12 Things I've Learned Since Moving to Iowa - Winter Edition

1. Kids in the backseat think it's hilarious when you can't drive up your own driveway after an ice storm. "More sliding Mommy!"

2. Cutting down your own Christmas Tree with a handsaw at Shrute Farms is much more festive than cutting open tree nets at Target to see which tree has the least amount of needles falling off. Okay, really it's called Strautman Farms, but whatever.  Also, after you have cut down your own tree at said farm, you get to go into the Family Farm Store where a sweet grandma-type is waiting with the sole purpose of passing out hot apple cider and sugar cookies and a kind gentleman is waiting with the sole purpose of passing out Christmas Tree coloring pages for the kids. Christmas Tree shopping does not get any better than that.

3. Winter brings crows (it now makes sense why a group of those freaky birds is called a murder) and bunnies (super cute but they poop all over the beautiful white snow and it ruins my view of my backyard). Winter takes away bugs. Which is excellent. Because have you ever seen a Wolf Spider? I won't include a picture because this isn't a horror story. But if you really want to imagine mini tarantula-looking spiders living in your basement, go for it. (I only found two this year, but still! GEEZ!)

4. Wind chill is a bitch. (1st blog curse word!)

5. Peyton's preschool teacher sent out a reminder for parents to make sure that the kids bring snow pants, boots, hats, and mittens to school. Why? Because the preschoolers will play outside "unless either the temperature or wind chill is below zero." Zero. Degrees. ZEROOOOOO!!!!! DEGREEEEEES!!!!!

6. Grocery Stores have drive up service.  Seriously. You pay for your groceries and leave them in the store. Then you drive your comfy heated car up and the sweet courtesy clerk brings out your groceries and freezes while he loads them into your comfy heated car.  I've never actually used the drive up service because I know I would feel too guilty. But it's amazing just the same.

7. When my husband and I lived in California we had an inside joke. It basically went like this: One of us would say, "I'm freezing, how cold is it?" and the other would say, "Two." Like 2 degrees was the freaking coldest it could ever, ever be. Turns out, it's not.

8. Getting two little kids ready to go out in the snow can easily take 45 minutes if you don't have a specific dressing plan. Also, the scene in "A Christmas Story" when the little brother can't put his arms down while wearing his winter coat is quite accurate. Also, watching my sweet little girl trying to hold her shovel while wearing mittens makes me frustrated for her because it's so hard to do. And she doesn't give up. She's just so patient.

Also, Peyton can get really sweaty while snow boogie boarding down the small hill in our backyard.

9. My (and my Mom's - Hi Mom!) Jabba the Hut snowman skills could use some improvement. So what? We're still proud!

10. There is really no limit to the crafting that can be accomplished when you are snowed in during an extremely long winter. There's no limit to the time you can spend in your pajamas, either. Or watching TV. Or drinking hot coffee fancied up with Bailey's or Kahlua or both. 

11. If you have a small crack in your windshield that leads to the left, it can actually start back at it's source and go all the way to the right. 2 windshield cracks from 1 small pebble. Now that's killing 2 windshield sides with 1 stone. Get it? HA!

12. Snow is beautiful. And it comes in all different sizes. And sometimes it swirls and flutters. And sometimes it's so big it looks like that fake tissue paper snow stuff on TV. And it's so, so quiet. And beautiful. Really, really beautiful.