on the iPod I had playing in the car. It was "Seasons of Love" from the musical RENT. If you're familiar with the song you know that it's all about measuring a year in the life of a person. The song completely broke my heart because I knew that Uncle Linus had been on his way to the VFW later that day for a Veterans' Day celebration and I knew that he had attended the exact same event the year before. When he sat there on November 11, 2007, with all of his friends, he didn't know that he wouldn't be there for the same event the next year. He didn't know that exactly one year later he would die in a tragic car accident. He didn't know that a few weeks after that day when he sat there having coffee and chatting with his friends that it would be his last Thanksgiving, or his last Christmas, or his last birthday. None of us did. When I last saw him a few weeks before he died I never imagined it would be the last time.

Here we are, one year later. We've all made it. We've all been able to celebrate another Thanksgiving and another Christmas and another round of birthdays with those we love. I look back at the past year and everything that I have been blessed with and the times that I've had with my husband and my children and my family and I know that at any time it could all be taken away. Because if we learned nothing else with Uncle Linus's death, I think we all learned that even if you were blessed with 70 of them, it's never enough. A year goes by way too quickly.

He was gone way too soon but we were all the better off for having known him and having him in our lives. In his honor today please go out and hug all of those you love. Let them know how you feel and pretend like every moment could be your last.

I miss you Uncle Linus......

Tomorrow

Tomorrow is the anniversary of Uncle Linus's death. His death has been incredibly rough on me. I didn't get to see Uncle Linus all that often. I probably saw him every year or two when we not only managed to make it back to the Midwest but also made it to Elma to see Dad's side of the family. It's not like I talked with him every day or called him just to chat but I've missed him every single day since he has been gone.

I think a lot of it was the suddenness of his death. He died in a car accident under unexplainable circumstances. Was it icy? Did he have a heart attack? Did a deer run out in front of him? No one knows and no one ever will. He was going about his business like he would any other morning and had plans to go to the Veterans' Day breakfast at the VFW. He never made it there. Gone. Just gone. No explanation. No time to say good-bye. Nothing.

About 7 weeks before Linus died my Grandma passed away. That was the last time I got to see Uncle Linus. Despite the sad circumstances of Grandma's death it was nice to see all of my cousins (there are 25 of us) and all of my aunts and uncles (all 7 of them plus my Dad). After Grandma's funeral my Dad and his siblings were sitting at a table in the garage going through all the condolence cards that had been left at the church. With that many people working on it they certainly didn't need my help but I sat down at the table anyway and happened to sit across from Linus. He and I worked together and had a nice little chat. Afterwards he was laughing because I recorded the Elma siren (which goes off every day at 7 a.m., 12 noon, and 6 p.m.) on my Palm Treo and set it as my ring tone. The Elma siren is something I always associate with going to visit Grandma so at the time it seemed very appropriate despite the fact that having a fire siren for a ring tone isn't terribly practical. Uncle Linus loved it. He called my phone multiple times and would crack up every time it rang. As others came out of the house he would have me show them what I did.

And that was the last time I saw him alive. Before that I don't know how long it had been since I had seen him. As much as I miss Grandma Lentz her passing was such a blessing for me - and I suspect many of my cousins as well - because we got to spend one last visit with Uncle Linus. At Grandma's wake he gave me a huge hug and held me tight. That's what I remember. That hug and that project with the condolence cards and that silly ring tone. And I am so grateful for all of that because that time was so special and I will take that with me always.

I miss you Uncle Linus.

20th Century Swine Flu

November 11th will mark the 1st anniversary of my Uncle Linus's death. I can't believe it has already been a year almost. I'm working on a memorial project that I'm putting together for the anniversary of his death and my cousin Karen sent me a disc full of photos and newspaper clippings. As I was going through the disc tonight I noticed this newspaper clipping that must have been taken back in the 1970s or '80s when Uncle Linus was receiving his swine flu shot.

I really wish he was here to get the swine flu now.

Righting Wrongs (or what Jake thinks is wrong)

The pretext of our surprise trip to Washington, DC yesterday was to replace the current pictures in our bedroom showing Lincoln, Hannah and me in Washington, DC when Hannah was a baby with pictures of all 4 of us in Washington, DC.

Mission accomplished:

June 2002:

October 2009:

Feeding an army.....An army of one that is

Tomorrow night my cousin Greg, his wife Misty, and their two friends are coming to our house to spend the night during their trip to New England. I'm very excited for them to come and visit but I'm a little nervous about what we're going to feed them.

My Aunt Lorraine and Uncle Bob raised three boys. Three BIG boys. And I don't mean big as in fat. I mean big as in big, brawny, strapping, muscular good 'ol Iowa boys. The kind that think a standard box of cereal is a single serving size. And usually is when consumed in a mixing bowl instead of a regular cereal bowl. I always used to be in awe that Aunt Lorraine can throw together a huge dinner when guests drop by unexpectedly but now I'm starting to realize that what is a huge dinner spread to her guests is probably only equivalent to what she set out as a light afternoon snack when the boys were all in high school.

When I was in high school I stayed with Greg and his first wife Marilyn for a few weeks one summer. I volunteered to cook dinner one night and proudly made a recipe for enchiladas that I had learned in Home Ec during the previous school year. The recipe made eight enchiladas and I remember telling Marilyn that it was probably more than we needed since there was only three of us and their toddler son but she gave me a look and said "not with Greg around." We sat down for dinner with the pan of enchiladas in the middle of the table and I remember Greg picked up the spatula and scooped out four of them for his plate.

So the question becomes, what the heck do we feed them tomorrow night? Lincoln and I are not used to cooking meals like that. Tonight we had ham steaks and mashed potatoes. Lincoln cooked two steaks and between the four of us we only ate one. I think tomorrow night we'll have to pull an "Aunt Charlotte" and make a huge vat of spaghetti with a big salad and a few loafs of garlic bread. I call it the Aunt Charlotte because she had 9 kids and one of the only things I remember from her house was the incredibly large pot of spaghetti that she made when we came to visit.

Despite needing to truck in groceries - not to mention the beer - needed for tomorrow night I am VERY excited for their visit and can't wait to see them. It should be a great time.

An eye-opening experience

I have always been a firm believer that if you're going to have a child you should have at least two. Typically, in my opinion, only children generally grow up to be spoiled plus they have no close sibling relationships (obviously) and when their parents are driving them crazy (or God forbid, deceased) they have no one to commiserate with.

A few weeks ago the sister of one of my dearest, closest, bestest friends gave birth to her second child. The sister's husband also has a blog and she occasionally guest posts on there. During her pregnancy both her and her husband expressed concerns about the fact that their little family of three would now become four and how that would affect their relationship with their daughter. It sort of boggled my mind that they thought that way because it never crossed my mind with Hannah. Lincoln and I knew we wanted more than one child. Heck, originally we said "no more than four" but later decided two was a really, really good number. I thought about having two kids in the terms of Hannah having a younger sibling and the new baby...ultimately Jake....having a big sister. I thought about how they would interact and how they would play together. How if it was two girls they could grow up to be best friends (and occasionally worst enemies as any girl with a sister will tell you). How if it was a boy Hannah would grow up to think he was a pest and how he would grow up to have crushes on Hannah's friends. Or his friends would grow up to have crushes on her. As the youngest of three kids I never thought about how the parental relationship with the elder child would change. I mean, after all, wasn't the greatest thing that ever happened to my parents and older sisters my arrival in this world?

A little over 48 hours ago we handed off Hannah to my parents for three weeks. In the weeks leading up to this adventure I thought about how much I would miss her and how it would affect her. Would she enjoy it? Would she be homesick? I remember Rachel and me clinging to each other under a tree at Camp Tahigwa and wailing at the thought of being away from home for a week. And that was only a short drive away from my house. Hannah will be hours away....BY AIRPLANE!!! What if she is miserable? She has no one to cling to under the tree and no way to get home.

But I digress.....

I thought about this trip in the many ways it would affect Hannah and how it would affect me. I miss her terribly but I know this is a great experience for her and that she is going to really enjoy it. I also worried about how it would affect Jake. I told myself it would make him more independent but I also worried about how much harder it would be to deal with him without having Hannah to keep him busy. She's a great big sister and a great helper when we need someone to watch him while Lincoln and I are busy. I'll admit a small part of me selfishly wanted to keep her here because it would make things easier on us.

But I never expected this.

I never expected how much more I could love and appreciate Jake. I've loved and adored Jake since the minute he came out of me looking like a grumpy old man. But to a degree he has always been Lincoln's. Hannah is my little girl and Jake is a Daddy's boy. When he was younger he used to tell me to leave the room whenever I walked in because he didn't want me to interrupt his Daddy time. Daddy is the one he wants when he has to go to the bathroom. Daddy is the one he wants to play Star Wars with. Daddy is the one he wants to read him a book at night. And I've been okay with that because I have Hannah. She's my little girl. She's my snuggler and my best friend. She draws me pictures and wants to know how my day was. She wants to be like me and is always asking when our next "girl day" is going to happen. When we go to restaurants Lincoln and Jake sit on one side of the booth and Hannah and I sit on the other side. In hotels Lincoln and Jake share a bed and Hannah and I share one. Since 1:14 a.m. on August 18, 2001 she is me and I am her.

But as much as I miss her I really am enjoying seeing Jake in a new light. I never thought about this before but Lincoln and I have never experienced a four and a half year old without a baby in tow. Once Jake was born, when Hannah was almost three and a half, our attention was split in two. And he's a riot now. I've always appreciated the humor he has brought into our lives but these last few days he has been that much more. More everything. More caring and funny and sweet and considerate and just plain more Jake. I love it.

Saturday night when we stayed in the hotel and Jake slept with Lincoln and I slept alone I missed Hannah terribly. When we stopped for meals and I had the entire side of the booth to myself I missed Hannah terribly. But I also sat there in awe as I watched Jake just be Jake without any distractions or comparisons to his older sister or having to divide my attention. It was incredible.

Don't get me wrong...I can't wait for Hannah to come home. I am counting the days and the next three weeks are going to be terribly hard on me but I don't think they'll be as hard as originally anticipated. I love getting calls from Mom about all the things that Hannah is doing while she is with them and how well she's behaving and how much she's proving to be a wonderful, caring, responsible, and social little girl but I'm also going to enjoy the next three weeks by taking the time to experience what we've never had before....Jake. Just Jake. And all the wonder he brings with him.

Star light, star bright....

....first star I see tonight. Wish I may, wish I might, have the wish I wish tonight.

Swimming, dinner poolside, s'mores, fire flies.....family. A perfect summer night.

Update on the Snow's

I'm sorry that I really haven't posted much this week except for a few quick updates on our doctor appointments. This week has been a doozy. On top of the usual things life throws our way I've also been dealing with the scheduling of doctors appointments, tracking down yearbook waivers, and of course, working on the yearbook itself. Wednesday night I also went with Tracy to see Katy Perry at the House of Blues, Thursday night was my PTO board meeting, and tonight is the Math Family Fun Night (isn't that an oxymoron?) and basket raffle. The few minutes that I actually have to sit down and not do anything the last thing I want is to be sitting at a desk and typing on my computer. I just want to veg.

So.....quick recap on everything I didn't write about this week:

KATY PERRY: Great show! Tracy and I had a great time and Katy puts on a fantastic show. Tracy even bought me a Katy Perry cherry chapstick from the merch stand. I told her I would treasure it as much as the NKOTB key chain she got me at their concert last year. It's the little things that make me happy.

PTO BOARD MEETING: I made it through the board meeting without volunteering to be on next year's board. I really need a break. I did, however, volunteer to chair the Fall Family Fun Night but that is something that I had really wanted to do this year but it didn't happen because of my other commitments. I chaired a FFN back in November 2006 and I loved doing it. The theme that year was "Around the World" and we set up seven rooms as the seven continents. We had sno-cones in Antarctica, karate demonstrations and lessons on using chopsticks in Asia, we had a drum group in Africa, a kangaroo (yes, a live one!) in Australia.....you get the drift. Next Fall I'm doing a Time Travel one to tie into History and Social Studies lessons. I'm actually really excited about it.

MATH FAMILY FUN NIGHT/BASKET RAFFLE: Tonight is the Math FFN which I honestly just don't see as potentially fun but I'm sure it will be for the kids. The co-chairs have put a lot of work into it and my understanding is there is a train theme and kids get to go around to different "train stops" and play games that fool them into thinking that math doesn't suck. (Gee, can you tell how I felt about math class through my educational years?) This is also the night of the PTO spring fundraiser which is a basket raffle. Each classroom chooses a theme and the kids all bring in one item that goes with their classroom theme. The baskets are then raffled off. Hannah's class chose the New England Patriots/Football as their theme so Hannah contributed a Patriots' Monopoly game. I co-chaired this event last year with my friend Denise and I have to say, I'm glad I'm not doing it again. It's a lot of work and I would have loved to have been involved again but there is no way I could do it at the same time as the yearbook without me ending up curled in the fetal position and Lincoln wanting to divorce me and the kids turning me in to Child Services for having abandoned them. See Lincoln....I am learning how to say "no" to things.

This weekend brings more yearbook (what else?), a hair appointment, and about a million other things that I don't have time for but the good news is that I talked Hannah out of having her slumber party this weekend. I just couldn't do it. I told her we'd choose another weekend sometime soon but neglected to tell her that it probably won't be until the end of May. This weekend is out, next weekend is Easter, the weekend after that is our trip to Niagara Falls, the weekend after that is April Break (which a lot of people go out of town for), the next weekend is Derby weekend, and then Grandma and Grandpa are out here the following weekend so that puts us into middle or late May for her slumber party. I'll just sell it to her as an "end of the school year party" if she complains about it. I'm certain I can get her to buy into that.

And that's all folks..... Thank you for reading the latest installment on the crazy life of the Snow Family.

Baby Lincoln!

Yesterday morning we had a nice little get together with Lincoln's parents and his aunt and uncle Russ and Elaine. Even though Lincoln's family is quite close geographically we don't actually get to see them very often so yesterday was a great day to sit and catch up. They also keep up on our day to day life by reading this blog so it's nice to know that even though they're not around our kids very often they can keep up on how they're growing and what they're doing.

The picture above is one that they sent me this morning of Lincoln when he was a little younger than Jake at a "Christmas in July" one year. Isn't he adorable?

The other thing that I have to mention about the get-together is that it's absolutely hilarious to watch Russ needle my father-in-law. I can just imagine what a pain-in-the-ass little brother he must have been for Bob when they were growing up but it's great to see that even in their 70's they still have such a close relationship.

An unwanted heating source

I absolutely hate when either of my children are sick. Hannah has a terrible bug right now and is fighting a croupy cough and a fever. She was curled up in my lap a minutes ago waiting for the medicine to kick in and I absolutely hate that feeling of heat radiating of her little body. I would do anything if I could be the one that could be sick for them instead. I don't like the look in their eyes when they're sick. It's so sad. So "Mommy, why can't you make me better" that it breaks my heart.

The longest 1 1/2 miles of my life

Yesterday we got a bunch of snow again. We didn't get too much accumulation but it was steady throughout the day. Our office closed at 4 p.m. so that people could head home before dark for fear that the roads would be pretty bad. My drive home on the Mass Pike was pretty good but you could tell that side roads weren't in the greatest condition. When I get off the interstate it's only about 3 miles of side roads until I'm home. The first mile and a half is a fairly busy road (especially at rush hour) and therefore was in pretty good condition. The last mile and a half was horrible. The roads hadn't really been plowed or sanded. It was slushy and slick and even worse than the day I had my near accident on that very same stretch of road.

That last mile and a half, with my hands clenching the steering wheel and tears streaming down my face, all I could think of was "Did Linus know he was going to die?" and "Did it hurt?"

God I really hope the answer was "no" to both. Whenever I think of how quickly Linus was taken from this Earth my heart is gripped in fear. I hate sending Lincoln out to work and I hate having the kids with me (or out with Lincoln) on even remotely icy days. I hate this fear but I appreciate how much it makes me value every moment I have with my family even more than I did before.

Happy Birthday Grandma Lentz

Today would have been Grandma Lentz's 95th birthday. I wish she was still here.

You can think a lot of thoughts in less than 10 seconds

Ever since my Uncle Linus passed away in a car accident back in November I have been haunted by the image of how it must have happened. I have an hour commute in both directions when I travel to and from work which allows for a lot of time thinking. It's not unusual for me to think about Linus's accident as I drive and it always makes me sad and a little freaked out.

Last night we got a few inches of snow and then this morning everything turned over to a nasty icy slush as it started to rain. School had a 2-hour delay this morning and my office even opened an hour and a half late in order for people to get to work safely. Lincoln and I both left the house about the same time. He had the kids and was taking Jake to Grandma and Grandpa's and then dropping Hannah off at school (I won't let her ride the bus on icy days) and I was heading straight to work. I pulled out of the driveway first as he was finishing up clearing off his truck to get ready to leave. Our road, the short little extension street that we live on, wasn't cleared yet and was pretty slushy and icy but I got up it without any trouble.

I turned onto the secondary road, one of two that I have to take to the highway, and it had been plowed and was in better condition than our street but was still a little slushy so I was being very careful as I drove down it. I wasn't talking on my cell phone, reaching for my radio or adjusting the temperature in the car. I had both hands on the wheel and was concentrating on driving down the road when all of a sudden I went into a horrible slide and started heading into the ditch and right towards a fairly good sized tree. As I started chanting "Oh my God. Oh my God." and correcting my steering while pumping my brakes (as any good Minnesotan will tell you to do) I managed to get back up on the road but my car started to spin and lean to the right as though it was going to tip over. When all was said and done I had spun around almost 180 degrees and was straddling both sides of the yellow line. Thank God there wasn't any oncoming traffic (or anyone behind me) or there could have been a serious accident.

They say your life flashes before your eyes in those situations and that was very true. Every thought I had was about my family and they certainly are my life. During those horrible few seconds...it had to have been less than 10 seconds because it all happened so fast....I had the following thoughts:

1. "Oh my God....my babies!!!" (as in they're going to be motherless and I don't want them to be sad and not because I thought they were in the car with me.)
2. "Thank God my babies aren't in the car with me."
3. "Lincoln! He's going to be so sad and he's going to have to raise Jake and Hannah without me."
4. And as the car started to tip I thought about Uncle Linus. I just had a vision of him and thought "Oh my God, this is what it was like for him. How horrible."

Luckily nothing bad happened. I corrected the car and it didn't flip over. I didn't hit a tree or another car and no one was hurt. Thank God. And quite possibly "Thank you Uncle Linus". I honestly think he may have been looking out for me. Maybe the vision I had of him was him actually coming down to protect me.

Once I caught my breath and got the car back on the road (heading back the way I came since I was completely turned around) I looked down and realized I didn't have my seat belt on. What the hell? I always have my seat belt on. I usually back the car up into the turn around at the top of our driveway and then put my seat belt on as I start pulling forward to go down the driveway. This morning I got in my car and backed up into the turn around but then realized that I had rain droplets all over my glasses so I took them of and was using my shirt to wipe them clean. I must have driven off then without noticing that I didn't have my seat belt on.

I guess God really does look out for idiots and fools. And Uncle Linus looks out for family.

Our mailman is back on the "nice" list (for now)

He's still a persnickety ass when it comes to delivering mail when it snows but he did bring me lots of fun stuff today. In addition to the yummy peanut clusters that my Dad made me he also brought me a bunch of holiday cards.

One of the ones I received today was from my friend Cyndi. Unfortunately I lost touch with Cyndi around the time I was pregnant with Jake so I haven't talked to her in years. She sent a note along with a picture of her incredibly adorable son. I am so excited to re-connect with her after all this time.

The other fun card (and adorable family picture) we got was from Lincoln's cousin Kristin. I have never met Kristin or her family but apparently she is a reader of this blog (Hi Kristin!) and presumably got our address from her parents (who also read this blog - Hi Russ and Elaine!). I have so much fun doing this blog and I'm really excited that it has allowed people that wouldn't normally know much about our family and our children a little glimpse into our lives. Hopefully I'll get to meet Kristin and her family someday.

Over the last few weeks we've gotten a number of great family photographs and Christmas cards. I had my children when I was relatively young by today's reproductive societal standards (24 and 27 respectively) but a lot of my friends are just starting out with their families. I love getting the pictures of their children at Christmas. I love looking at all the little babies and toddlers and it makes me think about how fast my own kids are growing up. It's amazing.

Anyhoo....I'm temporarily taking our mailman off the naughty list....at least until the next snowstorm.