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Category Archives: The Ins and Outs of Us
Snow Days Rock
So we just had our first real blizzard since we moved here. Pretty exciting since we’ve been here for 6 1/2 years. IT. WAS. AWESOME. We were like little kids looking out the window all night last night and couldn’t go to sleep. Silly us. Adam was outside early early this morning taking pictures of the snow. It is times like this that we miss Montana a little more than usual.
Nothing against Nebraska folk, but the place literally shut down for all intensive purposes yesterday. It was GREAT!!! I mean literally shut down. Schools were closed Monday in pure anticipation of the storm. I went to deposit a check into our bank account yesterday afternoon and the bank was even closed! The pharmacies in town closed. It’s like time stood still for a bit. Now, don’t get me wrong….there was VERY heavy snow and it did get VERY windy last night. Rumor has it there was an ER call last night (thank goodness I wasn’t on call) and they couldn’t get the ambulance out of the ER bay so they had to get the guy in a truck! Our grand total snowfall was 14-15ish inches. Tons of drifts though, which are the bestest part of course.
Now today it is sunny and gorgeous out! Not a lick of wind. But I hear some schools are still closed tomorrow. Which brings me to my next point. As Adam and I lie last night listening to the wind we talked of growing up in the mountains in Montana and how we were NEVER and I mean NEVER were lucky enough to have a snow day. For those of you Montana folk reading this can verify this. I clearly recall one day when I was in 7th grade when we got one but it was because we got 3 feet of snow in a 24 hour time period otherwise, 2 feet of snow….too bad, get your butt to school. No snow days, end of story, period.
It was a totally different mind set out there. No one really cared if the roads were plowed or not…you just gave it a rip and off you went. We learned how to drive in the snow on the mountain roads. The harder it was snowing the better the skiing was.
I will say though that yesterday was AWESOME at work as most patients cancelled their appointments so I got all of my dictation caught up (sorry ms. transcriptionist) and some research stuff for a couple of patients I had been wanting to get to as well. It doesn’t matter how often you get them, snow days do rock…just like my Miss Holly above shows (who looovvveess the snow). She is so gleeful and running so fast that even Adam’s fancy camera action couldn’t catch her very clearly.
My Nana’s angels
my very own Nana angels
So I have a story that goes back as far as I can remember and then a few years before that even. You see my late Nana would give my mom an angel every Christmas. Not just any angel. A very special angel. An all white angel from Goebel/Hummel from Germany. She began giving them to my mom in 1976 which happens to be my year of birth.
Every year Goebel comes out with a new angel and she is always holding something new, a harp, flute, flower, drum etc. And she has the year on her dress and she is a bell, of course. Nana and Pepe’s “Christmas box” by far beat anyone else’s each and every year as I grew up. The UPS man would pull up and we would spend hours upon hours arranging and rearranging what they sent to us.
BUT. Nana’s angel was different. Special, really. My mother always opened her angel right then and put her right out on the shelf with the rest of them. No waiting until Christmas Eve like the other gifts. The Nana angel was opened right away. So here we are now, 33 years later and my Nana gave these beautiful angels to each of her nine children each and every Christmas.
What I didn’t know is that she would have to place her order for them in the spring each year for the following Christmas in order to be sure to have them. Last spring as she was dying she placed her order for her 2009 angels. Her final Christmas gift to her nine children were passed out at her funeral…everyone got their 2009 angel, albeit 5 months early.
So I got to thinking. I finally have some pieces of furniture that I can actually display things in enclosed glass. The only thing I have ever really collected is doctor and nurse dolls/figurines, etc. I have two sets of salt and pepper shakers from my Nana on display in an antique buffet but I got to thinking about those angels more and more. They were such an exciting part of my mom’s Christmas each year when I was a child. At least that is how I remember it. It was always like….”what is she holding this year?!”.
I’ve decided to collect these angels in honor of my Nana. It will take me awhile but it can be done. I have already found a few on ebay. I have 1976-1979 and 2009 and I think my Aunt Laura may have an extra or two that I may be able to get too.
my Nana angels shelf
My mom said that when Nana started to give them to she and her siblings they were less than $4 each and now they are almost $40 each! So anyways, food for thought. If you have a daughter, or son even…maybe start a tradition of some sort when he/she graduates from high school or college or gets married by giving something like my Nana’s angel.
Things I THINK should be sold in pairs…
socks. shoes. earrings. mittens. chop-sticks. skis. knee-pads. leg-warmers…..CURTAINS!!!!!!!
For pete’s sake. My in-laws got us the beautiful curtains for our living and sitting rooms for Christmas that I picked out. Here we are tonite all excited to finally put these fancy schmancy double rod thingys up for these double type curtains and each package only has one panel. ONE. Yes, I am aware that it says PANEL, as in the singular sense. I see that nice and clearly now. Adam cannot fathom how I didn’t notice it before. I suppose I just assumed curtains fell into the things sold as a “pair” grouping.
stupid panel
Adam says nooooo, JCPenney’s curtains are just so fancy that they have to sell them separately in case fancy people want an odd number of panels. Whatever that means.
Suzy Snowflake
Another great song from an old high school friend’s Christmas album…honestly, you need to listen to it: