Snow Days!

Did I say it's been a mild winter in my last post? I take it back. It's just been a crazy winter, weather-wise. Check this out:

That was without the wind chill. The real feel has been -21, for the high, and it got down to -41 at the coldest point this morning. Basically, everything has been cancelled, school included. Dance, Youth activities at the church, Scouts, even Red Bell, though I think a few kids whose parents actually have to go into work have been there for at least part of the day. Jason came in from work early on Monday. Ford sent them all home, due to the snow storm. A lot of employees are still working from home, though Jason opted to go in. It's hard to get work done at home with 4 cooped up kids! He took the Explorer, in case the cold weather affected the van during the commute. We even got an emergency alert to keep our thermostats set at no higher than 65, to save on energy.

The kids and I have had fun at home. They didn't have much homework and I made them do it yesterday morning along with their music practice and reading so we could watch movies and play games the rest of the time. We ventured out and went to playgroup at the church this morning so the kids could run around. We tried to blow bubbles so they would freeze outside, but they just blew away, but our frozen water balloons worked out really well!

We just put them in the snow and they froze very quickly! 

We put food coloring in some of them. Here's a few after taking off the balloons. I didn't take pictures of the others because I couldn't stand going out too much. Austin came in crying after the final time he went out to take off the balloons because his hands were so cold, after only a few minutes.

He's been dying to make Resurrection rolls since last Easter, so we did.

Painting squishies.

 Tomorrow there will be school since the 6 am temperature is supposed to be 1 with a wind chill of 1.
As long as the wind chill  doesn't get below 20, we can have school. We're going to try to go sledding right after school so we don't miss the fun that we haven't been able to enjoy, due to the cold temps. Austin and I will be busy Saturday. On Sunday, it's supposed to be 47 and then 54 on Monday and raining! All this beautiful snow will be gone and who knows if it will return?! It's going to feel like 80 degrees warmer!!

What are Austin and I going to do Saturday? We're going to the second session of his brain study. He was selected to be a participant in a study of the brain. They needed 9 year-olds and we had done something similar a couple years ago, so we were on the list. It's through Wayne State University and they're studying the affects of trauma and anxiety on children's brains. Last Friday, they trained him on the MRI and asked him loads of questions. Then he went into the MRI and pressed some buttons according to what he saw on a screen that would trigger different reactions in his brain. He had to stay perfectly still for over an hour in there. They commented on how hard it is, even as adults, and that he had done a much better job than some of the adults they had done. Austin was the first one in the Detroit area to do this particular test. We go again on Saturday for more questions, some physical tests, and some other things that I don't even know, for 5 hours! The best part for him is that he will get paid $150. Since I'm not making money with all these snow days, at least he is! They want to keep up with us every 6 months for the next couple of years and he will get paid each time he goes. He loves his little job! He plans on buying a hover board with his first full payment.

Going in for the MRI