Christmas Eve and the start of the Blizzard

On Christmas Eve, we originally had great plans to drive up to Lamoni for a day to see my dad's sister, her husband, their daughter Anne (my cousin) and Anne's husband, Jim, Anne and Jim's new baby Connor (6 months), Michael (my other cousin), and my grandma and grandpa. WHEW! Lots of people. Anne, Jim, and Connor all live in Pennsylvania and were just arriving from PA that day so that's why we had originally thought we'd go up that day- to see them and meet the baby along with everyone else. Lamoni is the town that I went to college in (home of Graceland University) so it's kind of neat to have relatives to live there now so I have an excuse to drive 2 hours to see the old hang outs/school/friends that still live there, etc.

HOWEVER. Beginning on the evening of the 23rd, we kept hearing about this winter storm that was approaching Kansas City that was so powerful the weather people were saying it was unlike any other winter storm they had seen before. Really. Yeah right. I was a bit skeptical because I always feel like there is a bit of an exaggeration factor with said weather people. They kept saying it was going to rain, then change to ice, then to snow- with a total of 6-20 inches of snow.

Well.

I lose.

They were right. It started raining on the 23rd (POURING), which by noon on the 24th had turned to sleet/ice. Our trip was definitely out at this point. Ice in the midwest=DO NOT ATTEMPT TRAVEL. Of course all the stupid people do attempt travel which is when you see 100 cars on the sides of the roads when the roads clear up days later. Not only did we not end up going to Lamoni but pretty much all Christmas eve services' were cancelled that night in the area (which we always go to) due to the weather conditions. By evening on the 24th our "winter storm warning" had turned into a full on blizzard warning with a 100% chance of a white christmas. Crazy!! So we stayed in, ate, watched it begin to snow, and played games- cards and even some ping pong (so fun).

We also let my dad open an early Christmas present from us- the first one opened...

My dad is a HUGE KU fan so we got him the KU version of monopoloy. And of course played it that night. I'm not trying to brag here, but GUESS WHO WON. Yup. I did. Only reason I mention it is that I NEVER win monopoly. My brother always does (it's kind of known in our family as his game). It was down to my mom and I at the end but I pulled out the victory...and it didn't even take forever. Crazy.

A photo of my brother prior to playing games with a bow on his head. Merry (almost) Christmas to us!