staying sane in Chiberia

It is beyond freezing people. Seriously, record setting, make you wanna slap yo’ mama, bitterly ice cold. I’m trying to tell myself it will all be worth it in June but Gah! And if it wasn’t already close to the apocalypse with a polar vortex being all the rage Chicago Public Schools cancelled school! Seriously. Never happened in my years teaching in the system mostly because the city needs the kids to be in school and out of trouble and unlike normal grown-up professions teachers usually are not treated with the respect  they deserve (ie they have to teach with no power (happened to me) and in other similarly heinous circumstances.  But I stand corrected CPS DID cancel school and for two days at that! So you know it is bad.

I have spent the last 48 hours indoors wearing a mix of Pj’s and workout clothes (do you like how I wrote that as if this is any different from my norm? True story).  I ventured out to mail something today and quickly repented, ran home, and thanked the Lord for our heat.  As I have made abundantly clear I am not a winter person, never was and 4 years living on a tropical island where flip flops were my only shoes does not help this sun lovin’ mama.  But I’m trying, like really I am. By now many of you may know about my slight love affair with ridiculous & unnecessary hash tags and when I heard “Chiberia” it was love at first text. I plan to use it until it is dead and buried. I thought I should reminisce about a few of our adventures in the arctic tundra known as the Midwest.  We boiled some water and tossed it outside in a science experiment of sorts and learned about why boiling water freezes faster than cold water. Crazy but true.

While J was shoveling the girls joined him to play in the snow.  The above picture could have ended badly but actually proved to be a genius move by Jason.  Alley sledding. I humbly suggest it become a winter Olympic sport


The girls and I even managed to make a snowman.  Now he was pathetic and about 1.5 feet tall because I am a wuss and Abishai woke up (yes, let’s blame the baby).

By day 2 of no school it was getting weird up in here.
But the girls and I decided we needed a talent show complete with a play, dance party (umm, obviously), art work and poem reciting. We did a rendition of Beauty & the Beast written by Annikah (with suggestions from all of us) on my laptop.  We even had make-up, costumes, set design, and props.  We take our craft seriously people.

Since Joy ventured out to visit we cast her in the demanding roles of ‘Mrs. Teapot’ and ‘The Wardrobe.’  Evy was ‘Belle’s Papa’ and she wore a Pocahontas dress backwards, brown pants, sparkly sequin shoes, and sported a blue mustache with pink glitter. The reviews are not in yet but I am thinking, “daring and bold” and “original and never before seen” will be some of the critics comments. So although I am looking forward to school starting again tomorrow and getting back to a regular routine I gotta say I enjoyed our lazy days inside.  We found ways to amuse ourselves.
Love from icy Chiberia,