February

February consisted of the kids taking turns being sick.  Here's a sick Isaac snuggling with Alice.  He sure does love her.  

We got to attend a pancake breakfast fundraiser for the highschool's upcoming Mary Poppins where the cast was in costume and sang a couple songs.  It was so fun!  The pancake man even tossed the pancakes onto our plates.  He got nice and close for the little ones.

But for the adults he tossed them much farther.  I won't mention that I failed to catch a couple of them.  (Don't put me on your baseball team.)

The pancakes were really quite good!  AND we got to be one of the first to buy tickets to the show so we got great seats!

The kids got another snow day and our neighbor came with his cool snow contraption.  Lydia and Isaac got our driveway cleared in no time!

Fun in the kitchen.  While I was busy working I let the girls do their own "cooking."  Oats, raisins, rice in a shaker, and and celery bits.  And we got crazy after that with some sprinkles.  One of my rare awesome mom moments.  And look at Bridget's name on the wall.  She is loving preschool and loves writing.  

We went to a hockey game of a young man in the ward.  Isaac enjoyed it while the girls ran around a big open space behind us and played tag with other little girls.  

To celebrate the Winter Olympics (which we loved!) Bridget had her own preschool Olympics complete with a gold medal.  She was very excited!  (This is their school shirt.  It is purposely enormous so they can go on field trips and wear them on the outside of their coats.)

Our community had a tragedy of two police officers killed in action.  It was amazing to sense the strength of the community and to see blue ribbons all over town.  Lucky for us Oma and Opa came to visit the afternoon of the funeral so the big kids and I could go stand in the cold for a bit to watch the procession not far from our house.  Here's a picture of the many police motorcycles that started the procession.  It doesn't do justice to their sheer volume.

We watched it for about a half hour and saw police cars from Indiana, West Virginia, Michigan, and many more states.  It was very touching.  But it was lucky for us we had an excuse to get back home to have dinner with them because it turns out the procession went for 2.5 hours!  I admire so many people who stuck it out that long in the cold.  I was honored to give the closing prayer at an inter-faith devotion in honor of the officers held at our Westerville church building.  It was then broadcast and a few of my neighbor friends said they saw it. I hope it gave a little bit of peace to those feeling down trodden.   

For Relief Society we had a paint night and this is the picture I taught the ladies to paint. (Don't be too impressed.  I learned it from a super easy YouTube video using a sponge and Q-tips!)

That night I was washing up in the church kitchen and came across this drawer of forks!  Someone had waaayy too much time on their hands!!