St Patrick's Day Parade

On Saturday, we went to see Papa Rule marching in the St. Patrick's Day parade. That's him under the flag looking dapper in his Knights of Columbus regalia.

Afterwards, we went for lunch at Ada's Diner on Bank Street -- an old favourite of ours -- where Ada remembers the kids names and birthdays even though we only go in there once or twice a year.

More snow shots

56 cm of snow

Some shots of the front of our hous after the 56 cm weekend of snow. Shoveling all that snow was NASTY, but PLAYING in the snow with the kids is magical. We used to dream of a winter like this when we were younger. Dennis is having fun digging holes and tromping out hiking trails for the kids with his snowshoes.

The level of snow in our yard is between 4-5 feet -- bringing it right up to the level of our front porch -- normally 5 feet off the ground. The big bank by the front corner is about 8 feet high. It's a favourite of Rachel's -- who has taken to calling it her "basement" for some reason.

Here are the kids playing in the snow before the big storm. As you can see, the snow banks are already pretty high. The kids have really enjoyed the snow this year. It has been like something mythic - "the snow of '08 when it was up over our heads." Well, it helps to be short, but it is nearly over mommy's head as well!
In this bottom picture, you can see the last remains of our snowman - who lasted about two months (I think we built it in January). He kind of started to tilt to the side. He lost his head a few times (don't we all on occasion?) However, he was finally a casualty in the big snow storm - he wound up buried once and for all. Snow-man we hardly knew ye.