It may be a day late and a dollar short, but here are our pictures from our Christmas adventure. Enjoy!

Aunt Kat and Analise walking on the Ice Age Trail.

Analise and I went sledding. Analise is actually pulling me on the sled down a short hill here.

This football field was at the bottom of the hill where Analise was pulling me.

Analise and I made a wee little snowman before it snowed later that afternoon.

I biked 113 miles from Shell Lake, WI to Duluth, MN one day. I met everyone in
Canal Park where we spent the night and had a great time.

Here’s a picture from the top of the ridge overlooking Duluth back down at the port area.
Note the curved line where the bay is frozen over. We were lucky that it has been a warmer winter
and the entire bay is not frozen. Normally, the shipping season would be over, but we saw several
large ships entering and leaving the harbor right next to our hotel where we were staying.

Even though there was barely any snow on the ground, there was lots of ice around Duluth. These ice falls
were located very close to where I took the previous picture up on top of the ridge.

Here is a genuine homemade ice rink. No more than a garden hose and a few boards required!

Finally, it started snowing!

More snow!

Sledding in the street out front.

The smiling pink princess!

Analise went down the hill all by herself!

Lots of times!

Other people sledding (and falling) down the hill.
In the background, you can see the snow family we helped make.

Somebody else had already made this large snow man.

We made the two smaller snowmen named Analise and Josiah next to the larger one.

Here’s the church, Salem Lutheran, where Kristine and I got married three and a half years ago.

Analise helped brush the snow off the nativity in front of the church.

Analise also decided to participate in the nativity and see baby Jesus!

It was too cold outside for Josiah, but he had a great time inside by the Christmas tree!

Finally, on the way home I rode my bike from La Porte, Indiana
to New Buffalo, Michigan and took this picture of Lake Michigan.

The lighthouse in New Buffalo, Michigan.

I’m so far behind on blogging, I might as well just start from today. Maybe I should take that same approach with scrapbooking… hmm, another subject completely!

Anyway, it’s a lovely rainy winter (well, not winter-cold at 63degrees and 100% humidity, but winter-month!) day. We enjoyed being at church (Clearwater Community Church – our new snazzy website!) for the first time in 3 weeks. And to make it even more lovely, we didn’t have to work in the nursery or Sunday School classroom, and we caught the opening message of Chris’s new series, Optical Illusion (sometime this week you should be able to listen to or download the message).

We had our usual Sunday lunch with Brian’s family of baked beans and hotdogs. Then, as usual, my kiddos were ready to nap, thankfully. Josiah’s been a little fighter about sleeping lately, so when he fell deeply asleep on the way home, we left him sleeping in the car parked in the basement garage with the windows down and door to the house open. He and Analise napped for 2 hours, and I got lots done in my quest to get organzied. His room is finally getting settled, starting with a new comfy crib (particularly bought hoping he’d feel compelled to actually sleep in it, which he hasn’t yet, at least not for stretches longer than 4-5 hours), moving all the "extra" stuff out of room, and making it look like a little boy’s room, finally. When it’s really done, I’ll take some pictures, but right now, it’s still a work-in-progress.

Yesterday, I got my closet cleaned out, which feels quite good. It was a great feeling to pull out maternity clothes, and larger sizes from between pregnancies, and move in some nice new things I got for Christmas. I got rid of plenty of things that I haven’t worn in a long time, and it looks so organized. Ah, feels nice. Analise is awake now, so I’m going to tackle another little project for today – thank you cards for Christmas gifts. Maybe I’ll be back later tonight for some more blog catch-up.

Hope your weekend has been as relaxing as ours!