Ok, by now you all know the story. It doesn't look like this anymore. The long spring of January 2006 has faded into a genuine winter February. Weren't the kids thrilled? We went to bed on Saturday night and there was not a speck on the ground. The weeks of warm weather had assured that. Even the last circle of snow from the snow fort we built when the last run of wet heavy snow fell in January was gone by the time the sky turned dark. They began warning about this storm on Thursday; a low pressure cyclonic spin was crawling northeastward sucking humidity off the surface of the warm ocean and sneezing it in light fluffy flakes across the cold land to the west. These big storms
move toward the northeast, but they
spin counter-clockwise, scooping up toward the northeast and dumping down toward the southwest. It seemed like magic, the world transformed overnight.
Maxim woke up first and wandered into our room. Look out the window, honey, tell me what you see. Snow! She yelled. Can we play in it? I don't know, mumbled Marcela from under the covers, it's cold out isn't it? Remember that Marcela didn't see snow until I dragged her to this part of the world in 2001. We'll bundle up and go out for a ride in the sled later, I say. I roll over to sleep another few minutes but then someone is pounding on my back. Good morning Daddy. He
always smiles a playful smile pursing his lips as if he is trying not to smile. Look out the window, I say. No, I wanna get in the middle, he shoots back; he has no interest in the snow, only the warm bed between his parents. Daddy, he says when he is comfortably ensconced. Yes, Noah? Daddy, there was a, there was, Daddy the monster did not eat me. It didn't? I ask. No, he says proud of himself.
He lived in dread fear of monsters for months, going to sleep under his sheets and not wanting to get out of bed in the morning for fear that they would get him. These are big steps for him. Maxim, for her part, has decided it is time to learn to read and write. She practices by copying things she knows; here she has transcribed most of the first page of The Cat in the Hat. When she finished, she ran to me with the paper and said, read it Daddy, what does it say? "Thesundidnotshineitwastoo wettoplaysowesatinthe..." She knows letters and gets writing but hasn't fully put the two together. We sound out words, and Marcela and I have talked to her and modeled for her the way the sound of the letters' names can give clues to the sound it makes in words, but that connection isn't quite being made yet. She can write before she reads. The snow came down for hours, the heaviest snow on record in New York. Not so further north, but a lot of snow nonetheless. Plows worked through the night and everyone has a clear path to work today. Shucks.
Ok, by now you all know the story. It doesn't look like this anymore. The long spring of January 2006 has faded into a genuine winter February. Weren't the kids thrilled? We went to bed on Saturday night and there was not a speck on the ground. The weeks of warm weather had assured that. Even the last circle of snow from the snow fort we built when the last run of wet heavy snow fell in January was gone by the time the sky turned dark. They began warning about this storm on Thursday; a low pressure cyclonic spin was crawling northeastward sucking humidity off the surface of the warm ocean and sneezing it in light fluffy flakes across the cold land to the west. These big storms move toward the northeast, but they spin counter-clockwise, scooping up toward the northeast and dumping down toward the southwest. It seemed like magic, the world transformed overnight. 
Maxim woke up first and wandered into our room. Look out the window, honey, tell me what you see. Snow! She yelled. Can we play in it? I don't know, mumbled Marcela from under the covers, it's cold out isn't it? Remember that Marcela didn't see snow until I dragged her to this part of the world in 2001. We'll bundle up and go out for a ride in the sled later, I say. I roll over to sleep another few minutes but then someone is pounding on my back. Good morning Daddy. He always smiles a playful smile pursing his lips as if he is trying not to smile. Look out the window, I say. No, I wanna get in the middle, he shoots back; he has no interest in the snow, only the warm bed between his parents. Daddy, he says when he is comfortably ensconced. Yes, Noah? Daddy, there was a, there was, Daddy the monster did not eat me. It didn't? I ask. No, he says proud of himself. 
He lived in dread fear of monsters for months, going to sleep under his sheets and not wanting to get out of bed in the morning for fear that they would get him. These are big steps for him. Maxim, for her part, has decided it is time to learn to read and write. She practices by copying things she knows; here she has transcribed most of the first page of The Cat in the Hat. When she finished, she ran to me with the paper and said, read it Daddy, what does it say? "Thesundidnotshineitwastoo wettoplaysowesatinthe..." She knows letters and gets writing but hasn't fully put the two together. We sound out words, and Marcela and I have talked to her and modeled for her the way the sound of the letters' names can give clues to the sound it makes in words, but that connection isn't quite being made yet. She can write before she reads. The snow came down for hours, the heaviest snow on record in New York. Not so further north, but a lot of snow nonetheless. Plows worked through the night and everyone has a clear path to work today. Shucks.
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