snow good

You can take that title anyway you want.

This cute face makes you think of fun times with the fluffy white stuff...

 ...and fun times were had on this day, just over a week ago when Chicago landed 8 inches of pure white powder.  It started coming down in the early morning. And by rush hour all the roads were covered pretty thick.  My school is typically an hour commute for me one way with the downtown traffic heading out of the city to the southwest.  On this day, I knew to leave promptly, so at three o'clock I hit the road...

...only to find myself an hour later, still stuck on the south end of Lake Shore Drive because they closed the ramp getting on to the Stevenson.  I was able to get off at 31st Street -which was a whole other bag- because the main side streets were clogged.

By the time the clock was striking six, I was still playing stop and go with the side street red lights and the itty bitty cars spinning out with no traction. (So thankful for my big Suburban that everyone makes fun of - he did the job well!)  I made it to around Kedzie and Archer when my brain started telling me to pull into the White Castle drive-thru for something, anything to eat.  Lo and behold, a car spun out just in front of me blocking the entrance.  

Sigh. 

 

A few blocks more of the stopping and going convinced me to try a different route.  I headed down 47th Street, which is a LOT less trafficked unless you count 18 wheelers heading to factories, and was able to move between Kedzie and Central in 10 minutes flat, hitting whopping speeds of 20 miles per hour!!  It wasn't much longer then.  I arrived home around 6:40pm.  SNOW GOOD.

We spent the rest of the weekend playing in the white stuff; which is what it SHOULD be...

 Brandan got a brand new snow board and mastered that thing fairly fast.

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I took time to paint my nails a festive bright color to make me smile.

 ...and the rest of the week flew.

I did wrap up the grant a colleague and I have been working feverishly on...

 ...and our fingers are crossed that Fund for Teachers will grant us $$$ to head to Costa Rica this summer; can you imagine?  We won't know for sure until the beginning of April.

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And on that SAME $$$ page, and on the down slope of things...

Brandan (and his horrified parents) found out that it costs $5300 to put braces in a mouth for a struggling, misguided eye tooth. Eeegads!  (Coming to a post near you mid February!)

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So, all's good.

We are busy being busy and enjoying the wonderful winters Chicago always guarantees us.