What a Week...

Happy Birthday Kristi!

The week started off with schools being cancelled due to no power. The boys were home through Wednesday and Jim was out of work (tough time for construction). Today I took a personal day since Joshua had a doctor appt. but now due to the impending storm, schools were called off early so we're all home (Jim's working-thank god).

We can thank my niece Jenna for the snow. Auntie Jeanne and the girls will be visiting the day after Christmas from Tennessee. Jenna had big plans of 'sliding down Auntie Michelle's big hill because it was covered with snow'. Of course, at that time we had not a lick of snow around. This week we will have had three storms after Sunday. Now there will be plenty of snow for Jenna. Of course if she was old enough to understand, she would know that Auntie Michelle needs every last minute for Christmas shopping and this snow is a bit of a damper on the shopping scene. On the other hand the snow is good for Uncle Jim's plowing.

Auntie Michelle was asking about traditions on her blog. We really don't have any besides the comerical advent calendar which is why I adopted the 24 books to Christmas idea from Letti's blog. This week (the one good weather day) I brought my students on a Christmas shopping fieldtrip to the Christmas Tree Shop. I found this cool advent idea that I am excited to try out next year. I will have all year to find trinkets to fill it up with...no peanut gallery comments :)

I bought myself a Christmas present since I had to pick it out and needed it for Christmas. I got a new camera. I am a creature of habit as many of you know and have only had Kodak Easyshare cameras. I really wanted something with more zoom and better lighting. I got the Nikon P80 figuring you can't go wrong with a Nikon. So far, I'm not so sure. It seems when you try to get fancy, the picture taking is not as easy. It is still a point and shoot, but the more you zoom the more super sensitive it is to movement (even pushing the button) and the result is blurred pictures. I hope I can figure it out because I know I will never hear the end of it if Jim hates it. He also needs easy, straight forward.