Christmas photos (belated)

I am way behind on blogging lately - sorry!! We returned from Christmas break and found that we had no Internet access at home....so, we had a week "un-plugged." And, we survived! Well, I should say I survived (Erik had it at work...so he didn't really suffer!!). :) It was a great stretch for me and I am really convinced that I should limit Internet access regularly. :) I'll let you know if I can actually be disciplined when it is accessible again. ;) In the meantime, I'm happy that my house is cleaner, my thoughts are more collected and I've practice 4 times! Definitely worth it.


So....more Christmas photos!

fun new wooden toys!!

gotta have some Aunt Amy time! :)

and, time with great-Grandma (GG-Ma!) and cousin Lila

4 generations!

Handmade Christmas Gifts

We had fun creating handmade Christmas gifts this year for several family members.

To give Will and Erik's brother, David, something to "hang around" in at college, we made them each hammocks this year for Christmas. We found a great tutorial online for an easy way to secure the fabric to the climbing rope and then used the alpine butterfly knot to secure each end to the wall.

Will and Erik set up the hammock in the loft of the McKinzie's carriage house, where he will be sleeping for the next couple of days (there's quite a full house already!). We'll find out how comfortable it is.

There are a few more photos of other items coming on a later post.... :)

Snow in North Carolina!

It began snowing on Christmas day here in North Carolina...and through the night. By Sunday morning, the 26th, this was what the outside world looked like...

Erik, Will (Jane's youngest brother) and a bunch of Will's friends had snowball fights, built forts and a snowman all day long.
It was Meredith's first experience with snow. She was pretty wide-eyed.

And...so far, she's not a fan of sledding. Yes, we did bungy-cord her into the sled...but, she only allowed that for about 5 minutes. Too cold!!

Christmas Day!

We are in North Carolina with Jane's family. We had a lovely Christmas together and the celebrating continues the rest of this week with more family arriving for the next 3 days!

Meredith got a special toy from Granna and Grandaddy - a wooden stackable snowman. She loves it! Here she is exploring it and watching Granna show her how it works.


Thanks, Granna!!

We had a yummy Christmas dinner together - a delicious spread and fun to be together again. Meredith enjoyed being apart of the dinner and sported her new "Santa" bib from Grandma Petersons. :)