The Rowdy Pea

my son bluebeard

 

 I was upstairs getting dressed this morning when Ivo called up the stairs in his most self-satisfied voice, "See Mom, I don't need supervising! I don't need supervising with this after all!" Wow did I make it down the stairs in a hurry, and this is what I saw. But the picture doesn't show the whole story. Ivo, in his masterful attention to detail, had carefully dipped several Q-tips in the blue and black tubs and covered both ears, inside and out, with a thick layer of paint. Of course I couldn't help but burst out laughing, and make a dash for the camera. I don't know what I'll do when my little guy is grown and these silly and unexpected moments are no longer a part of our day-to-day life. And I definitely don't know how I'll get that paint out of his ears. (Did I mention it was both ears? oy.)

two surprises

We woke up this morning to two surprises:

1. All the area schools were closed because it was SO cold. So no preschool for Ivo and no work for Josh -- yippeee! Josh said it was 23 below, but I wouldn't get out of bed to see for myself because of surprise number 2 . . .

2. The furnace was broken! Yikes were we ever shivering. Luckily our landlord came over right away with some workers and had the ol' girl running again before noon.  Again, yippeee! These are the times I love being a renter.

In the meantime, to keep warm I decided to turn on the oven and make a nice  coffee cake. Here is my recipe:  Buy a box of coffee cake mix and follow the directions on the package. Krusteaz Cinnamon Crumb Cake did us all a little justice and turned the morning from cold to cozy.  Between the three of us and the two workers, we finished off the whole thing, yum!

 

Now Ivo and Josh are in the middle of a game of Mille Bornes, the house is warm and snug and I'm about to curl up with one of my new library books and just relax and enjoy the gift of a winters day like this with no place to go. And my hat is off to the furnace repair workers of the world, my new heroes!

family game night

 

Josh found this old version of the French card game Mille Bornes at our local thrift store, and since I am notoriously impatient with card games he decided to teach Ivo how to play instead of me. Ivo was immediately interested because of the cards themselves, showing things like flat tires, firetrucks, and mechanics in jumpsuits tinkering under the hoods of little French voitures. And to my amazement he eagerly learned how to play, following most of the rules most of the time (like his mom). He loves counting up his miles and especially loves shouting "Coup-Fourre!" His only real problem with the game is that he wants it to be more cooperative. Like when Josh plays a Creve card to give me a flat tire, Ivo will just reach over with a Roue de Secours and say, "It's ok mama, you can have one of my new tires." He's about as competitive as his parents, which is to say, not very. But that's ok because it makes family game night a strictly tear-free, no-drama event. Winners and losers aside, we're really all just in it for the giggles and the popcorn.

wow, january already?

I can't believe my poor blog has been so neglected these many weeks. With the two (!) moves,  another busy Etsy holiday season, and general Christmas/New Year hullabaloo, we've had more to do than time to write about it. And I wish we could say we sailed through the holiday season on a tide of time-honored tradition, but once again we tended to do more flying-by-the-seat of our jammies than intended. All is well though. We had a wonderful end to a busy year and our new year is off to a good start. A cold start too. The Minnesota cold followed us into Wisconsin apparently. Which brings me to this photo:

 

It's a bit grainy because of the low light, but this is bedtime at our house. We've put away the Christmas stories and are now reading through our collection of Winter books. The Tomten is a favorite, it's maybe one of the all-time best bedtime stories at our house. Ivo loves the cozy imagery of children and animals sleeping peacefully while the bitter cold is held just at bay. And he loves the sweet, impish Tomten who ambles through the snow in the moonlight, bringing a word of comfort to everyone at the farm. We've been saying it ourselves a time or two when the temperatures drop below zero:

"Winters come and winters go,

Summers come and summers go,

Soon you will be in your clover field."