Making the most of a beautiful winter Sunday

Syl is taking ski lessons through school this year, so we arranged for these guys to come outfit her with rental skis and boots (me too!). Cool idea. They do everything right in the truck,

Then Syl and I took the mutts for a great winter hike.

Syl challenged me to a snowball fight, then went inside to get her snow pants on. Clearly the mutts were on her side, because they sabotaged my arsenal!

The aftermath:

The hot tub in the snow is pretty, er, cool. Syl was a daredevil with the hot/cold thing.

Snow throne!

Snow bed (she is nuts!)

Aaaaand, inside.

Winter House

A little drone video. Note: this may be the last one for a while, as the night shot ended with the drone stuck in a tree. Long ladder + dumb climb in the dark + longer pole = drone out of the tree and pretty well wrecked on the ground. $99 for full replacement warranty was the best $99 I spent last year. Hope you enjoy!

Perfect Day for an Early (unexpected) Christmas Present

This morning, Melissa's 2011 Nissan Murano gave up the ghost. Happily, the first snow of the season cleared the weekend crowds out of the local car dealerships and, going with convenience above all else, Melissa steered us to the BMW dealership four point five minutes from our driveway. SIX hours later, we drove away with her Christmas present: a 2018 x3 in--I kid you not--"Phaetonic Blue".

I for one am happy to see my Nana's plate adorning such a fine piece of automotive technology! For me, the "lease or buy" question is influenced not-insignificantly by the prospect of giving up this number in the event of a lease. Nope!

Back on the home front, I took a few snaps of the glorious new snowfall and our Christmas lights.

More archery

She's getting pretty good!

First Band Concert

For those keeping score at home, Syl currently plays the piano (well!) the guitar (coming along) and the flute (beginning). She has abandoned the violin in favor  of the guitar, and has set aside the recorder (for all time, Dad dearly hopes).

First band concert was this week. Wayland Public Schools do these things right: start time 7pm, end time 7:23pm. Just enough time for pride and appreciation, without the teetering-on-the-brink of insanity feeling that can creep in to the less time-bounded school age performances...

Lunch bags

After Syl lost her fabric lunch bag last year, I switched to paper bags in a pinch—and it turns out she loves them. She’s a big fan of the drawings I do on the bags, despite the fact that I’m artistically challenged. I’m happy to do them but they do sometimes stress me out. I wasn’t meant for daily drawings. 

At Thanksgiving Naomi and Emma graciously offered to help a sister out and draw on a bunch of bags. Syl even did a few. 

Big question: which one was drawn by a 10-year-old, and which two by adults?

Archery

Syl is taking an archery class at the Wayland rec center—and she loves it!

Cold weather runners

33 degrees. Syl’s comment 10 minutes in: “I like this even better!”

Gingerbread house