Keeping Warm

• You know you are in the middle of a cold spell when you say to your son in the car, "Hey, it's up to 17 degrees outside - not so bad!" and you mean it.
• It was -1 yesterday morning when I woke up, but a balmy 6 degrees today. It was almost cold enough to make me rethink leaving the gym in a wet towel and bathing suit... but naaah. Who wants to deal with drying off and putting on clothes when you are just going to shower as soon as you get home anyway?
• I have been on a soup kick lately. It's one more good thing about winter that I will try to remind myself of come March. Lately, I've made lentil soup, white bean & chicken chili, rivel soup (that old family fave), potato-leek soup and had at friends houses' butternut squash soup and pasta & fagioli. Yum!! I am going through chicken broth like it's nobody's business.
• Getting up at 5am last week was pretty rough. Not so bad for Monday or Tuesday, but by Wednesday, I was definitely feeling exhausted. Every year I vow that I will not sleep in later than 6:30 or 7am over the winter vacation so that I can maintain some semblance of my normal sleep schedule, but I never had the will to stick to it. Plus, one day my alarm went off and Chad said, "why are you setting an alarm when we don't have to be anywhere?" and I said, "okay" and immediately fell back to sleep. What a bad influence.
• The kids started swim lessons again last week. Parker seemed a bit rusty - not on skills, just on his comfort being back in the water and being with a new instructor. Brandon, on the other hand, picked right back up where he left off, swimming like a fish. I love watching them out there.
• Speaking of swim lessons, there is one other little girl in their class, who is 4. Her Mom, while perfectly pleasant to me, is a crazy stage Mom!! She yells at her daughter the whole time, who hopefully misses much of it because she's underwater. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING??? MOVE YOUR ARMS! WHY AREN'T YOU DOING IT LIKE WE PRACTICED??!!" I've never seen anything like it. I mean, she's 4 and she's learning to swim, and frankly, she's doing a pretty great job. Why the pressure?
• We went to Providence yesterday to see Rebekah and the fam, and as a special bonus Lisa was also there from Vermont! It was such a fun and relaxed day. We hung out and had lunch and watched the uber-painful Patriots game. Reba, Lisa and I used to watch football together as kids, so it was really fun to recreate that. First time we've seen a game together since they lived in Boston right after college. I always enjoy myself so thoroughly when I get together with them... there's just a comfort level there that only comes with knowing someone for pretty much their entire life.
• I watched a lot of football this weekend, and pretty much every team I rooted for lost. I was happy to see the Cardinals come through though.
• Bless him, but do anyone else's kids talk to them no matter whether they are in earshot or not? I feel like when Parker and I are home alone, he keeps up a steady stream of (sorry, Parker peanut) meaningless conversation and it doesn't matter if I've left the room or not. I find myself doing something like switching laundry downstairs and hearing him upstairs still talking and waiting for my responses, and I'm screaming up the stairs, "I can't hear you; I'm switching the laundry." But, he still keeps going. He's got a lot on his mind apparently. Sometimes, I just really want absolute silence for a few minutes.
• I'm reading Barbara Kingsolver's new book "Lacuna" right now. Love it. I bought it online and then had my nook download it - instantaneous satisfaction of my need for a new book. I have a list of about 8 books that I read last month that I keep meaning to review on here, but not enough time lately.