Hey! It’s a snow day! The angle on this picture is a bit weird. The drift on the porch is actually up to the top of the railing.

Periodically trains have been crawling past us on the railroad tracks in the background.

Hopefully we’ll not be shoveling our roof .

Oh, and one more picture sitting at our front door.  Here’s where you see the real hight of things (the top of the railing is about 4 feet high):

Noon Update: This is suposed to go on for another 12 hours potentially.  The snow is now above the railing and way above the roof on the car.  Updates coming shortly for pictures.  The snow shows no signs of stopping…

9 p.m. Update: I think the snow has stopped.  Regardless, I finished making a second pass through the driveway only to land at a three foot drift known as my street.  Seriously, it’s pretty sad when you don’t know where your street is and the snow is too deep to feel the street.  I had to dig into the snow to find the curb.  The big variable will be how much they can get plowed by dawn as to whether things will open again tomorrow or not.

Today was, in no uncertain terms, hellish – divingly so.  MJ is sick.  Aidan is better and so am I, and Aidan is in the habbit of waking up way before dawn now.  First some highlights of today’s coversation with Aidan:

On getting a snack:

“I want Cereal!  That’s NOT Cereal, that’s Cherrios!”

On apologizing after getting in trouble:

“I’m sorry” 

“Why are you sorry Aidan?”

“I’m sorry because I want you to be happy.  I love you daddy!”

On What he wants to be when he grows up:

“I want to be an astronaut and play music.”

Today was a battle of inches.  It started around 5:50 this morning with Aidan getting up to go potty and wanting to wake up for the day.  Melissa is sick and so I flew solo for most of the day.  During the midst of the day there were a ton of time outs, a couple of spankings and a few stern talks; we’re firm believers in a strata of discipline.  Tonight, I may have bit off more than I could chew in starting to get rid of his pacificer by cutting the tip of it down.  Needless to say, he isn’t going to be right away and notices things are a bit different.

Tonight I also thought about how God sees us.  While I was sitting with him, weary and sinking into despair about the length of my day I thought about how God sees us and about how, as a perfect God, how much he may get frustrated at our behavior and yet still loves us.  How some days as we try and learn lessons changing us becomes a battle of inches.  For Aidan, my ultimate goal is an individual who loves and respects authority and who does things with integrity.  For God, the ultimate goal is fitting us for heaven, in technical terms to sanctify us. 

Along the way there are huges lessons that are learned – learning to go potty, eating solid food, learning to read – but there are also days that are battles that gain only inches on the way to adulthood; the only results of which are tears, disciplines and sorrow at the end of the day. In these days, it’s important to think about the final product.

Days like today make me look at my father and God with tons more respect that had before today started.

As an update to our friends that didn’t get called:

Melissa’s mom passed away last Sunday morning rather suddenly.  Please pray for us and the family as we navigate the upcoming months.

Just some brief news from the Juvinall family:

I’m finishing grading from the semester today.  Over the next week, I’m taking a brief break from blogging (unless something cool comes up) and catching up on some reading.  Specifically, Edward Tufte’s new book and U2byU2.  Starting Monday, we’ll be traveling, first to Danville and then on to Urbana @ St. Louis where Melissa and I will be working with Paul Grant on the Urbana.org webcast. 

I’m going to bring some of my stuff down and hopefully do a TWiT-style podcast (maybe) that I’ll post up here (it depends on how ambitious I am and what I’m doing).  At the very least, Notes… will switch over to Urbana coverage and what we’re doing each day.  So, get outside, drink some hot chocolate and I’ll see you all in a week.

Merry Christmas!

Final Aidan update here:

We had an additional night of ibuprofen/tylenol and his fever was non-existent for the whole night (thanks for your prayers!).  The new themometer was really nice because we didn’t have to wake him up to get his temp.  We gave him his last dose of it this morning and we’re going to watch his temprature all day. 

However, he is on a stronger antibiotic that is giving him more diapers.  We’re giving him gatorade today to keep his electrolytes up so he doesn’t get dehydrated and we’ll see how that goes.  Thanks fo your prayers.

Much love,

Pete, Melissa, and Aidan