It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

We're having quite the snow storm here in Minneapolis. Somewhere around 12 inches have fallen in the past 12 hours, and it is still snowing! Here's what our front yard looks like right now:

We shoveled the drive and sidewalk (oh the joys of homeownership!) and then Eric decided first to throw me in the snow(!) and then he made a snow angel. You can kind of see it above, but it started filling with snow almost immediately.

One of the neighbors decided to move his car, but didn't get very far before giving up. Even with two people pushing, he just couldn't get anywhere.

Today is not a day to leave your house. Did I mention that tonight the wind chill is supposed to be 20 to 35 degrees below zero? Good thing we put up our Christmas tree a couple days ago so we can relax and enjoy it today!

 

Gizmo enjoyed putting up the tree too...

... well really he just likes to bite on the fake needles.

The best part is that I got the tree for free on Craigslist (not bad, huh?).

Since this was our first big Christmas tree, we were seriously lacking in the ornaments department. I'm way too cheap to buy those expensive ornaments from Target (especially when I know they will be on super-clearance a few days after Christmas). So, we filled the tree in pretty well with some new inexpensive ornaments and some that I have accumulated over the years. The star was $1 from The Dollar Tree!

We got a bunch of other ornaments from The Dollar Tree too (and they don't look too bad if I do say so). Red bulbs - 12 for $1, red swirl icicles -8 for $1, wire stars - 2 for $1, snowflakes - 6 for $1.

We got a hand-me-down from Eric's mom: a moving, light-up Ebenezer Scrooge (I can't understand why she didn't want it anymore...).

Our roommate, Steve, decided he looked better with a Santa hat.

Add a few presents and we are almost ready for Christmas (and Gizmo is ready for some more chomping on the tree).