The great dig out of 2010

As you may have heard, the D.C. area has received more snow this winter than they've seen since 1898. The biggest dump came the first weekend of February. Coincidentally, we had scheduled to bless Harper this weekend (more on that later), so both our parents and my brother, Ben, were in town.

My parents and brother decided to sleep at my aunt Linda's house, who lives about 20 minutes from us, so they could have beds to sleep in. As the snow fell on Friday night we knew it would be tricky to get them back to the house, so we tried to convince them to sleep at our house on air mattresses. But, my dad is "from Idaho" and isn't afraid to drive in snow. Unfortunately, in Idaho they have enough equipment to plow most, if not all roads around town.

We woke up to several feet of snow, which was still falling - and continued to fall until that evening. There was so much snow that even the biggest cars couldn't get through without a plow.

By noon on Saturday it became clear that a plow was not going to make it to my aunt's street - a small cul de sac off of a main road - and we were hearing rumors that the snow plows were going to stop plowing at 3 p.m. My mom was determined to come see Harper, and was not going to miss her blessing, so they started to dig.

My aunt lives two houses into the cul de sac, and the main road was relatively cleared, so they decided to dig out the smaller road to get their car to the main road. In hopes of getting them out before the plows stopped working on the main roads, Shiloh and his brother, Jesse, drove up to help.

Here are some pictures of the impromptu work "party".

The finished product.

What a difference a day makes. On Sunday the sun came out, giving us a chance to get a good look at the huge amounts of snow we received.

Here are our power lines, in a very precarious position next to our overgrown pine tree.

Our power flickered several times over the weekend, but amazingly it never went out. The rest of the area was not so lucky. Many of our friends, along with thousands of others, were without power for most of the weekend.

This storm was 2 weeks ago, and I wish I could say that all the snow has melted, but back to back storms and cold temperatures have kept it around - causing major parking/driving/garbage removal/school & church attendance (seriously, some schools are still closed and we've had to limit church b/c there are not enough parking spots) issues.

V-Day 2010

This Valentine's Day we dined at home. Shiloh found a great recipe for Brie and Apple-Stuffed Chicken. We cooked together tonight and were quite pleased with how the chicken turned out. The only adjustment to the recipe (found here) is that we would add more brie.... but we really like cheese.


Shiloh wanted to take on dessert this year, and this is what he came up with:

one word: yum.

The best part of dinner though? The company:

Happy Valentine's Day

four

Today was Adi's fourth birthday. This year has brought many changes, many of which have had big impacts on Adi's life. She has coped extremely well and has impressed us with her reaction to those changes.

Most important of all, Adi is so good with Harper. She is very careful not to get too close, and has only sneaked a lick or two. Occasionally we'll find Adi sleeping in Harper's room on the rug next to her crib, while Harper is napping. We're excited to see these two grow up together.


Adi has enjoyed the last couple of weeks of tons of snow. Normally she isn't too impressed with playing "fetch," offer her a snowball though, and she's game. It has been hilarious to see her running around like she did when she was a puppy.

Here are some great shots my brother took of Adi this year.