Lea's Trip to Atlanta - 3 Months Ago!

As a sequel to my mom's visit in October, Lea came and visited me in January! The reason why? Well, because I called both of them around 6am in the morning in early fall, told them there was an incredible airline deal from Salt Lake City to Atlanta, and helped them book their tickets while they were still asleep. Before they knew it, they were committed to coming to visit me!

What was extraordinary about Lea's visit is that it was just her. I don't think I've seen my sister without her kids for...well...for at least 8 years now. And while I love my nephews and brother-in-law, it was nice to have my "blister" all to myself.

Lea thought she was coming to enjoy our famous Georgia warm winters. Unfortunately, she came right after the worst ice storm we've had in years, and the entire city literally shut down for a week. This was supposed to be my first week at school, but even GSU closed for the first full week. And let me tell you, GSU NEVER closes.

So although Lea didn't get the warm weather she had hoped for, she also didn't have to watch me teach classes and we were able to hang out all week with my extra vacation time!

This is our driveway a week after the storm. Greg shoveled his side (on the left) the morning of the storm so he could get to work, but my side was left untouched, and I didn't even try driving for 2 days. My side of the driveway was solid ice. Luckily Lea is pretty much a workaholic, and she was determined to get this ice off. It took a lot of banging the ice with the shovel, and lots of steaming hot water, but we finally got that ice off!

Lea was in Georgia on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, which was quite a treat. We went to a parade in Fayetteville, and she got a real kick out of this float!

And the picture below is of my oboe student, Mary, marching the euphonium. I pretend like she doesn't play a secondary instrument, and that works well most of the time. She's the tiny little one in the middle.

OBAMA RIDE

Of course no trip to Peachtree City is complete without a ride on Obama, no matter how bad the weather is!

Greg took this really cool picture of us in the rearview mirrors. What's even cooler is that we have rearview mirrors on our golfcart!

Here are the golfcart paths in the winter. Still beautiful.

TRIP TO WARM SPRINGS, GA AND THE LITTLE WHITE HOUSE

Lea and I went to Warm Springs, GA and took a tour of FDR's Little White House.

Hanging out with FDR on Dowdle's Knoll

The view from Dowdle's Knoll, FDR's favorite spot in the mountains.

And of course we had to visit the Warm Springs. FDR found these warm, mineral waters soothing for his polio, and made this into an important polio rehabilitation center.

For those affected with polio to the most severe degree, they would have to use these "iron lungs" to help them breathe. I am so grateful for the even further advancement of medical technology. This looks torturous.

PLANTATION TOUR IN ROSWELL, GA

I love the plantation homes in Roswell, and had been on tours in 2 of the 3, as had Lea. Poor Greg had never been in any of them, so we decided to splurge and pay for the pass that allowed us to visit all 3. Totally worth the money.

The picture above is Greg, me, and Lea in front of the Smith Plantation House, which was a block from where we used to live in Roswell. The Smiths were packrats and basically everything is preserved in there. It's definitely the best tour of the three if you have to choose one.

Okay, so we also really enjoy the Roswell Ghost Tour. This is a picture of the attic at Barrington Hall, which is reportedly the most haunted space in all of Roswell according to the Ghost Tour people. Our regular tour guide said she doesn't believe it's haunted at all, and here is proof that there is no ghost family living in the attic. Greg was seriously disappointed.

I took a picture of this bed because the Dahls have a spindle bed similar to this.

Historic kitchen in Barrington Hall. I prefer stainless steel.

The walk to the slave quarters at Barrington Hall. This area was closed because of all the snow (in fact, it was pretty much a miracle that they were open at all seeing as how it was Saturday and the ice storm had hit just on Monday!). We told them Lea was from UT and we would be fine.

Master Bathroom

Long Awaited for Post - More House Projects!

We have been on a break for a while from House Projects. And I'm ashamed to say that because life got so overwhelming for us, this first section of projects we hired out. Please don't judge us for this!

Remember these wagon wheels? I don't have a good picture of these since painting the house because I tried to always crop them out of every picture I took. They are exterior front porch wagon wheels, and we almost felt better when the neighbor down the street had them on their front porch. But then they redid their front porch and got rid of them. Point being: they're even too ugly for outdoors.

We hired a wonderful man named Homero, and look at the miracle he performed! Yes, it looks normal. I stare at it for hours a day, enjoying the lack of tackiness in the house. (PS, Greg is posing from the couch!)

And this had been ugly for too long.


So Homero fixed that as well, along with all sorts of ceiling and wall problems, and added crown molding.

Before.

After. And Greg requested this column. Looks so fancy!


MY PROJECTS

Before - this is the kitchen, living room, and half bath gold light fixtures.

And this is after. Thank you Wal-Mart's $5 globes. Do you see how ugly the globes used to be in the previous picture?

Before.

After. Please note my Christmas present from my mom - my new quilt! Love it!!!!

And a close-up.

Before.

After. Yes, I painted the mirror and the light fixture.

3 bottles of Rustoleum later and hundreds of dollars saved. I love my projects!

Happy New Year!

Greg got New Year's Eve off, and so we headed 2 hours south to the Little Grand Canyon in Lumpkin, GA. This is one of the 7 Wonders of GA, and Greg took me here 5 years ago when he was wooing me. The weather was amazing - 70+ degrees and we were sweating in short-sleeved shirts.

It is a beautiful canyon, but it is not that old. It is a canyon created from erosion from poor farming in the 1800s. One day a farmer noticed his land was start to erode away, and within a few years it was this. For real.

We hiked around in the bottom of the canyon rather than hiking around the rim.


See - it's all just sand. Erosion.




We're still just as happy 5 years later!









New Year's Eve

Greg started a new tradition this year. Instead of using party favors to bring in the New Year, we used oboe reeds. They are the reeds Greg made with a Dremel tool, and sound even worse than party favors!

We celebrated with Darah and David.

And here Dave and Greg are trying to get my Christmas gift of marshmallow shooters to work. They never got them working. It might have been a bummer night if the "A-Team" hadn't saved us. Great movie!

Christmas in Charleston

This year Greg and I spent Christmas in Charleston. No, we do not have family in Charleston. It was the off year for both of our families where the siblings go to their in-laws, and so we had no obligations and decided to spend the Christmas holiday just the two of us. It was a perfect Christmas, and exactly what we needed.

We loved Charleston. Here's the view of Fort Sumter from Battery Park.

And apparently Charleston is called "the holy city" because it has hundreds of churches. I love all white churches with big white columns.

Greg in front of the replica of The Hunley, one of the earliest submarines used during the Civil War. That's actual size and 4 men could fit in it. Talk about claustrophobia!

This is one of the richest houses in the area. These houses were old (pre-Revolutionary) and surprising huge. I think this one had 24,000 square feet or something like that.

A lot of the houses have privacy doors. See how there's a door facing the street, but it opens up onto the piazza (plaza)? This is very typical Charleston architecture.

Greg visited Charleston when he was a kid, and his dad had all the kids pose in front of this statue and point. This one's for you, Dahls!

When Greg and I started dating we discovered we had one mutual friend - Wendy! Wendy was a missionary in Greg's mission and they actually traveled on a train to a new destination ALONE (scandalous, I know). I know Wendy from the BYU music dept. where she was a horn major and Lea's roommate. We met Wendy and her husband at IHOP on Christmas Day and had a wonderful time reuniting over hashbrowns, pancakes and stuffed french toast.

We went to the Festival of Lights on James Island. This is one of the biggest light shows in the country, and we were not disappointed making this 3-mile loop of over 30,000 lights.




Tokyo Express is where we had our Christmas dinner. It was much better than where we had our Christmas Eve dinner - the Shell gas station. Did you know EVERYTHING closes on Christmas Eve in Charleston?

It was pretty nice weather, and we missed the white Christmas in Atlanta. However, it did start snowing in Charleston on Sunday and we drove in the snow all the way back to Atlanta. Weird.



Christmas Morning at the Radisson

Greg got Marshmallow shooter guns. Unfortunately they don't work. Fail for me!

But I made up for it by giving Greg an iPad. Now he can play "Angry Birds" for hours on a big screen.

And he gave me a laptop that is Lara-sized. I love my little Netbook and use it mainly to journal every night. No more pen and paper!

And Greg got me a Snuggie--just what I always wanted!

Stain-Glass Window, the best present ever

PRESENTING...

Paul and his specially tailored stainglass window for US!

Look closely at the design...can you tell what it is? Any oboe nerds out there?

They are oboe reeds!

Check out the dark cork, the verigated thread, and the "cane-like" appearance of the glass in the tip.

(And for any quilting nerds, I stole the idea of the "piano key" border from my Mom's quilts.)

Paul (pictured above between the reeds) is the father of my former oboe student, Ariel. As a gift, he wanted to make this window for us. You would probably guess that either myself or Ariel came up with the design for the window, but that is not the case. It was Greg. That's right, Greg thought of and designed this window of oboe reeds for the transom above the music room! What a brilliant reedmaking husband of mine (and yes, Greg really can make a good oboe reed)!

We love it! Thank you Paul!

A Charlie Brown Christmas

Before Greg and I ever got married, his mother gave him a Christmas tree. I thought it was terrific that not only did my new husband come with bedroom furniture, but also a Christmas tree!

But after 4 years, I felt like maybe it was time to move past our Charlie Brown Christmas Tree.

Greg was very attached, and it took a lot of convincing.

I don't think I really had him convinced until I bought THIS pre-lit 8 ft. tree for $30 off Craig's List.

You have got to love Craig's List!

There, isn't that much better? Now we finally feel like grown-ups.