Snowed in for Christmas Eve

We were snowed in today. We were supposed to go to Dave's folks' for our Christmas Eve celebration, but the weather was not cooperative. In fact, the weather has not been cooperative all season. Above is a picture of the front of our house. We have a wrap around deck that extends across the entire front side and wraps around the porch to the back of the house. As you can see in the picture the snow is as high as the deck. Our windows in the front of the house sit lower than the snow line right now. We are continually shoveling a pathway from the front door down the stairs and out to our car. I am used to snow. I grew up in a lakeshore community where "lake effect" was a term that was well known and dreaded, but I have never experienced snow quite like this!

I had to rescue our mailbox this afternoon. Whenever the plow goes past (as infrequently as that happens), our mailbox is knocked off its post and goes flying into the ditch. This often results in us not getting mail. Today when I went down into the ditch to retrieve the box, I promptly found myself in snow past my waist. I got a little panicked when I realized how deep I was in and that the embankment that led back to the road was as high as my head. It was a significant struggle but I managed to get both myself and the mailbox back onto the road.

Below is just a nice picture of the pond on the side of our house. It looks so beautiful . . . Oh, and if the pictures look a little "blurry" it is because it was, of course, snowing when I took them today.
So, how did we amuse ourselves in our snowbound state? Well, I made chex mix so that we could at least enjoy a typical treat we get at family get togethers. We watched a couple of movies and I finished wrapping the last couple of presents. But we also were privileged to some new "Chloe-isms."

Chloe says the darndest things sometimes. The other morning she was still covered and I was feeding the baby on the couch. Chloe started talking to me to try and convince me to get her up for the day, but I was preoccupied with Sylvia. I am used to her "hellos" and "whatchyadoin's" but when I heard "It's time to get up!" that got my attention!

This morning she announced that "Chloe is a girl." And when Dave filled my glass a little too full of milk Chloe informed us "That's a problem." This bird just cracks me up sometimes.
We also managed to get in several loads of laundry today. Folding the clothes involved sorting out Sylvia's 0-3 month items to box. This made her daddy so sad when he found her shirt that says, "I'll always be daddy's little girl." He placed it over her little body and told her that while the shirt is now too small the sentiment remains the same.

And Sylvia got some quality time with Mama today as well. I noticed her looking, actually looking at and studying, her hands today. I went to get her wrist rattles, so that is what she is wearing in the pictures.

This has not been our typical Christmas Eve and we were quite disappointed that our plans had to be altered (again!) because of the weather, but we still managed to have a nice day with just the three of us (well, twelve, if you count all the indoor animals).