Early Tuesday morning we started to hear the storm bouncing off the windows. Temperatures were well below freezing and, as Max made sure to inform us, it was VERY LOUD. Schools were quickly shut down and the boys were stuck at home with us. The first day was mostly spent like this:

Hooray?

The second day, we found out that the power company was planning on doing rolling blackouts in our area. The power conveniently went out right at 6:45 in the morning, when the kids were still asleep. It was only supposed to be out for about a half-hour, but that slowly turned into an hour, then two, then three. The house got a bit colder and we bundled up the boys as well as we could.

Luckily Owen didn't mind the gloves too much.

Once we passed the sixth or seventh hour, we decided it was time to get out to a hotel so we could be somewhere with heat and not worry about losing it overnight. We really didn't want to drive on the ice, but we pushed through for the sake of not being freezing cold.

This is not too fun to drive on. Luckily most people on the roads were driving sanely.

We returned to a fully functional home the next morning and pretty much just spent the rest of the day trying to catch up on work and get the boys to relax. Much to our chagrin, the boys wound up being out of school the entire rest of the week. Luckily we wound up getting some actual snow so the boys could finally enjoy the winter weather as it was meant to be enjoyed. We took some time to examine the situation while they took their naps.

Okay, fine, we were just playing in it.

First time either of us have ever seen actual snowflakes rather than the chunks or powder that normally come down.

When the boys got up, we quickly got them dressed for action.

Obligatory matchy matchy shot.

...and a shot of Owen's serious smile.

Unlike last time, Owen didn't get upset by the mere idea of being bundled in forty-seven layers of clothing. Once we got him out there he was actually curious and happy about everything.

He's not quite ready to care about snowballs, but tromping around in it is fun.

Max worked hard at making snowballs, but unfortunately it was too powdery for him to hit me with anything too threatening.

We tried to do a little sledding on some plastic storage lids, but there wasn't a hill steep enough to make it work. The boys didn't seem to mind, as going out to the sloped driveway just opened up more space for them to try and run off into the snow.

He would have just kept going if I hadn't told him to come back.

For some reason Max didn't quite get the idea of walking NEXT to his brother so I could get a photo.

Before we went in, Max had to get one last bit of fun in.

Those are his shark mittens. They are roaring. Deal with it.

The boys were so exhausted from their week at home that we let them sleep in on Saturday. We skipped Owen's gym class but we still made it out for Max's swim lessons.

He's getting better and better every week.

In what must be some sort of record, I actually happened to get yet another video processed for your viewing pleasure.

Slide!

I'm guessing he's going to ask to do this every week.

Sunday was a lazy Super Bowl watching sort of day, just the sort of thing we needed to finish out what turned out to be a very long week.

If you want to see the rest of the photos, you can click here. See you next time with (hopefully) another up-to-date post.