spring has sprung

it seems that spring is slowly making its way to frigid wisconsin. it hit nearly 70º here today so we finally made it outdoors to wander around the yard and check out what's going on after 9 months of winter. the boys had a blast and i had so much fun taking outdoor photos again! so, for the next week or so, you'll be seeing many more nature photos. i'm so excited about being about to photograph outside again!

....and again.

once again we find ourselves in the middle of a huge snowstorm. my hubby's work decided not to open until noon today because of it, so he spent the morning snow-blowing. somehow i have the feeling he would have rather been at work!


snow that stuck to the outside of our window. it's VERY windy outside.


after 15 minutes of snow-blowing, i went out with my scarf to tie around hubby's face. since it is still snowing and really windy, his face was freezing off. doesn't he look so handsome in my scarf?


the kids LOVE watching daddy and the snow-blower outside.


and here's a photo to show just how much snow we have. i'm only leaning out the front door because i don't actually want to step outside. that's poor hubby in the distance taking care of the sidewalks. and of course it's all still coming down, so there's more to come. we're supposed to get anywhere from 11"-22" in the next couple days.


this is how my hubby looked after about an hour of snow-blowing. poor guy....by the time he got done, everything he started with was already covered in over an inch of snow again! he looks so happy.


and look at this hat! what a guy!

what a coincidence

so if you happen to follow me on twitter, you know i've been whining a LOT about the weather here in wisconsin. it's been frigid cold and we've already had enough snow for the year in my opinion. it just so happens that my studio is in the basement of our house. while there is heat down there, it's minimal and gets very, very cold in the winter. my assistant and i often complain about how cold our fingers are when we're working.

after another day of complaining on twitter about how cold i was in my studio, my assistant came in this afternoon with fingerless gloves for both of us! that girl deserves a raise! maybe next year i'll break down and buy a space heater!

huge snowfall

this is what we woke up to this morning. these photos were actually taken after 2 hours of shoveling by my hubby! (of course our snowblower won't start!) i didn't stop snowing until early afternoon. all schools were called off and there were kids sledding all over town. seems that we're getting so much more snow this year than in years past. just a few years ago we were hoping for snow for christmas. this year we already had snow on the ground in november. it's going to be a long, long winter.

look real close

it's not much, but it's there. we've had a few small snow-falls this year, but nothing that hasn't melted on impact. it's been pretty cold the last few days so the ground was cold enough to hold a few flakes without melting. the little dude was so excited that he had to call daddy and leave a voicemail telling him to "look out your window daddy.....it's snowing!"

before & after

yesterday we got a few new windows in our house. we were in great need. our house is a mid-entry colonial that was built in 1924. from what we can tell, the windows were original. needless to say our heating bills were astronomical in the wintertime. according to the window guys, the average house has 12 windows.....we're "lucky" enough to have 33! and of course, since it's an old house, the windows are huge. which, of course, means more money. our original quote for windows was over 1/3 of the price that we paid for our entire house! several quotes later we found a better deal. even with that better price, 33 windows at once was not feasible. we decided to break it out through several years and yesterday was the day for round #1. we got new windows in our entire sunroom and one in the bathroom we've been remodeling. (figured since it was already ripped apart we may as well include that one!) here are some before and after pictures so you can get an idea of just how bad the originals are.


before #1. the previous owners of this house liked paint.....a lot! most of the windows had been painted shut and didn't function at all which made getting a breeze in the summer nearly impossible.


before #2. some of the windows were able to open. however, they all needed to be propped up with sticks because the counterbalances were broken off and had fallen into the wall. fun times!


after. ahhhh! how clean and beautiful! i can't tell you what it's like to drive up to our house and see the sunroom full of nice, bright clean windows!! and speaking of clean, i can actually tip all of these in to clean them! i'm so excited!

field trip : pumpkin farm

today the little dude's preschool went to a local pumpkin farm. here, they got to:

jump in the bouncy house (since our wagon ride was cancelled because of too much mud.)


read a book about pumpkins.


sing a song about a horse.


feed the goats ice cream cones filled with goat feed. (and look at a million other animals)


and explore thousands of pumpkins!


and more pumpkins.


and still more pumpkins.

fun was had by all....even with the muddy, muddy weather.