Snopocolypse 2011: The Aftermath

Alright, I know. . . that sounded like a rather dramatic title. But things were looking pretty dramatic last night. Check out the view from my front door. I think this was around 10 p.m. on Tuesday.

I had a truly crazy afternoon at work, and then a 2 1/2 hour drive home. I was careful and took the long way home, avoiding the back country roads. It was pretty boring, considering that I didn't go much faster than 10 mph the whole trip. I felt somewhat better, though, knowing that I would have Wednesday off from school. I love snow days. While the blizzard was pretty crazy yesterday, (see picture below) things were looking much better by late this morning. We decided to go outside, but just look at what we found when we opened the door.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Nick was eager to go outside and play in the snow, but it was very cold once we got out there. Our side and backyard were pretty cleared of snow, because the blizzard had blown it all towards the neighbor's house. The deepest snow was up by the garage and the front door. Grandma Toni's car was nearly covered!
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Here's Nick and Greg showing off their winter gear.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Our next door neighbors loaned us a sled for Nick to try, and Greg took him for a few trips up the street and back.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Nick was a little crabby and complained about being cold. I asked him if he wanted to go inside and he said, "No!" So we played for just a little longer.
 

I showed Nick how to make snow angels, and . . .

snowballs, too.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Right about this time Nick told me he was cold again. I asked if he wanted to go inside, and he said, "Yes, Mommy." So inside we went to shed our many layers of clothing. Here's what our entryway looked like.
 

We were only out for about 25 minutes or so, but Nick was shivering when we came in. His nose was running pretty bad, too. I took his shirt off, and the poor boy was burning up. Poor kid had a temperature of 102.7! We're still not sure what he has, but he's obviously not feeling well.

His nose is running, his eyes are watering, and he's kind of achy. There are no other symptoms that we've seen. We've been giving him tylenol and lots of snuggles and just hoping he gets better. Good thing I have another snow day tomorrow. I wouldn't want to leave him when he's running fevers like this. Plus, they haven't plowed us out of our subdivision yet, so we're stuck at home anyway.

Brooding Over a Snowy Future, or Roti Bread to the Rescue!

I like this picture of Nick and me, because we both have such brooding looks on our faces. It's because we had just learned about Snowpocolypse 2011, and we were perturbed about the potential for a three-hour car ride home tomorrow. Seriously, though, Greg and I took Nick to Flat Top Grill in downtown Naperville on Sunday. Nothing like a choose-your-own vegetables lunch to make you feel good about eating healthy.

See how happy Nick is to be eating broccoli? Next time I need to get him way more broccoli in his bowl, because it is his absolute favorite. He's even trying to eat with chopsticks, though he stabs more than anything. While we were there, Nick ate broccoli, brown rice, pork, edamame, green beans, mushrooms, carrots, and tofu. Not sure how the tofu got in there, but Nick ate even that. We were really surprised that his meal was free, so we let him pick whatever he wanted to put on top of the rice. We've never done that before--we always just let him pick from our plates. But we figured this was a good time to let him choose his own toppings, and he really liked pointing to the things he wanted. My boy chose nearly everything.

I had been craving their roti bread for quite awhile, and I had two pieces with my lunch. I wish now that I would've requested more. Even reheated, it is delicious. Aren't pregnancy cravings weird? I guess it's a good thing that I was craving roti bread and stir fry; there are far worse things this baby could've been demanding.

Do you want to know the best part? Dessert. It was just perfect, not too sweet, just the right mix of crunch and melt-in-your-mouth goodness.

Here's the description of the dessert, from their website:

"Cinnamon Fresh Fruit Roti:


Our very own roti prata bread rolled in cinnamon sugar, stuffed with seasonal fresh fruit in a crème anglaise sauce. Topped with cherry orange glaze and mint leaves paired with french vanilla ice cream and house made whipped cream."

I do believe that I think about food way, way more when I'm pregnant. (Yes, I did indeed notice that I did two posts in a row about food. It's my blog. I can write about what I want. Lately, I want to write about food.)

I've even been awake in the middle of the night (after one of my many trips to the bathroom), fantasizing about the food I could eat the next day. The positive side is that I crave many healthy things, in addition to the naughty comfort foods.