It warmed up, yay! But watch out… because the snow is sliding off of our tile roof in BIG (dangerous!) sheets!
No snow on that part of the roof because it’s all here:
We can hear it inside the house when the snow starts to slide off the roof. We race off to watch it fall and go everywhere. Data is not a fan of it. This afternoon a huge sheet came off by where he was sleeping and he was freaked out!
This seems really dangerous for someone walking by. Luckily, no one is. Otherwise we’d have to put up signs like they do in the city:
I seriously saw a gigantor piece of ice fly off of a high rise in Chicago and land on the roof of a car that was driving down the street a few years ago. Those signs are serious!
Owning this home continues to be full of surprises! I wonder what is next?!
And this is why #8 was on my “Things I’m Excited About in December” list!
On Sunday we got about five inches of that beautiful (but actually very dangerous) thick, heavy snow that covers everything and makes it look magical (and sound really creaky and make your power go out in the middle of the night), and makes you feel like you’re sitting in a snow globe!
I love our home year round, but decorating it for the holiday and seeing it with snow on it really makes me fall in love with it all over again.
Yay! All the holiday decorations are up! It’s not a lot, but I’m going to document it here so I can look back in the future if I want to set it any of it up the same way.
Living room:
Our Fraser Fir tree is eleven feet tall on its own, and a bit taller in the stand. It has 700 lights on it. We (expectedly) had to buy more lights and ornaments. I got the LED lights to try and those were a big NOPE – way too harsh of a white! We went back and bought conventional lights.
As kids, we’d spend Christmas Eve at my mom’s parent’s home, and they always had metal “NOEL” letters that we’d rearrange to say “EL NO” or “LEON” and see how long it took an adult to find it. We thought it was really funny. I was happy when my mom gifted me my own “NOEL” set one year!
A fire place with no mantel!
We’ll see how long it takes for Data to knock these down. He is getting in to ALL the decorations. And I don’t mean he’s “in to them” metaphorically. He is physically getting in to them and messing them up and knocking them around (and eating them and throwing them up).
Dining Room:
Steven said, “It looks like coffee = joy.” Ha!
Downstairs bathroom:
Upstairs hallway/stair:
Upstairs bathroom:
Front door:
Mailbox:
And now… to put all those storage boxes back in the basement. Blah. Ha ha.
Just kidding.
It’s so big we had to call in reinforcements – we couldn’t get it aligned by ourselves! Thanks for your help, Bobbi!
We’re letting the branches settle, and we’re hoping to decorate it this weekend!
Gosh, if he is going this nuts for the garland now, how is he gonna to react when we get a REAL tree on Saturday?!
I’m sure he’ll behave himself… right?! Ha ha.
It was fun to pick out garland for our stairs and (not up yet!) our mailbox. And it was easy to set it up. Now I just have to see how long it stays up, since Data already managed to undo the end of it once! What a stinker.
This is all we have up for decorations so far! I plan to do more this upcoming weekend!
It’s been a year since last year’s first snow… which was seventeen inches…
This year? I haven’t really even worn a proper coat yet. Weird.
I am looking forward to seeing the house look like this:
(only it will look even better this year, because we power washed the brick a few weekends ago and the stains are gone!)
And it may snow tomorrow! Yay! Hopefully, not in that* high of an amount, ha.
*Only because I’d like to still run on the trails a few times this year! I don’t mind being “snowed-in.”
This orange guy showed up tonight. I think we’ve seen him walking on our driveway once, and that our neighbor has mentioned him too. He seems older, Steven said (I was out running errands when he stopped by and didn’t see him). Apparently Snow wasn’t too happy he stopped by. Sigh, can’t they all just get along?!
- It’s awesome the Cubs won the World Series! They’re not the team I follow, but them winning has made so many people happy, and that makes me happy! All that being said, I’m making sure I’m NOT working downtown the day of the celebration parade (if there is one), ha ha.
- It’s totally fine not to be interested in following mainstream stuff like the World Series, and to say it’s not your thing. There are plenty of things lots of people like and get jazzed about that I have no interest in! But what’s not cool is being a complete sourpuss about it. Newsflash – you aren’t special if you are moody about a thing that a lot of people like when they are all excited about it. It just makes you, well, moody. And makes it seem like you can’t enjoy other people’s happiness and feel left out. Grow up!
- We don’t have antenna (or cable) and couldn’t watch any games at home but got to see Game 4 because we were at a hotel, and part of Game 7 at Red Robin (and we listened on the radio at home after that). What a series! The last game was a real nail bitter!
- We were at a hotel last Saturday because Steven surprised me with a night away on Lake Delavan in Wisconsin! It was so sweet he planned all that and surprised me, and recognized that we both needed a break. We had a great time!
- Thanks for voting for Data in our veterinarian’s Halloween costume contest! He got second place, and will receive a $20 gift card to PetSmart! Should I use it to get him something fun, or more food for all the cats?
- The election is making me feel so anxious I decided to vote by mail this year, because just thinking about making it to my voting office on Tuesday was stressing me out.
- The last time I posted about the pond level, it was almost gone. It actually did completely go away in August/September. But we’ve had so much rain in October and November (5.50 inches in the last 30 days), it’s back, and in a big way!
Link to Random Thoughts Thursday 114
- I banged my elbow so hard on a towel rack Saturday that my arm became tingly and I lost feeling in my fingers for a few minutes. Ouch. That is one tender bruise. Steven asked me what I was doing (dancing? karate chopping?) that I hit it so hard – you know, just putting my towel back on the rack. Such a klutz.
- This opinion article from The New York Times, “The Art of Making (and Not Making) Plans” (pdf here), exactly mirrors my approach to making social plans – mindfully, and not too many. I know my limits and I do NOT function well being busy every. single. night/day (applause to you who thrive on that kind of schedule!). Since I know my limits, I only have to cancel if it’s an emergency or I am sick, which is what the article is bringing up – maybe people would cancel less if they didn’t over commit and actually thought about whether the thing was something they actually wanted to do in the first place (don’t just go because FOMO!).
- I’m digging that new song “Starboy” by The Weeknd featuring Daft Punk (love me some Daft Punk!). When Steven and I first heard it, we thought he was saying “I’m in love with a cyborg” instead of “I’m a motherf*ckin’ starboy.” Ha. So when Luca was here, we taught him that those were the lyrics (the cyborg ones!!!), and I hope he’s still singing it that way when he hears it, ha! Anyway, Steven and I do NOT love that during the lyric “Star Trek groove in that Wrath of Khan,” The Weeknd pronounces “wrath” wrong (like it’s spelled “rayth”). Grating.
- Our pond is back, so these guys are back! I’ve lost a bit of interest, since we have cats hanging out now (now we’re trying out the name Geordi for the black cat). Sorry, guys (I still feed them, ha).
- Our pumpkin collection has GROWN!
- I am getting closer and closer with the baby blanket. Maybe I will finish it this weekend? Ha (I don’t really sit around and knit on the weekends so I am not sure why I think that).
Link to Random Thoughts Thursday 112
So much for Vader (placeholder for a better name) “guarding” the house. He slept while this opossum ate his food!
Completely slept through it.
Of course, putting cat food out is (duh) attracting other critters as well – two huge raccoons keep visiting, and now, this guy. Guess we should put away what the cats don’t eat when it gets dark. Or, stop being crazy cat people and not feed the cats at all.
Comments (4) 
Themocracy