Please Stay Tuned

Life as we know it has returned to normal so I've been taking some time to get reacquainted with schedules, deadlines, obligations and such. Plus our home computer has decided it doesn't want us to connect to the Internet anymore, so it's been hard to keep up with things online. I can use ^J^'s mini-laptop when he gets home from school, but it doesn't have my pictures on it, so until I figure out what's going on with our other computer, please stay tuned for updates including the double birthday festivities and the fact that we now have a 3 year old and 5 year old in the house...oh my how the time flies.

More snow and less hair

Here are some pictures from our adventures outside this weekend. We bundled up and went around campus taking pictures of some of our favorite places covered in snow.








We stopped mid-way for a hot chocolate warm-up at All Saint's Chapel.
Then we were ready to take on the sparkly snow and bitter cold again, and proceeded to make Sewanee Snow Angels!




That night after baths I decided it was haircut night. *A*'s been asking on and off to have her haircut short for about a month now. It started one day when she came home from school with a mysterious layer around her face. Upon further investigation, she told us she wanted short hair so she cut about 4 inches off a small section of hair around her face. It looked kinda cute actually but I had to act stern and tell her not to cut her own hair. She told me she wanted all of it cut to her chin, but then decided a few days later she didn't want it that way because she wouldn't have ponytails or "tinkerbell hair" anymore. Anyway, the other night I was just going to trim an inch or 2 off and she looked in the mirror and told me to go shorter, so I did:


Cute right?! She loves it and so did I except it just didn't seem short enough, so the next morning I went to "even it up" and ended up cutting a few more inches off, so now we have this:

Super Cute! We are both very pleased. I am SOOOOO happy not to have the tangled hair struggle in the morning and she loves flipping it around and all the compliments she's been getting. Plus we can still do ponytails and stuff so that's good. The only problem with it is that she now looks SO big, and SO much like the almost-five-year-old girl she is. *Sigh*

Fire and Ice

For Epiphany this year we decided to invite the neighbors over and burn our Christmas trees. We ate chili and cheered as we watched the flames rise higher and higher.
It was good old fashioned primal fun (with a fire extinguisher close by)!
Yesterday we were predicted to get some of the snow that was hitting the southeast. It started out light and the deer were quick to have a snack before the snow got heavier.
It continued through the day and we went sledding before dark. All in all, we've probably gotten 2 inches with a steady snowfall continuing today. During naptime, ^J^ and I took turns taking a walk alone to enjoy the snow and the stillness. The kids have fun, but they can only last so long when it's in the single digits.

Here's scenes from my walk. Hope you enjoy your winter wonderland this weekend.

Frozen Lake behind our house



Some brave soul's snow angel *on* the lake

Me standing on the lake (just the edge!) looking at the back of our house

And snowflakes on my coat!

Christmas Recap

We've been enjoying our time off and time together so much that I haven't really had time for this place. Yesterday was a partial return to normal, the kids' preschool has resumed, so I have some time now to sit and download the thousands of Christmas pictures we took and catch up here.

Our Christmas started off with Christmas Eve at the Children's Creche service where *A* was asked to bring Joseph down the aisle. Then we headed to our friends' house where we enjoyed a yummy dinner and each other's company despite losing electricity (yay for lots of candles)! We headed home opened new jammies and quickly went to bed so Santa could get things ready.

We spent a leisurely Christmas morning at our house opening gifts and playing with new toys. I'm not really sure at what point (H) lost his jammies but this seems to be the norm with him lately. He loves to strip down to his undies and proclaim "I'm Maked Boy!"



Anywho, we headed to Atlanta just as it was starting to snow, it was very pretty but not sticking, so we weren't too worried about missing a white Christmas. We had a nice time relaxing, eating, and opening gifts with my family and the hugs were plentiful.






Then we headed to Josh's parents' for Christmas #3 with his family. More presents, hanging out, good food, Night at the Museum 2, and fun. The cousins loved having so much time together to play and they shared each other's new gifts quite well. Even my nephew's highly popular Nintendo DSi was shared around (with only a few quibbles about who's turn it was).





Then we went back to my mom's house to spend an afternoon visiting with my extended family.

I love seeing my kids play with the same cousins I grew up with, although it still weirds me out that they are in their 20's now. I also love the way they are with my great-aunt. They don't have many family members from that generation left and when I see them together it reminds me of how much I loved being with my great-grandmother as a child.
To end our whirlwind trip, we met up with some old middle school and high school friends and let our kids play while we caught up on each other's lives. With a full car and full tummies, we headed back to the mountain and proceeded to lay around in jammies and unpack slowly. And here we are, slowly returning to normal. Slowly, slowly...