Prepping for Punxsutawney Phil

If I were to tell you that there is an octopus named Paul that is famous for predicting the German National Football League's 2010 FIFA World Cup wins and losses...

Would you believe me?

Well, its true. 

But I only discovered that because I went on a mission tonight to research Punxsutawney Phil...who....if you don't recognize the name is the infamous 120 year old groundhog from Punxsutawney, PA that accurately predicts whether we'll have 6 more weeks of winter or an early spring.

Next Thursday, February 2nd, Punxsutawney Phil will be peeping his head out at 7:25AM. 

At 8:07AM, the Canadian counterpart, Wiarton Willie, who is also a groundhog...only he's an albino groundhog, will be making the same prediction.

Hmmm...I'm not saying it outloud...I'm just typing it outloud, but is anyone else finding it fishy that the Canadian groundhog is waiting a full 42 minutes AFTER Punxsutawney Phil to make his own prediction?  You sneaky Canadians. 

Regardless.  I wanted to give you all a few days to prepare...

We made Punxsutawney Phil pop-ups...  Only because we're in Germany we've decided to call him GutenTag Gustav.  Hey...if the Canadians can have their own groundhog...so can we.

I call this one "toddler and Gustav in motion" - which is the only way that I seem to get a photo of this toddler these days...

Unless I catch her unawares with her groundhog...

Unfortunately, Gustav in his own version of "groundhogese" has let us know that we can expect more winter...any guesses as to how this brilliant animal figured that one out?

PS...that snow hasn't stopped me!  I dropped 3.6 pounds this week.  One more pound...and three days to lose it in to make an even 10 for the month of January.