Baby, it's cold outside!

My usual morning routine is to go for a half hour walk, read the Chicago Tribune online, get the weather forecast from weather.com, read comics (through a Seattle paper, I think), read my favorite blogs, check email and then start my day. It takes a while, but I take a while to wake up. 2 large cups of coffee.

When I checked the weather at about 7, it was -5 degrees air temperature. We have a dangerous wind chill warning. And there's about an inch of snow that needs to be shoveled off the sidewalks. Wow, that's cold. And it's been cold, although not this cold, for days now. Ever since the Buick died last week it's been cold. Not good walking to stores and classes weather.

So, what have we done since being banished indoors? Let's see. Moon sand has been strewn all about the living room, sticking deep into the spaces between the floor boards and at the junction of the fireplace apron and the floor. Many of us have had a cold, so we've mostly huddled and blown our noses. Those who do not have a cold have been busy making Kleenex sculptures, villages and people. Paper has been brought out, as have crayons, markers, and tape. The little man is in his tape period right now, it's amazing what a child can do with a roll of tape. What goes through the brain as it decides to tape together R2D2, a pop stick with moon sand on it, a balloon and a play mobile goat?

The house is a mess with us being home all the time, it's impossible to keep up with the tidying. Roomba doesn't like moon sand, he still has no voice and now his battery wont hold a charge. So, he's no help. Of course, I would be more help if I spent more time cleaning and less time knitting!

We have been getting more scholarly pursuits accomplished. We made a run to the library when the car came home last night and picked up 18 items that had been on old for us, transferred from other libraries. We've been doing more science experiment, more history reading and playing around with math more. We have some old science project books from the 1980s, the one we are going through right now is Physical Science Activities for Grades 2 through 8. This is how my kids like to learn science, by doing things. They have been learning about light by doing things making a pinhole camera and seeing how light bends through water.

We have been walking to dance class, just three blocks away. Three nights a week we have dance, one night for each child. It's supposed to get all the way up to 10 degrees today for Little Missy's class. A heat wave.