Winter Activities

Every time my husband suggested we take the girls out for ice skating I would inwardly cringe.  For some reason I just couldn't warm up to winter this year, ha ha.  Then in the space of a weekend we, as a family, wound up enjoying some fun winter activities.  Audrey tried ice skating for the first time, and we took advantage of the colorful backdrop at the Mall of America's Ice Castle for some fun  pictures.  So this blog post will be heavily pictured with wintery fun.

Audrey & Sean

 Little sleds are fun to rent.  Towards the end of our time there Jamie wanted to try skating too. Next time.

Centennial Lakes pond is long and winding and so pretty to skate on.

With several bridges to go under.

                                             
                                               Now on to the Mall of America's Ice Castle...

We are greeted by ice princesses at the Ice Castle.

The theme for day was find the dragon eggs.  The girls had fun looking.

There were a lot hearts at the Ice Castle.

I love this picture. I wish it turned out better and not so much camera noise.

I wish I had this for holiday pictures this year, although not a good one of Jamie.

I love sci-fi and fantasy, so these colored pictures are right up my alley.

Audrey & Jamie

Write you own caption.

On a side note, my sister-in-law's sister got married at Mall of America on Valentine's Day.  I don't know the details yet but she won a contest and the wedding was paid for.   She is the one in the pink dress (2nd marriage).

Missy, Dave and 10 other couples tie the knot on Valentine's Day at the MOA.  Pictures at the Ice Castle.

Crawling out from under a Rock

Our household went through a round of a cold virus.  It was inevitable I get it because the girls were coughing all over me.  It was a dozy of cold.  So miserable that I even made myself some chicken soup with a bunch of veggies in it, which also included sweet potatoes and kale and the juice of one lemon. I ate this soup every day with abandon feeling like the ingredients were finding a home in my body.  One day when the cold felt the worst I called in sick to work.  My boss wanted to know if I wanted him to email me some work.  (Really? no)  I felt pressured to go back to work the next day in a sort of delirium.  Other coworkers made comments like "you look kind of green".  For some reason a part of me went into hiding. Somewhere nestled inside I wrapped a part of myself in a cozy embrace of silence.  It was a part of me that was so exhausted and after several weeks I began to wonder if that part of me was ever going to come back out.  For that part of me was my creative child and I needed to find out what was going on?  I no longer felt like blogging or facebooking.  Every time I wanted to sew or crochet, a lot of unfinished projected ran through my mind and I could not focus on any of them.  Then for some bizarre reason I started to connect with this inner, recuperating child while taking my shower before work. So with the warm water flowing down my back, I closed my eyes and pictured my inner child, who was dark like a shadow, and I held her, like I would hold my girls (wrapped my arms around myself), and I told her I was there for her, and that I loved her.  This happened for two days and that was enough to make both of us happy.  Later that day I picked up my unfinished amigurumi Pony Girl and finished the body.



And in the outside world, where up is up and down is down, my girls turned 5 this year.  And I learned to have fun with picasion and a silent lesson about embracing the inner darkness (where a part of myself  hides) in order to emerge once again into the light united with love and warm water flowing down my body.



picasion