FINALLY!!!

The snow is here! And it is beautiful. There is just not enough of it. It started off this morning as sleet but quickly changed to big fluffy flakes, and then to that fine snow that covers the ground quickly. But then, after a few hours, it fizzled out and stopped. I was sitting on the couch earlier and heard a noise outside. I looked out the window to see a site I don't think I've ever seen before. Our neighbors have two sons, ages around 7 and 3. The mother was driving her lawn mower down the unscraped road in front of our house pulling behind her a sled with her two kids. Her husband and great dane were walking along. What a cool idea!

Thoughts On An (Un)Snowy Day

I just read Megan's blog, and I feel the same way she did about updating. I want to update this blog more often, but I have no idea what to talk about. I'm sitting hear waiting for snow, which hasn't come yet. I'm all ready to make some snow cream. So far all we have is a soggy mess outside. There was an article in the Journal on Thursday, I think, about Ryann Abraham. He is one of the Puerto Rican kids playing for Starmount this year. It talked a lot about his basketball, and then it mentioned the fact that he had never seen it snow, and he was looking forward to it. It quoted the coach saying that the week before Ryann had sat out on the back porch for two hours waiting for the snow because the weather report was calling for it. When it never came, the coach said that he got mad and asked why the weather people would say something like that if it wasn't true. That's the way I'm feeling this morning. I want it to come on NOW, not tonight when I can't watch it.

Last night Quentin came in from High Point, took a shower, and left for Charlotte around 8:30. It was supposed to be doing stuff last night, and I told him that and not to drive to Charlotte, but does he listen to me?? Anyway, he went on. A couple hours later I turned on the TV and it showed traffic backed up for miles on Hwy. 77 because of several wrecks. The guy was talking about how bad the roads were with all the black ice. So, I got immediately on the phone to call Quentin to make sure he was okay. No answer. I left a message and asked him to call me back right away. Does he? Of course not. He told me later that when I called he was watching a movie with some friends and "couldn't answer right then". He never did call back but made it home just fine around 3:00 a.m. or so.

Which brings up another point. It is very hard to be a parent of grown children. I know Josh and his family live in the snow and ice all winter, but I don't know when they are out in it. And I don't know when Justin and Vanessa are in any danger. But when they are home and go out at night, and stuff goes on like bad weather, then I can't help but worry constantly until they return.

Oh well. I've got a pot of soup on, getting ready to play some Yahtzee, and just waiting for SNOW!!!

Good Reads

I was talking to Justin this afternoon, and we got to talking about books. He had just finished "The Da Vinci Code", which I had given him for Christmas. That is one of my all time favorite books, along with its prequel, "Angels and Demons". Both by Dan Brown. So I was thinking about all my favorite books. I have some recent ones I've liked, and then there are the lifetime favorites. First, my recent ones:

Are You Afraid of the Dark? - Sidney Sheldon
Redbird Christmas - Fannie Flagg
The Zero Game - (I forgot who, but it was good)
And the two mentioned above. I can't remember what I've read good lately besides these.

Now, for the lifetime favorites:

The Chronicles of Narnia - C.S. Lewis - my all time favorite books!
Lord of the Rings - J.R.R. Tolkien (and The Hobbit)
My Side of the Mountain - (can't remember who)
The Forgotten Door - ?
All of Janet Dailey's thick books - Touch the Wind is the best.
All of John Grisham's - The Bleachers and The Partner are tied for best.
All of Fannie Flagg's - Fried Green Tomatoes is best.
Wild Bells to the Wild Sky - Laurie McBain - the all time best romance novel ever!
Most of Stephen King's (the earlier ones - he's really gone downhill in the last ten years).
The Flame and the Flower - Kathleen Woodiwiss - the third best romance novel.
Childhood's End - Arthur C. Clarke
Which reminds me of - Ender's Game - Orson Scott Card - the all time best sci-fi novel ever!
Lazy Liza Lizard - ? - a great book to read to children. I first heard it when my third grade teacher read it to us. I checked it out when my kids were little and read it to them.
If Tomorrow Comes - Sidney Sheldon - I like a lot of his books.
All of Jan Karon's books

Well, that's all I can think of now. If anyone wants to list their favorites, please do.

My New Favorite Place

Yesterday we took the Dobson youth to the temple in Raleigh for baptisms. Afterwards we went to this restaurant for lunch - The Italian something, Pie? Anyway, right beside that restaurant was a place called Ralph's something. As I was walking by it to go to the pizza place something caught my eye - Italian ices. Well, I love Italian ices. I always get them when we go to the beach, but I've never seen them anywhere else. (I'm not counting the frozen Italian ices in the grocery stores)

So, after lunch I talked everyone into going to this Ralph's place for an Italian ice. I was just expecting a few flavors and figured on getting cherry or something. This place blew me away! It had one section of what the guy called "water ices", which was what I was thinking of, with about 20 flavors. And then there was a section called "cream ices", with another 20. Then a third section of, I guess, creamier ices. And then a fourth section of "gourmet ice cream". And the good part was that you could try any of them and see what you liked. I tried several and ended up getting a coconut "cream ice". It was so good that I dreamed about it last night.

President Jarrell saw the Snickers flavor and tried that. He said, "Well you can't beat that," to which the guy behind the counter said, "Oh yes I can," and he pointed out another tub of Snickers with fudge swirled through it.

Anyway, I had thought that the frozen custard place in Raleigh was really good, but this has it beat. I told the Young Women today in church that next time we go to the temple (in March) we are definitely stopping there afterwards.