A Windy Weather Day

What an interesting day today was.  It all began around midnight with winds so strong that I was worried that our apartment's long, flimsy windows would shatter.  At 2:20am, there was the chilling sound of everything powering down.  I had forgotten how dark it can be without electricity.  Now that we have Kayleigh, there's always a night light on so that we can check on her.  Without the night light, our digital clock, or the 24/7 apartment lamps outside, it was very dark!

I remember lying in bed thinking, "What a long day it's going to be without electricity!"  I wondered what I would do at home alone with Kayleigh.  No computer, no phone (it was charging when the electricity went out), no tv, just a very long, quiet day with a sleeping baby.

But when we woke up in the morning, the air was still and the power was back.  And, there was a facebook status eluding to the fact that my friend Stacey, who just so happens to live up the street, had to stay home from work do to a fallen tree blocking her driveway.  And, since she still didn't have power at her apartment, wasn't it so nice of me to offer to have her come over? :)

We had a wonderful morning.  Stacey and I are co-hosting a table at tomorrow night's Advent by Candlelight at church (an evening of devotions and desserts for women) and still had a lot of things to prepare for it.  We spent the morning drinking tea, listening to Christmas music, and looking at the ideas we had been pinning on Pinterest for the past month.  Gosh, I love that site!

At noon, I headed over to my friend Kayse's house to make salt-dough Christmas ornaments while Stacey went home to check on things and get some work done.  Since it's the first Christmas for both of our girls, we had decided to collaborate on some fun "firsts" gifts for grandparents.  Kayse and I had a lot of fun mixing the dough and figuring out the best ways to get a 2 month old and an 11 month old to leave their cute little handprints in circles of dough.  No one prepared us for what a challenge doing something like that really is!  We had a lot of fun, though, and I think we'll make some grandparents very happy this Christmas :)

On the way home from Kayse's, I stopped to take some pictures at the same park I took Kayleigh Girl to last week to get these pictures.  Only this time, I took pictures of fallen trees.  It's sad that this beautiful park lost so many trees last night.  And not only the park, but everywhere around here!

Ok, and I couldn't resist this sweet face!

Back at home, I joined Stacey (who still had no power at her house and had taken me up on the offer to do her work from our computer) and the two of us worked on crafts, made dinner, and entertained Kayleigh.  When Jesse got home, we ate, played a game of Settlers of Catan, and then Jesse made his very first batch of chocolate chip cookies (to which he added cinnamon and ground cloves "just because") while Stacey and I finished up some Advent by Candlelight preparations.  I'll share pictures tomorrow!

Don't you love it when a day that you think is destined to be very lonely turns out to be a friend-filled, craft-filled, wonderful, happy day?  Thank You, God!

What a blessing dear friends are.  I'm so thankful!