Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

We have been getting some decent snow for the first time in about 5 or 6 years. Started yesterday morning and stopped about an hour ago. There's supposed to be more coming. I am loving it, though I know it has got to be a hardship for many people living further north. So far we have about 3-4". It's crunchy, it's crispy, has some ice on the top, and Lucy cannot quite work out what to do with it all :)

Lucy and her snowball

So we had a little bit of snow. Just enough for Nik to make a nice size snowball which Lucy decided belonged to her. Then she and I played catch. I should really have had my camera at that point to get a picture of her racing round the back yard with a snowball in her mouth. We kept going till there was nothing left :)
We did get more snow after this picture was taken but what you see is what had the kids out of school for 2 days :)

Happy New Year 2010

Happy New Year to each one of you. May it prove to be a productive start to a new decade.

The last day of 2009 saw us having our windows replaced. The weather held up fairly well. Now we just have to repaint the shutters and re-stain the front door :)

Christmas greetings

From our house to yours. May you enjoy the peace of Christmas and the love of family and friends.

Nativity

We have a version of this beautiful picture displayed in our living room year round. One of my favorites.

How much longer?

Waiting for family to come home or eyeballing squirrels?

Christmas tree toppers

Here's a look at what is on the top of two of our trees :) A twiggy wreath on our main tree in the family room and a poinsettia on the little tree in our front living room.
One of these years I might talk John into buying a white Christmas tree for a our family room because the strong pink walls (a surprise from him and the kids) can be a bit of a challenge to decorate against.

Mammograms and Christmas trees

Mammograms are a necessary inconvenience in my opinion. Had mine this morning at our local imaging center. New technology to boot which may result in another visit just because the new style images often come back looking different to the older ones.
Decorating the Christmas trees are underway. The big one is in our family room and the small ones are in various parts of the house. I love twinkly lights and am making some garlands to go on shelves:)

Brrrr.

The beginning of December has arrived and I guess winter is definitely here. We woke up to a hard frost this morning. The water in our outdoor dog bowl is frozen solid !!!!!! Looks like it is also cold enough in the sunroom for me to be moving the plants into the warmth of the house.

Windows and Thanksgiving

Yesterday we signed on the dotted line after making a few revisions. Now we wait for a few weeks and hopefully some still nice weather.
It is Thanksgiving Day here in the USA, a holiday that I love. We've celebrated in an assortment of ways over the years, mainly with extended family, but today we opted to stay home, just the four of us. Juliet and Elisabeth are celebrating together with friends. I feel greatly blessed in my life and grateful to those who paved the way for the freedoms we enjoy.

Moving along

We are making progress with our quotes. We had an energy audit done yesterday. All the quotes are in for the windows and the foundation work. All very different in what needs doing and prices. Now we have to make some decisions.

Changes are afoot.

We've decided to do some more renovations to the house.

We are going to get an energy assessment done by TVA to the house and are looking at replacing most of our windows.

We have foundation people coming to check the sunroom, front porch and a couple other areas. (Nothing major, just a precaution).

We are pricing out remodeling both bathrooms and looking into creating a new access area to the attic. Most of that we can do ourselves.

Maybe we should get a quote for the roof while we are in research mode :0

We are also contemplating getting the yard landscaped properly. We've been talking about terracing our slope on and of since we moved in.

So we have a number of appointments set up for the next couple of weeks. Good thing we don't party much :)