Snow Day!

beautiful beaded snowflakes

My fabulous snow dance worked last night and I'm so grateful to have another three-day-weekend. Hip hip hooray for snow days! I got a call from work this morning telling me that we were closing early due to the impending winter storm and I didn't need to bother coming in. It was music to my ears :). Not that I didn't want to go to work...but Erik has been home on vacation all week and this gives me the chance to spend a day at home resting and relaxing (or cleaning and organizing...) with him. Maybe I will even get a chance to dust off my craft table and do something creative! Thank you for snow days!

I must confess...

...I still have some Christmas decorations out. Yikes! I really thought Erik and I put most of it away when we got rid of the tree in January, but I'm just now realizing I never put away our nutcrackers. (or the ceramic Santas on our kitchen windowsill) Oops! I guess I will spend part of today making sure there are no other remnants of Christmas laying around, after all, it's almost St. Patrick's Day!

Pretty in Purple...

I made a few easy necklaces last month to give out as gifts...but this one is for me! I love the color purple and while at the bead store in December I fell in love with these and simply had to use them all together in a necklace. It's perfectly purple. It makes me think of all the lavender that grows in our garden...I can't wait for spring!

Adventures in Alabama Part 2: Trap Shooting

Hunting is an everyday part of life for Erik's family down in Alabama. Since we were out in the middle of nowhere, there really wasn't much for us to do other than shoot things. I got to try my hand at trap shooting for the first time and it was actually quite fun! The first three photos are of us trap shooting. The orange things in a box were the clay pigeons we were shooting. The next picture is of our ammo and the last is photo is of a shell shoved in an ant hill...boy oh boy did those ants get mad :)

Adventures in Alabama

I'm sad to say that Erik's grandfather, Elsie Whatley Jr., passed away on 2/3/08. He was a wonderful person and I feel blessed to have had a chance to meet him a few years ago when we traveled to Alabama. He led an amazing life and will be greatly missed. Erik and I were able to get tickets and fly down to Alabama for the wake and funeral last week. Despite the occasion, the trip went well, and it was really good to spend time with family. Erik's grandparent's are from a very small town called Sweet Water in southwestern Alabama. (insert banjo music...) It is literally out in the middle of nowhere...and it was kind of nice to be away from everything for four days. No malls, no traffic, hardly any cell phone service, no internet...nada...just miles and miles of pine trees. Here are some photos from our trip down south...

Alabama here we come...

Watching the sunrise while on the airplane and enjoying the view of the mountains...


Once we landed in Birmingham we rented a car and drove 3 hours to Sweet Water...

We were out in the middle of nowhere...and it was nice for a change!

Baby pine trees were everywhere...

...and I had to take a picture when we drove by the hay-bale art! There was a monster truck, tank and helicopter all made using hay bales.


Here is the "Whatley Estate"...otherwise known as Erik's grandparent's house :)

Say hello to the Elk...and the elk's rear...


...and last but not least, Anne the hunter...lol...not really, but I did get to learn the fine art of trap shooting and brush up on my target shooting skills. :)

So, there are a few pictures from our trek to 'bama. More to come soon...

Hola Amigos!

Señor Erik and I trying on the festive sombrero at Mary's birthday party 1/18/08...olé!

Hello everyone...sorry it's been forever since my last post. January was a crazy month for us and every-time I sat down with the intention of blogging I would have a hard time relaxing much less find something interesting to blog about! But I'm back, and hopefully will be able to get back in the swing of things. Anyway, January was a blur and I won't bore you with all the details, but here's a peek at what I've been up to...

We hung out with my sister for her birthday...

We visited Cassandra in Boston...and helped show Flat Stanley around town :)

We totally broke every New Year's resolution we made...

and we also took several more mini-trips to the shore...check out the waves!!

There's January-in-a-nutshell...now onto February! (even though it's already half over...oops!)