You are in for a long read!

Its been awhile so this post may be a long one, but that depends on how long it is until Joshua notices that I'm not around.

Thanksgiving was nice. We made the trip downstate to Janine & Mark's house. Our only problem was Joshua throwing up in his carseat north of West Branch. Yum. That meant a quick change of clothes for Josh and as-good-as-we-could-clean-it-on-the-side-of-the-road cleaning of the carseat. So yes, that meant 3 more hours in the van with the puke smell. So Jennifer, I totally can feel your pain about the whole Angelina thing.

Thanksgiving Day was great. We had almost the entire Gazley clan in one house (minus Rochelle and her family and Kris and his family) so I think the count was 31 people total. Could you imagine if all Ryan's siblings were there with all their family? Wow. I seriously slacked on taking photo's but I will blame it on dealing with sick Joshua and holding Claudine's new baby girl! Here is one shot I got of Emma and Joshua. Cute little ones, aren't they?
On Friday we left to visit my Dad for awhile at his home-away-from-home in Marysville. The boys were really excited to see Grandpa. Josh started laughing and fidgeting as soon as he saw Grandpa's truck. I'm glad that we got to see my Dad cause it has been awhile! Now the boys are counting down till "Brampa" will be home--its a big concern that he be back before Christmas! After that we drove over to New Baltimore/Chesterfield to visit with Jackie, Jeff, and Nicholas for a few hours. We had our Chinese Thanksgiving which was really yummy. (We can't get decent Chinese up here so it was a real treat to have some downstate!) Aunt Jackie had ice-cream Christmas trees for desert. (Just like when we were kids at Busia and Grandpa's house!!!) Nicholas is getting so big. He is a very active little guy and if you get to hold him for more than 30 seconds without him squirming to get down, you're lucky. After we said our goodbyes, it was time to drive back to Linden to spend some more time with Ryan's family. (Which included Rochelle this time cause she made the drive from Richmond to come see everyone!)

Here is a pic of the 4 boys. Notice its not easy to get a 5 yo, 4 yo, 1 1/2 yo, and a 1 year old to pose. We cut our trip short by one day, coming home on Saturday night instead of Sunday. We were all ready to come home. Ryan and Joshua were sick with the virus that the other 2 boys and I had in the previous week, plus I needed to get home to work on homework.

Yesterday I took my very first snow day from school since moving up here. We've had days where the school has cancelled classes, but this is my first time not going when classes were still on. I attempted to drive to school, but turned around once I got to M-28. The roads were ice and snow covered, the wind was blowing, making for poor visibility. They are calling for more snow for the rest of the week and through the weekend. Today we are said to be getting either 4-8" or 5-9", depending on which weather service you listen to. This creates another dilemma for me. DO I GO TO CLASS TONIGHT?? I have patho, which I hate to miss anyways, let alone 2 days in a row. But is it worth it for me to drive thru horrendous conditions for a class that is only 1 hour and 20 minutes long?? Then I'd be driving home in blowing snow in the dark. Hmmm. My gut is telling me that I'm not going to class tonight, but my brain is still freaking at the thought of missing 2 days of class.

Due to weather, my Mom, who was supposed to leave Thursday, left to go downstate this morning. The bad weather is on its way, so she decided to leave early to try to get ahead of the snow. She has a wedding on Friday to attend and then Saturday she & Dad and Norm & Dominique will see The Lion King.

To give everyone an idea about how our weather has changed so drastically, these photos will show it. Tuesday morning we had just a small area of ice on the water's edge. These pics were taken this morning, 24 hours later to show all the ice. You may see sections of the beach beneath the snow. That is misleading making you think we have little snow, but the reason is that we have high winds causing that.

Basically, all our plans for the rest of the week and weekend are on hold due to weather. Our usual trips to the Soo are most likely going to be cancelled. Friday I had plans to go to Newberry for some van repairs, but if the weather holds up like this, I won't be doing that either. Saturday the boys have a birthday party to go to, but its down by the point, so we can deal with that. If nothing else, this means we can play in the snow!! I'm also thinking it must be time to do some baking. Cookies, brownies, all that yummy goodness. I can almost feel my jeans getting tighter.........