Snowed In

Here in Connecticut we recently experienced a blizzard named either Charlotte or Nemo. Well I guess the official name is "Nemo", however here in CT some weather stations give the storms their own names, thereby creating more confusion than necessary.  In any event, we received 32 inches of snow here in Manchester, CT and we were snowed in for 3 days before a snow plow finally showed up.  3 days - 2 preschoolers, a 200 lb dog who is not a fan of "going" in the snow, and limited liquor.  By day 3, we were ready to hoof through the almost 3 feet of snow down to a liquor store in hopes of replenishing our supply of liquid sanity. (but the plow showed up just in time, and we were able to drive..)

There's only so much play-doh, art, coloring, puzzles and building tents in the living room out of bedsheets the kids could do before the fighting, whining and nagging began.  So here we were, 6 hours into the storm of the century, when all hell broke loose.   So I did what any other mom-on-the-edge-of-sanity would do.  I put them in front of the TV, and promptly started texting my friends with kids to commiserate.  Had I known at that point we were in for 2 more days of the same, I probably would've lost a little piece of my soul.  But instead I discovered 2 - count 'em TWO - magical activities that kept the kids busy enough to get us through the next two days. With that said, I'd like to thank Disney Junior Online, for providing fun, educational games that my 3 & 4 year old could easily learn to play on their own with limited direction. Go to Disney Junior Online Games  and check it out.  The best part was that I felt that the kids were actually DOING something and not just sitting zoned out in front of the TV like little couch potatoes.

The second fun & FREE activity was playing on my iPhone with free apps for kids I was able to download.  Now I'm very protective of my iPhone after the incident last summer where my son fell into a duckpond and I had to go in after him - iPhone still in my pocket.  It was destroyed and I didn't have insurance on it.  It was a $500 trip to the duckpond.  So I keep this new phone under lock and key, lest anyone look at it the wrong way and so much as hurt it's feelings.  But desperate times call for desperate measures, and so I let the kids take turns playing with the phone.  Turns out there are lots of free, fun & educational games to keep them entertained.  When they tire of one game, I delete the app and download another.  And it's portable.  Let's just say this will come in quite handy on our next grocery shopping trip.  I'm now on a Pinterest mission to find more fun, creative fallbacks for a rainy day.