This earth...

We celebrated Nativity this week! It had been a good 3 weeks without snow here, but in the morning on January 7th it started snowing... Just enough to make everything beautiful and the drive to church was still safe!

Hannah followed the simple salt dough recipe:

1 cup salt
1 cup flour
1/2 cup water

(she had to add extra flour, because it was too sticky at first)

* You can cook it to make it dry out quicker. She decided to make a volcano for her "landform" project. The girls just got a volcano set from Susanna...really cool book, all you need to make your own is vinegar and baking soda!

Rob bought some heirloom seeds earlier this week. From left to right: Mayflower Beans (tan flecked with purple, brought over on the Mayflower in 1620), Gentleman's Corn (pretty yellow with red streaks, introduced in 1890), Black Valentine Beans (deep black color, they're longer and skinnier than most beans), Detroit Dark Red Beet, Butterscotch Beans (white with a bigh tan "eye," they date back to the 1860s, were used for "Boston Baked Beans"), etc. I am really looking forward to our garden this summer!
We had an awesome visit from old friends from Ft. Stewart, Georgia. Lori's husband got back last month from his deployment to Iraq and drove up north to visit family and were able to stop here on their way back home! We had so much fun hanging out at the local coffee shops, playgrounds with our kids, scrapbooking and cooking together...

I think Ingrid is playing the ukuele. My Uncle Jim came here in September and played his ukuele...it's such a beautiful instrument.