polar vortex

Update from Polar Vortex MN 2014. We are hunkered down here in our little apartment baking bread and not getting anything done and curling up on the couch. I feel like just as there are phases of grief there are also phases of being cooped up with a 7 month old during the coldest weather in decades.

First there was joy. Pure, unadulterated, childlike joy. What luck! Not only did we get an amazingly long Christmas break, but it was extended! With a cold day! Visions of cozy cold day activities filled my mind - mid afternoon naps and movies with popcorn and hot chocolate, endless cups of coffee and kitchen baking scenes with powdered sugar and flour flying about.

Then there was laziness. I had such grand plans of deep cleaning the house and writing an entire book in 2 days. Then the reality of a teething 7 month old set in. She didn't know it was a day off. In fact, 'both Mom and Dad are home, so why don't I skip naps!' she thought. Why is it so hard to be productive when your schedule disappears?

Suddenly the cabin fever arrived. I always think of that song from the Muppets movie, you know "been stuck at sea so long that we have simply gone bananas - we got cabin fever!" I think at some point I did sprints around our tiny apartment. I vaguely recall shimmying at some point? The cabin fever spread through the household, affecting both the baby and the dog. We gotta get out of this house! What is fresh air? What is this thing you call "the sun?"

In all honesty, I feel ready to rejoin the real world and put on makeup and do my hair and get dressed. I think I even want to have some sort of schedule, which is unheard of if you're me. I have cherished the extra time with my whole family at home, but we are ready to get out and live!

It's kind of cool, in a pop culture sort of way, though, knowing that almost the entire country is experiencing #polarvortex together. It will be that thing we look back on in a few months or years when we're scrolling through our old Instagram photos and go "oh yeah, hashtag polar vortex 2014. wasn't that something." The weather people on the news are making all kinds of corny jokes but you can tell they're really in their element. These are the moments they live for.

Through it all I can't help but think how grateful I am to have a warm place to be when it's colder here than at the North Pole. It sucks to be a prisoner in your own home for a few days, but it's far better than being a prisoner of the elements.

Here are some pictures of our time cooped up indoors.

reading and writing and coffee

sleepy puppy - I kind of think he's going through some sort of canine depression. He just sleeps all day. No walks, you know, when it feels like 40 below.