Pancakes, puzzles and princesses OH MY!

Hey everyone, I'm back again from the septic system. Part of me thinks that it was food poisoning AND part virus... although I knew I wasn't doing right by my stomach eating at Taco Bell to begin with...Ha! Charma got me this time. Anyway, back to life. (shhh... I don't want Andy to hear me say this...but some weird warped part of me really enjoys being deathly ill...its the only excuse I get to lay in bed all day. Tho, I could deal with something less extreme... like a cold or hangover or something more desirable...than wrath o' Taco H---)

Today was Max's first day back at school... we've been a bit snowed in. It actually snowed something substantial...and then screwed up all the niceness by throwing down about a 1/2 inch of solid ice. It was quite interesting getting the kids out to the car this morning... it was almost cartoon like watching them slip over and over...even with me holding their hands...it was dangerous. My driveway is on a steep incline, but the top is fairly level... so as soon as I got the back tires on the slope...the rest of the truck went down the driveway on its own...I nearly smashed into the mailbox. Oh dear... to say the least I stayed away from the house until late afternoon in hopes that the ice would be melted down by then... it was (pheuf). Max did have a two hour delay this morning, so we had a really fun breakfast.

About 2 months ago I accidentally bought "real" pancake mix... you know, the kind where you have to add the egg, milk, oil and flour. well I was accustomed to the lazy mans "water and mix" ...and did not read the directions on the box. Sooo I made it the way I normally do and fed them to the kids and Andy for breakfast one morning... (rothlmbo...remembering these faces)...Andy and the kids all looked like dogs that got into the peanut butter jar...and the peanut butter was stuck to the roof of their mouths. Oh my goodness...of course my husband...the saint... trying to be gracious for the breakfast could barely get the words out of his gummed up mouth to ask what I had done differently with the pancakes. Hes so cute :) Sorry honey, I didn't read the box. Anyhoo, since then I've perfected the homemade style pancakes and actually prefer the taste over the premix. I usually add a little bit of vanilla, sugar and cinnamon...yumm.
Max did a floor puzzle all by himself today... look how super fun this one is... Melissa and Doug brand puzzles make a really sturdy product. The kids got a few of them for Christmas I have put away for a rainy day.

Oh ...Katy made up her first story yesterday...I wrote it down word for word...here it goes.

"Once upon a dream, there was a beeeeeautiful princess. She went to a castle and then to have a princess crown. Then to have a princess shoe, and a princess dress...a pink dress."

that's it :)