Sleepless in New Hope

Today was a mixed blessing here in Minnesota.  This was the weekend we targeted for doing our cookie decorating with the granddaughters and we also planned a day of shopping at the Mall of America, rides in the Nickelodeon amusement park, and lunch at the Rain Forest Cafe.  Well, Mother Nature intervened as often happens this time of the year and we postponed our granddaughter weekend for another week when we heard the forecast of a huge snowstorm.

We woke up to snow and it continued all day.  Bob estimated about 12 inches came down over the course of the day.  If was a beautiful day - very Christmas-y - and it gave us the opportunity to stay in and continue our efforts to sort and organize.  We've been working at this for well over a year - with the goal of moving into the motorhome.  Well, I (Paige) have been having trouble sleeping recently with so much to accomplish prior to the start of our full-timing.  Today we were captive in our house so we took advantage of this time to empty closets and organize into keep- and donate-piles.  I'm hoping that this will decrease the number of items to think about so I can sleep better tonight.

There was a pan of lasagna in our freezer that was waiting to be consumed.  As our house has limited seating, we arranged with our good neighbors, the Buehring's, to bring the lasagna and cheese bread to their house for dinner,  After bundling up, the walk to their house seemed longer than normal in the wind and snow.  We enjoyed their great company, festive decorations, good wine, and recently created cookies.  It was a wonderful ending to our snowy day! 

Time seems to be moving faster and faster lately.  Bob's retired now (one long awaited goal), now I'll be retiring - only 9 days of work left.  I'm training 2 people in on my job prior to leaving.  Christmas tasks are looming still.  And, of course, the emptying of the house and move into the motorhome.  Lots to do!!
Our sons got new laptops from us as an early Christmas gift.  These laptops will benefit us also as they'll now be able to Skype with us.  The granddaughters Skyped today - this will be so great when we're on the road.  See what we mean?  Here are 3 of our 4 granddaughters, and their dad, with the photo taken from our Skype session:

So, ok - enough snowstorm now.  We're hoping to get out to church tomorrow - although I see on TV that many churches are cancelling services for tomorrow already.  I just hope we'll be able to get the motorhome out and loaded in 3 weeks!!  Once we are officially "snowbirds", we will know what we are missing!