Senior night, a delicious chicken sandwich, and the last regular season swim meet...

 This week we celebrated Senior night for all the winter sport athletes.

Dan's arm is mid-swing but other than that I think this is a cute picture!

Here is Sarah with her swim besties:

And while we were in the gym, I had to snap a picture of Sarah's senior poster:

After the recognition, Sarah went to dinner with her friends so Dan and I grabbed dinner together. We tried Bossy Beulah's Chicken Shack and it did not disappoint! It's a fast food restaurant serving only chicken and fries. Dan got the regular chicken sandwich (with house made pickles and mayo - so basically a Chick-fil-a sandwich only better if that's possible) and he gave it two thumbs up. The chicken is from a local farm.

I had what they call the "Hot Thigh" and it was so delicious I wish I had one right now.  It was a fried thigh that was coated in hot sauce with mayo and pickles.  YUM!  And the fries came with a spicy dipping sauce and they were equally delicious! When Sarah found out we went there without her she was upset.  "You know I've been wanting to go there!"  Well, now we have to go back!

Last night was Sarah's final regular season swim meet.  She swam great and finished first in her backstroke and shaved a couple seconds off her individual medley (where you swim 50 meters of each stroke). She was very happy with that as she doesn't like to swim the IM and any time shaved off is a victory! Her relay teams finished well too,  1st and a 2nd!

Here is a picture she took after the meet.  

Next Friday will be regionals and hopefully she will do well enough to make it to states in at least one event the following weekend. Fingers crossed!

We are supposed to get another 1 to 3 inches of snow here this weekend.  BOO!!!!!!!!!!! But it should be in the 40s on Sunday so whatever we do get will start to melt.  I've said it before and I'll say it again - I don't like snow.  But, I'm not going to complain (too loudly) because Boston is supposed to get up to TWO FEET of snow this weekend.  Even the Cape is supposed to get a bunch of snow and a lot of wind - potentially 60 mph. Hopefully the little Cape house will survive!

That's all the news around here that's fit to print.  Have a great weekend!

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Peter got to enjoy the snow this time!

After our snowfall the previous weekend, we ended up getting another little snow on Friday evening. It wasn't much but it left a nice little coating on everything and it was cold. This storm ended up bringing snow to the Raleigh area so Peter was excited. Raleigh typically never gets snow so it added a festive feel to things around campus.

Peter hung out with his fraternity brothers on Friday night and they had a fire in the fire pit and enjoyed the snow.

I was very thankful that we got Peter duck boots and a heavy coat for Christmas. His high school wardrobe didn't include a winter coat because "nobody wears a coat to school, Mom". But since going to class now includes very long walks from the dorm to class, apparently it's okay to wear a coat. :)

He sent me this picture (looking out from his dorm room) on Saturday morning.

I know it doesn't look like a lot but classes at NC State were cancelled on Friday and a lot of the dining options were closed on Saturday. I know, I know. It makes no sense to northerners but we don't do snow well down here.  It drives Dan crazy every time it snows and things shut down for days over a couple of inches.  

It's finally starting to warm up a little bit this week thankfully. But there is a very slight chance for some more frozen falling water on Friday but I am keeping my fingers crossed that it doesn't happen!

What's going on around here.

We took Peter back to school on January 9th.  It was so nice to have him home for a month but he was ready to get back to his friends and a routine. And he's very excited about his schedule this semester. Somehow he has managed for no classes before 10:15 and no classes on Friday.  He's going to attempt this schedule every semester from here on out.  I told him this was a unicorn and he should just enjoy it while it lasted because there's no way he can get that lucky every semester!

Last Wednesday poor Buddy had his claws removed and was neutered.  Jennifer sent us pictures while he was in their care.

Post surgery. Poor baby!

Buddy right before they left for the evening.

Buddy the next day. "I'm ready to go home, Mom!"

He's doing great!  And (I'm assuming thanks to the neutering) he is much calmer and is getting along very well with Kitten. There is minimal fighting and they can now both be in the same room without an attack happening.  Buddy, will also sit on my lap in the evenings.  Something he would not do before. He's definitely not a snuggly cat but hopefully that will change a little bit as he ages.

All last week they were calling for snow this past weekend. Then the closer it got, their predictions turned to some snow and a lot of ice and that's exactly what we got on Sunday morning.

This was the snow when we woke up. It snowed for a while longer and then turned to sleet and freezing rain.

This was how it looked in the early evening. Everything was covered but it was icy and slick.

Monday was Martin Luther King, Jr. day so Sarah didn't have school but since Dan works from home he still had work.  He only had two conference calls yesterday and the whole day he said was very calm.  As if everyone was enjoying a snow day from home so to speak.  

Sarah has no school today but Dan is working hard. He's been on calls all morning so I guess everyone is back at it. Peter was disappointed that Raleigh only got a little freezing rain and now snow. But never fear! They are call for more snow this weekend and it looks like Raleigh might get a significant amount this time. (Significant being a couple of inches.)

The sun is out today so hopefully there will be a decent amount of melting.  I am thinking that Sarah will go to school with a delay tomorrow.  She is starting to get cabin fever. She does have a hair appointment this evening. She's ready for some layers in her hair.

And while none of this is exciting, that's all I've got!

Some snow pictures...

We finally had to close the windows on Sunday night and say good bye to our 70 degree weather.  They were calling for very cold weather and possible snow on Monday morning. There was no snow but the wind was really whipping around that morning and we lost power around 6:30.  Sarah went to school and Peter got up and headed to the high school for a young alumni brunch.

It started snowing big wet flakes around 9:00 and it was really beautiful. Our power finally came back on around 9:20 and I was able to enjoy my first cup of coffee with the snowflakes.

And then around 12:30, the sun popped out while it was still snowing and proceeded to melt away all the snow! This was my kind of snow.  It was beautiful and then it was gone!

The rest of the week has been pretty uneventful.  We will be taking Peter back to Raleigh on Sunday afternoon. :( It's been so nice having him home for a month but I think he's ready to go back. 

Sarah's been working hard with school work and swim practice and tonight we are going to a swim meet.  She's hoping for good swims and fast times! 

Our ridiculous cat, Buddy, is growing and looking as cute as ever. Unfortunately, he isn't a cuddly cat like Wally was but I'm hoping that changes.

Have a great weekend!

Happy New Year!

It's January 2nd, 2022 and I am finally getting off my lazy duff to do my Christmas post.

But first, I must comment on the weather. It has been so hot this past week that we have kept the windows open since before Christmas!  Yesterday it was 78 degrees! There were a couple of times this week that I thought about turning on the AC but never did because I kept thinking it would get cooler.  Which it never did.  Today, though, it's supposed to only be in the upper 60s and tomorrow the high is only going to be 43 so while that will be  more normal, it's going to feel very cold.  Oh well, that's life in the south....

Okay, back to Christmas!

I was prepping for our Christmas Eve party and Peter told me I needed to run outside to see the sunset.  Y'all!  I'm so glad I did because it was gorgeous!

These pictures are unfiltered straight off my phone.  So BEAUTIFUL!  God was totally showing off for Christmas Eve.  My Facebook was filled with beautiful images just like this from local friends.  So pretty!

Anyway, we enjoyed the Christmas Eve Lovefeast and Candle Light service at Enterprise Moravian with mom, my brother, and Jennifer's family. Then we all came back to our house for appetizers and drinks.  It was such a lovely evening!  I really love this little tradition.

On Christmas morning, we finally prodded the kids out of bed and unwrapped Christmas presents.  Per tradition, it's always stockings first, then presents.

After we unwrapped gifts, we went to Mass.  When we got home from church, Cathy and Eric had arrived and we headed over to mom's for Christmas lunch!  It was delicious as usual!  My mom is an excellent cook!

Cathy snapped this picture of us before we started to eat.

After lunch, we took our annual family photo and unwrapped more presents!

The next day was Sunday so we headed back to Mass and then back to my mom's for our normal Sunday lunch.  After lunch, we took Cathy and Eric to Old Salem and walked around. We got a picture under the Heritage Bridge with the Moravian Stars.  I was excited that we were able to get this picture because when we were taking our Christmas card pictures in Old Salem, there were too many people trying to get a picture with the stars.

Eric and Cathy

After touring around Old Salem, we headed home and relaxed and then ate dinner and then we decided to drive to Kernersville. We went to the Ceiner Botanical Garden to see their Spectacular Holiday Blooms display.  The 6000 "blooms" are actually recycled water bottles that have been turned into flowers.  It was really cool!

Cathy and Eric left on Monday morning, Dan had a doctor's appointment, Peter and Sarah had dentist appointments. Dan and I also attended a funeral for a friend of mine who passed away after fighting cancer and brain tumors for over a year.  It was a beautiful celebration of life and I'm so glad we were able to attend.

The rest of this past week has been a hot, hazy blur.  We had no real plans. We slept in, watched a lot of football, went out to eat a few times,ran errands, etc. We did decide that next year, we would make better use of this weird week in between Christmas and New Year's and try to plan a two night trip somewhere. Had we known it was going to be in the 70s all week here, we definitely would have planned a quick trip to the beach!  

I hope everyone has a happy, healthy, productive, joyful 2022!