I meant to get these pictures up earlier this week, but Aiden came down with a yucky, horrible stomach virus, and life stopped for a few days. Thankfully it was limited to throwing up, but it certainly was extremely messy and I have never washed so many loads of laundry at one time, in all my life. He is over it now and back to his old self, but Carl and I are anxiously waiting to see if we will be the virus' next victims.

Anyway, back to the snow. We did indeed have a record snow, just over a foot in 24 hours. We spent some time playing in it the next morning and then after lunch some of our neighborhood friends invited Aiden to join them sledding. Of course I couldn't let that opportunity pass. He absolutely loved it!!

Lots and lots of snow!

We went for a walk around the cul-de-sac.

Whee! It was so deep in some spots!

Going sledding down a hill in our subdivision!

Look at the smile on his face. He couldn't get enough of it! Over and over he went down. Such fun!

This picture is hysterical! My friend, Maggie, snapped this of Aiden with her cellphone. Poor boy went face first into the snow as he came to the bottom of the slope. He is always such a trooper, no tears, just ran over to me to help him brush the snow off and then proclaimed "again" with a huge smile on his face!

We woke up this morning to lots of snow on the ground! It started snowing in the early hours of the morning and it has been snowing non-stop all day. On the news they said this has been a record snowfall, the highest ever recorded in the Dallas Fort Worth area! When I saw all the snow outside this morning, I was determined that this time we would go out and really play in it. I am so glad that we did. I armed myself (and Aiden, but he could care less) with lots of layers of clothes. I even put on my cuddle duds. It helped so much and I really stayed pretty warm!

Eagerly looking out the window, waiting to go outside and play!

Quick picture as we got outside.

Mr Snowman! When Carl looked at these pictures, he laughed. I guess the correct way to build a snowman is to roll balls of snow?? I thought we did a fine job!

The same height as Aiden!

Trying to make a snow angel!

Aiden couldn't get enough of the snow. He would have played out there for hours if I let him. We went back out after naptime and finally he came in and said "I'm fweezing". He promptly took a nice warm bath.

I thought I would throw this one in. This is my one and only snow in all my years growing up in South Africa. After now realizing in my adult years how cold it is when it snows, I am curious (mom) as to why I was in shorts??? :) Also do notice the nice grocery bags over my shoes protecting them from the snow...

... I realized today how effectively they work :)

Just 2 months shy of being 3, Aiden is maturing in leaps and bounds! Sitting still and focusing on something, with the exception of looking at books, has never been one of Aiden's strong points. He just has so much energy and wants to go from one thing to the next. This has, in some ways, been very frustrating for me, but just in the last month or two he has grown so much in this area. One of the ways he has learned to focus more, is by doing puzzles. For Christmas he got a Sesame Street one from our neighbor and then a box of 4 different Thomas the Train one's from my mom. I figured he would take a while to get a hang of them, but after only doing them with him a couple times, he could do them completely by himself. He is now obssessed with doing puzzles and puts them together over and over each day. We'll clean them up and put them away, but then a little while after, he is asking to do them again. He just can't seem to get enough of puzzles! The most he has done is 24 pieces, but this weekend we bought him a 60 piece puzzle of the Map of the United States and he is already working hard at putting it together. It is really fun to watch him learn and grow. I am wondering if he is gifted like his daddy, with a love of working with his hands and figuring things out :)

Sesame Street puzzle

Working on one of the Thomas the Train puzzles

Working on his letters.

Clearly these are not flattering pictures of me, and ordinarily there is no way I would post these on the blog for you all to see. Aiden and I were just playing around taking pictures together the other day, like we have done many other times. But when I uploaded them onto our computer and was looking through them, I was struck by how blessed I am with this sweet boy! Blessed that God would entrust him to me as his mommy, and blessed that I am able to stay home with him each day and relish in the joys of motherhood. Not that it is all happy all day. Many times motherhood is just plain hard, teaching and training a little soul, but there is also so much joy. I get to enjoy the simple things of life through the eyes of a 2 year old. I love laughing with my boy, being silly with my boy, smothering him with hugs and kisses and tickles. These moments are fleeting and I want to soak them up! Thank you Lord for my boy!

The weather here has been so darn cold. I told Carl last night that this is the coldest winter I have ever experienced... he laughed since my only comparision are winters in South Africa and Southern California. Usual Texas winters are mild with an ocassional cold snap. However, It feels like this winter has been one long cold snap (high temps in the 30's and even some 20's) with a few mild days (high temps in 60's &70's) thrown in. I know for those of you further north I sound like a wimp since you have endured a much colder winter, but for me it has just been miserably cold. It seems like it has been an unusually cold winter most places. So much for global warming. LOL! Anyway, I am counting down the weeks till spring, and thankful that this winter is not the norm around here!

Saturday night we took Aiden to the Urgent Care. Earlier that day he had been bouncing behind Carl on the office chair (while Carl was working on the computer) and he fell off the chair sideways and hit his head on the baseboard. We figured he had just hurt his head, but as the day went on, we realized that he couldn't use his hand very well and putting any pressure on it made him cry. We decided that night to take him in just in case he had fractured something. They took an x-ray and thankfully all looked well, he had just sprained his wrist. It was really interesting, though, to see the x-rays of his little hand and arm. We could see all the growth that still has to take place for the bones to meet up and that much of his wrist is actually still cartilage. I guess that is a good thing when you are rough and tumble 2 year old!

Waiting for the Dr