'Tis the Season

Here in New York the "season" is in full force. This week is a perfect example.

When the weather outside is frightful....

It started out on Thursday with some snow flurries and sleet. Not that big of a deal until you combine 18F temperature and you get this... (Don't ask why the new car is not in the garage,that's a story for another day).

We woke up Friday morning, which was my day off, thankfully, to a power outage. The power had come off and on through the night, but went out for several hours during the day. Since we only had a few more hours of battery time left on the smartest investment of our lives (Emma's portable DVD player) I decided I would attempt to make it to the store to get some supplies (no mom and Tammy I was not going to go get just junk food, I would have bought some soda too).

After a half hour of scrapping the 1" thick ice off the car I was able to open the driver's door to find out the battery was dead. Another hour went by before I could dig out our other car to jump the van. Needless to say shortly after I was done the power was back on and the car is now in the garage.

It hasn't been such a smooth story for many in our ward. For 3 days now some of our good friends have had heat, but no power and others have none at all. We have been housing the Neitschmanns whose power was back on but is now off again. Hopefully everything will be back tomorrow, if not, we are gonna need some more cookies and hot cocoa.

Our Cocoa Junkie(s)

Does anybody know the number and meeting times of Cocoaholics Anonymous? Now that the winter weather is here (it was welcomed by a day where the high was 20F, but for most of the day is was 9F) we have 2 cocoaholics who shall remain nameless (Emma and Torrie) who may need an intervention soon, especially since one is still in denial. With me leaving for work super early at 6am these two burn through 2 cups of "deyisciousness" before the sun rises. I think I am immune since I don't have to say no to this face all day. Lets face it, I can't even say no more than two times in a row, so I guess we are lucky the "Cocoa Latte" is not running 24/7.

The "Ickey" Store Adventure

With the power back on and our cocoa hangovers in full force we did what any true New Yorker would avoid, we took a road trip to New York City on a Christmas season weekend. This was an adventure and a half. It took us until 1pm to make the 3hr trip to Manhattan only to discover the parking garages around the Manhattan Temple were full since Juilliard, which is across the street, was having a performance. After searching for another hour we met up with our good friend from BYU Hawaii, Donald. We took a picture outside the temple and headed to meet up with the Leavitts (at least the younger versions) who had flown in for the day at the Disney store, or in Emma's words the "Ickey" store (mickey without the m). The multiple subway rides were interesting enough, Emma actually got a kick out of riding the trains. We spent over 2 hrs in the Disney store. Emma's favorite part other than picking out her Christmas gift, which hopefully Santa will bring back Christmas Eve, was seeing Minnie and Santa "Gooky". We had planned to also visit the Rockafeller Christmas tree and Santa at the Macy's store on 34th street, but the crowds and weather dictated otherwise. Case in point we tried unsuccessfully for a half hour to hail a cab to try to get around faster. We ended up riding the subway back to our car, thanks to our hero Donald. Thanks man, without you we would have been lost for hours. We finally made it back to our warm home.

Although the season tried to throw us a curve ball, we are very grateful for the chance to make once in a life time memories with our little girls.

P.S. We don't know if we should continue to blog, we put in the time and pictures and get no comments, ::sniff, sniff:: Does anyone hear a tiny violin? :)