On the second day of Christmas...

...we have pics of the girls with Santa! They visited Santa twice this year - the first shot is from the local mall in mid-November. On the way to the mall that evening, we coached Sophie to tell Santa she had been a good girl and that she should ask for toys! When we got there, she stared at him and seemed a little unsure at first, but with big sister holding her hand, they walked up and talked for a few minutes. Sophie finally spit out: "Good girl. Bring toys!" Then, I lifted her up onto his lap, and she even smiled for the photo! EJ asked for Monopoly for Christmas, and when Santa asked if there was anything else she could think of, she said NO! He obliged, and a version of Monopoly was safely delivered under the tree - she and Pap Pap and Mamaw are in the middle of a game now.


A few weeks later, we saw the big guy again when he came to have breakfast with the kids at EJ's school. She was used to the routine by now and crawled right up into his arms.

Today is a slow day here - YEAH!!!! My cousin and her kids are on their way up to visit, and we're going out for dinner tonight. No more cooking! I love to cook, but after a few days of big meals, we're opting for leftovers for lunch today and pizza at Flatbreads tonight for dinner!

On the first day of Christmas...

Here's this year's official photo...look for others from the same photo shoot over the next few days, as well as Christmas Eve and Christmas morning shots, pics with Santa, and EJ's appearance as Mary in the church pageant. Hope your day was wonderful!

Merry Christmas to all...

...and to all a good night!

So, I couldn't start my 12 days of Christmas posts last weekend due to the ice storm, so I'll start them tomorrow.

Hooray! We have power!

Sophie was very excited that the power came back on! Actually this photo was taken a few days ago, but too cute to pass up!

The power finally came back just about two hours ago after 10 LONG days. Here are some photos that I took on the day after the storm.

One of my two Japanese maple trees in the front yard:

The view down my street taken from the end of my driveway:

EJ went out to pick frozen leaves from the shrubs. Notice how long the icicles are are the leaves!

A pic of my neighbor's oak tree. All of the branches are broken or bent and pointing downward.

A shot from the house down the driveway. Our drive is about 300 feet long. Note the little trees laying on the power lines to the house. Those weren't the problem, though. Apparently, our circuit, which powers up to 2200 homes, was a problem in this storm.

I'm so glad it's over. On Thursday, the power company thought they would have us back up by Friday, but then on Friday morning, they changed that estimate to Sunday. As of about 5pm, it wasn't looking good, but then we saw the blinking yellow lights on the corner. K drove down to get more gasoline for the generator and the snowblower (oh yeah, we've had about a foot of snow today, and it's still coming down), and saw them working on the line. We were so excited that I ran out a big sampling Christmas cookies for the line workers to thank them.

Still no power...

Just an update that we STILL have no power, but hope to in the next day or so. We've seen work crews around our town finally. EJ had school today, which is a good sign since most of the town must have power for that to happen, right?

Ice Age

Hi all...just wanted to give everyone an update.  We have been without power since about midnight Thursday night, and we don't expect to have it back anytime soon.  Things are very bad in NH.  Most of the houses in our neighborhood have power lines pulled away from the house, as tree limbs knocked them down.  Not good.  It could be several more days before we have power.  We are spending the nights with my cousin about 30 miles away for now.  We'll see what happens tomorrow.  Keep your fingers crossed.

Yes, I'm still alive...

...despite the lack of posts. It's been a very busy week since we returned. We had a big deadline at work and I've been busier than you can imagine. And then add holiday "stuff" on top of that and I'm a basket case! I'm looking forward to a comfortably busy week this week and next to finish up my holiday chores. The shopping is nearly done, but I need to bake, do cards, trim the tree (it's standing and lit, though). And then there's my dentist appointment, EJ's chorus concert, haircuts, and pageant rehearsal and pageant this week. But now that my head is clear (or, at least I hope it is after a good night's sleep), I'll be just fine.

And yes, in a few days I'll begin the 12 days of Christmas photos! Oooo, I already have some cute ones from a Santa visit. Sophie loves the big guy. Walks right up to him and says "Good girl, bring toys!" She says the cutest things. I asked her to do something this evening and she replied "Okay, mama. No ploblem!" That's how it comes out anyway.

Oh well, I'm off to bed. I know it's early, but I need to catch up.

And by the way, I've become slightly addicted to Facebook and tend to "microblog" little status updates over there. Feel free to be my friend...!