As many of you know, New Hampshire was hit with a major ice storm last week. My parents still never lost power in Laconia, but they did lose cable for about 4 hours. (Boo hoo!) The rest of the state is another story.
At our house on the pond we lost power at about 10:45 pm on Thursday night. As I write this it is 2:15 pm the following Wednesday and we still don't have power back yet. Much of the southern tier of the state is without power though many communities will be getting power back today or tomorrow. We don't know when we will be getting power back in our town and Public service of New Hampshire doesn't seem to know either.
As you may know, our basement is a wet one and we have a generator specifically for the purpose of running our sump pump should we lose power. It has also been used to run the blower on the wood stove to help heat the house, a few lights, and, of course, the TV & DVD player.
Riley and I hunkered down on Friday with Chris and the dog, but left for Laconia on Saturday morning when news hit that it may be awhile before we had power restored to us. So, Chris is holding down the fort and running out to places like Panera and the gym to get some food, a hot shower, and internet access.
School has been canceled for both of our districts for the rest of the week and next week is up in the air. We all hope to return for Monday and Tuesday before Christmas break begins, but a snow storm is coming Sunday night so we'll see. There are districts next to ours that have already canceled school until January 5th (the end of Xmas break).
Chris is lonely and misses us and we are lonely too, even though we have the company of Nana and Grampy. Chris and I both hope to have power back by Christmas so that we can have Riley's first Christmas at home like we planned.
These pictures were taken on Friday outside of our house. You can see it is pretty icy and messy with downed tree limbs and such, but is really NOTHING compared to the rest of the area we live in.
I'm a little tardy in posting about the actual Christmas day festivities, but thought you would all enjoy some pictures. We had a nice time with Grampy, Nana, and Uncle Peter who arrived Christmas Eve and Grandma and Grandpa who joined us all Christmas morning. We had Chinese for dinner Christmas Eve and a roast on Christmas. We adults opened presents while Riley was taking her morning nap and then watched her open presents once she woke up. She didn't really get the whole tearing paper/opening thing and was much more interested in munching on the piece of apple she had been given. (We were all eating appetizers including caramel cream cheese apple dip and she wanted to join in.) She has enjoyed playing with all of her new toys these past few days.
Today was the Christmas party for the little daycare Riley goes to. The kids all did a secret santa and there were other gifts there from the daycare lady. This morning we put Riley in her party clothes to get ready. 
She also enjoyed eating a cookie with frosting at the party and later making faces at Daddy once we got home.
"Well, I first had to try out my new high chair. Mommy forgot mine at home and went out to buy a new one at Walmart that could stay at Nana's house for the next time I visit. Grampy said it was silly to get a new chair for only a few meals. I guess he didn't think we would still be here 5 days later!"
"I went to sleep at my normal time the first night we were there, but I screamed a lot because Uncle Peter's room is kinda scary. Then, when Mommy checked on me at 11:30pm I was awake and ready to go so we went down the hall to visit Nana."
"My new accomplishment is trying to get up the stairs. I tried to follow Grampy and got up one stair before I got stuck. Then Mommy pulled me away because she was trying to watch Ellen."
As many of you know, New Hampshire was hit with a major ice storm last week. My parents still never lost power in Laconia, but they did lose cable for about 4 hours. (Boo hoo!) The rest of the state is another story.
It has been freezing here this week. I think it is below normal temps and more normal for late December or January. In fact the pond was almost covered this morning with a thin sheet of ice. Some of that has broken up by now, but a lot remains and winter is definitely on its way.
In addition to the weather being cold, Riley came down with another cold which led to another ear infection. Last time she just had a mild infection, but this one is full in one ear. Hopefully this won't be a cycle for the winter and she won't follow in her parents' footsteps by having lots of ear infections as a baby.
With the cold weather upon us, I've been Bundling Riley up in the morning. It wasn't cold enough this morning for her big pink parka, but she did end up in her hat and mittens. She doesn't seem to mind wearing either until we get in the car and the fleece of her hat sticks to her car seat and the hat ends up covering at least one eye after she moves her head around. Her mittens are tricky because they mean she can't pick anything up and becomes frustrated. She's so cute though in this stuff!
Riley is 10 months old today, and I can't believe it. Time goes so fast it seems unreal. She's been recovering from her first ear infection and a loonngg cold, but seems to be in better spirits these past few days. I myself have been dealing with a cold for a few weeks now. We had no school today due to the election and had a workshop instead. Later we took Riley to vote and played on the floor at home. Riley is trying to crawl over everything these days, and the dog doesn't even stop her.
Since Riley is crawling around on her belly now (and is really fast), we decided to get her a "pen" to put her in so she can't get into trouble when we need to run off to the bathroom or something. So far results are mixed. She usually cries at first but calms down eventually.
