Spring. For Real er No?

In my heart I know that our first full day of spring is fake. But it felt so good to embrace it anyway!

After an in promptu choir practice this morning, it was really just hoops and hoops and little outside exposure.

And I got to meet our new neighbor! She's so cute!

That was the highlight of the day other than remembering how to use my Cricut for an upcoming bridal shower. And visiting with my father-in-law. 

With the warm temps I did sit out on the deck steps for a bit. But dang, we really want this to continue! It won't of course. Despite the calendar. But please know, Mother Nature, that I truly liked you for one day!

Sport Shorts

The last 48 hours have pretty much been all sports. Yes, it was SUPER Sunday yesterday. What that meant was that is was "Souper Sunday" at church with a fundraiser for the food pantry/soup kitchen.

Then, I got home in time to watch legit LIVE Olympics coverage of team figure skating.

The Quad God for the win! I mean, WOW. How fun to watch!

After that, I did pop over to what I believe is like the 44th annual SuperBowl party in our friend Chet's basement! Said hello to all and participated in some "investment opportunities" (which yielded nothing!), then came home to actually watch the game and/or flip with Olympics coverage.

Boring game if you ask me. I like the ones that are super close and down to the last second! But that's just me.

Today was a work from home day that ALMOST had me wishing for a lunch hour with Mr. Deck Chair.

Oooh this high temperature was amazing. Obviously not sit outside for endless hours, but still so refreshing!

After work, I continued on my sports quest with Lady Royals middle school hoops. Turned out we were hosting Stratford – home of all the Austin clan that I'm related to (through marriage). Didn't take me long to recognize their coach as Jim's cousin's daughter. Then, when I talked to her at halftime, she said one of the players belonged to another cousin's daughter... so granddaughter. How fun. I then had players from both teams to shoot pictures of. 

Just got done editing and uploading pictures. And since I know what happened with co-ed curling and ice dancing today, I don't need to watch the delayed Olympic coverage. Or do I?

All the time delays... I just don't know. Go USA! And Royals! And, yes, Stratford!

Grin and BEAR it

 

We had brutal wake-up temps today when you took windchills into effect. But since I had to sing at my church and Jim had to read at his, we had to brave it.

In our heated vehicles, that is. We're not terribly brave after all.

After church and a little shopping, I headed back into town for BINGO. Hey winning the $1,400+ cover-all jackpot would've made it worth it.

Came up well short again. Story of my life. Nobody got cover-all in 54 calls or less so that jackpot will keep growing for the next session in a few weeks. Nice to see friends anyway!

Came home and sort of watched the Patriots-Houston game. Houston really choked.

While hubby got out the leaf-blower... yes! 

It works magically when we just have a dusting. While he did that, I baked a cake for trifle and started a new blanket. A baby one this time.

All while somewhat cheering the Bears on to support my father-in-law, a life-long fan. After being out in cold just a teeny bit. I can't imagine playing in that cold! And then overtime! Oh, Bears. So close. Guess our Central Division will not be represented any further. 

That's the playoffs.

Now back to your regularly scheduled... winter! Ugh. Cold tomorrow. Be careful out there!

Super Cold

 

It's definitely a Midwestern thing where we are obsessed with weather forecasts from Thanksgiving to Easter. So we all knew we'd have the coldest morning of "fall" today, but we sort of had to document it to compete to see who had it worse.

Frankly, I didn't want to compete with my Up North counterparts because -7 degrees is low enough for me. I was just happy my car started fine in the nice garage and I made it to work safely. And when the temperature was twice as high – at 8 above – during lunchtime I ran to get gas so I wouldn't have a "low fuel" light come on after work when it was likely plunging back to the negatives.

I went straight from work to St. Vincent's to shoot hoops – pictures of the middle school girls, that is. I think today was their first game, but I prefer to take pictures early in the season so I can "skip" the games when it's snowing or just icy out. Apparently, I had an exception today for the COLD.

Speaking of cold, the "Cold Moon" was shining brightly tonight.

I don't know if this is the "what seems to be common SUPER moon," but it was a super Cold Moon on a super Cold Night so I think this one fits the bill. Ha.

And these are the highlights of my day. I have quite the basketful of "low-lights" but I am still processing those. Thank goodness I have tomorrow off with total focus on my upcoming family Christmas on Saturday. 

Step aside, Old Man Winter and Work Stuff, I have Christmas on the brain! 

I Still Love Summer, I Swear

I love summer. I do. I like warm days. This summer it seems we either have super hot or it's rainy. No much middle ground there.

So my big project yesterday was starting a little landscaping before it got hot. And it was even in our yard.

There's a beautiful flat rock landing along the river that I like to take senior photos at. But when I checked its status last week, I found that bushes had grown so much it was unsafe to navigate around them without falling in. So armed with my yard shears (I don't even know what tools are called), I went down to the river.

Here's the before picture. See what I mean by precarious?

And here's after my Edward Scissorhands stint. So much safer!

The before of the other direction was even worse!

And after. I felt so accomplished when I was done and hoped the evidence would float away. Ha.

Of course, I didn't even get to reap the rewards of my hard work today because we postponed tonight's senior photo session. I didn't want the poor girl to melt! 

Naturally, the AC is cranked in the house so you know me, I'll probably go outside to warm up!

Be careful out there!

Reality Bites, Y'all

After experiencing some 4 summer-like days in Nashville – including Monday's 86-degree afternoon temps – it was so hard to come back to reality last night.

When we landed and our "real feel" temp was more than 40 degrees colder, that was tough to take. It made me wonder why I didn't cave and buy a Nashville hoodie somewhere along the line!

This morning, waking up to an annoying alarm and only 32 degrees, was even tougher to handle. At least it was a fast day at work with so much to catch up on. Then it was straight to Girls Night Out at el Mezcal. Who knew we were already at the middle of the month?!

It was nice catching up. And I realized I should probably start sorting through some photos before my next long weekend – in 36 hours or so. I'll share when I can tomorrow. I am having unfortunate technical difficulties syncing my pictures from my phone to Google.

There's always tomorrow, I've heard. 😀