Out West: February 2008

Sunday, February 17, 2008

I think He_ _ froze over!

We have had the worst winter that Utah has seen in over 20 years! Lots of snow. I mean...lots of snow. Pictured is our tower to the snow gods. Steven likes to shovel the driveway all into one big pile. It's been over 9 feet tall, but we've had some nice warm weather that it actually has melted. Yes...the weather was really nice last Wednesday, Feb 13th. It was almost 50 degrees. My friends were wearing sandals and shorts. I thought, it's warm and I've finally acclimated to Utah winters...and then it happened. I think he_ _ froze over. Out of no where came the worst snow storm many people had ever seen. We only got about a foot of snow, but the winds were so bad that the snow drifts in our backyard were over 4 feet high, higher in other areas. The visibility was so bad that people couldn't drive and they closed the highway by our house. As a result...

the school buses from Michaela's school had to turn around and could not take the kids home. Many of the children and teachers were stranded at the school the entire night since their homes are 4 miles down the highway and there was no way to get them home. We live right by the school and so our ward and neighborhood collected blankets, pillows and food and took it over to the school on snow mobiles and 4 wheelers. Since many of the teachers never got to go home, school was cancelled on Valentines.

One bus got stranded on the highway. Those poor kids were on the bus for over 8 hours with no food. They couldn't get off the bus to go to the bathroom because many started to blow away...literally. It was not pretty.

My mother was driving home from my house right when the storm hit. She was stuck on the highway for over 8 hours...Apparently, the wind was so bad, her car was moving even when her breaks were on and the car was in park. There was no where to go as the highway was at a standstill. She was even rear ended a couple of times. Luckily she had her cell phone and lots of gas to keep her car warm and running. Sometime after midnight, she was finally rescued and taken to a nearby church and had to abandon her car on the side of the highway. Apparently, over 50 cars had to be towed off the highway the next morning.

Fortunately, as far as I know, everyone stayed safe. I'd hate to see what kind of a blizzard we would have if he _ _ really did freeze over.

Twins...

We have twin birthdays in our family. (OK...how many of you saw the title and thought we were making an announcemnt of another sort.... ;-) fooled you!) Andrea and I share our February 6th birthday. Andrea turned 4, and I turned 30 something. Although I try and make a "birthday dinner" for each of the children on their birthday, I decided that Andrea's and my day would always just have to be a go out to eat celebration. This year we went to the Mayan Adventure and had dinner. It is actually pretty affordable and as such the food is just average, but you definitely go there for the atmosphere. For those who have not been, the restaurant has a couple of levels with all the tables facing these cliffs and a swimming pool in the middle. They have a show featuring two cliff divers as well as a fire dancer which put on a show involving the celbration of the Mayan corn harvest with beating drums and all. It was fun to watch and both the girls were in complete rapture. Almost every table in the restaurant was celbrating a birthday. On your birthday, they take a free picture of you in a special headress and give you a free sundae as well...hence the picture shown. (Apparently they only have one headress, so I got out of having to wear it in the picture!)

Andrea celbrated her special day with a cousin "Candy Land" party. Since it was her turn to have her dance playgroup at our house on her actual day, she also had a little party with her playgroup friends.

We played Princess Lolli's Parade of Colors and the kids danced to the music with lollipops as their banner of color. The music tells each color when to stand or sit or march.