Yesterday I spent my first REAL cold day traveling to Fairbanks. The thermostat on my mini-van ranged between -19 and -36 degrees during late-morning into the afternoon. We packed extra food, blankets, snow pants, etc to make our trip. Our day included a trip to the library, going out to lunch, picking up a prescription and taking the kids to their Taekwon-Do lesson. And after was all said and done it wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be; not as easy as a winter day in Florida but very do-able. There are some interesting things that happen in -30 degree weather: after your first breath outside the contents of your nostrils freeze to the hairs; if you wear a scarf or neck warmer and cover up your nose then the warm air you breath works its way up to your eyelashes, forming little ice crystals on them – you have to blink carefully when entering a building to thaw them out; you can SMELL the cold air; you end up driving 35-50 mph all the way into town on a sheet of ice that is covering the freeway. I don’t know if we can call ourselves real Alaskans now, but at least we’ve had a good start!
Peter is enjoying his work schedule since the busy summer time is over. He is able to make it home most days by 5:00-5:30 and has been spending more time with the kids than he has ever been able to. Isaac, Sydney and Peter have all signed up for Taekwon-Do lessons and are sometimes able to make it to a family class together. Peter says he has had to suck up his adult pride a little bit while learning a new skill but he has enjoyed it so far.
Sydney has been reading so many books I can’t keep up with her. She is currently reading the Fablehaven and Artemis Fowl series; fantasy books with plenty of fairies, dragons and elves always tickle her fancy. Last Sunday she was able to play an arrangement of The First Noel in sacrament meeting; she has this amazing quality of not experiencing stage fright – WHATSOEVER. Even if she skips a measure or trips up she just moves on and doesn’t let it phase her. Her mom wishes for that same talent.
Isaac moved on from a pre-level piano book to level one. He goes around letting people know he is in the RED book now. Then mom has to explain what that means. Isaac is doing an excellent job reading and is making his way through the first few Magic Tree House books.
Sydney has been making a list of boy names for us to choose from – she has even taken name ideas from kids and teachers in primary. She seemed a little disappointed when we told her the name we are most likely going to use is not on her list (we’re not spilling the beans on the name until the little bambino is born).