Finally back from the holidays!

Well, sorry I'm so behind in getting this post up, but it has been a busy few months (as I'm sure everyone feels)! It's hard to know where to start, so I guess I'll back up to December.

As most of you know, David and I were able to fly back to Fayetteville for a week around Christmas. We had a pretty crazy time of it, actually, especially where travel was concerned. Out of all our flights, both going and coming, all but ONE were either delayed or cancelled! On our way in, we arrived pretty close to our scheduled time despite all the weather trouble, and our bags were only lost for about 24 hours. We had a great time visiting everyone, although it was a pretty complicated week. We managed to see both sets of parents, both of my sets of grandparents, and even our friends in the short time we were home. I think everyone felt that it was sort of a teaser - just long enough to remember why we miss each other so much, but too short to feel like we spent enough time with anybody. Still, we were incredibly grateful to get to be home, and we certainly cherished our time with everybody. I think Callie was happy to reconnect with Byron, plus all her human grandparents! (: Here are some pics from our trip (and as always, there are many more on Picasa)!







Although it was really hard to leave, David and I managed to pack up all our gifts and fit everything on the plane (but of course we went over the weight limit on our luggage). We made our first connection on the way home with no problem, but our flight from Chicago to Montreal was cancelled "for maintenance"! We were re-routed through Boston and put on an Air Canada flight. Little did we know, Air Canada does not allow pets on their planes! So in short, they didn't allow us to board the flight, and our choice was to rent a car and drive, or to wait until morning to get on standby for a flight BACK to Chicago, then get on standby for a flight to Montreal... We rented the car! We had an interesting drive from Boston to Montreal, dropped the car off and got a cab, and finally got back to our apartment around 6:00 on Monday morning. What a trip that was!

After we got back, David had a bit of a break before school started up, but I went right back to work. (I took Monday off though, since I just had to get some sleep...) My office closed for 2.5 days for New Year's, which meant I really only had to work a day and a half after we got back before getting a 4.5 day weekend! On New Year's Eve I left at noon, and that night Jim and Mikaela came over to celebrate the New Year with us. It was fairly dorky, but definitely a lot of fun - shots, champagne, and Guitar Hero! At around 11:56 p.m. we put the TV on CBS so we could watch the ball drop in New York - we clinked our champagne, toasted the new year, each couple shared a kiss (aww), and then we went right back to Guitar Hero! It was great. (: We have seen Jim and Mikaela a lot lately, pretty much every weekend, and most of the time 2-3 others come as well, so there is a pretty nice social group that has really started to solidify here. Here are pics from New Year's:





In other news, it has been REALLY cold lately! This week has been milder, with highs around 10 and even into the teens, but the week before that was bitterly cold. We had a week straight with "highs" in the negative, and a constant wind chill of between -15F and -30F! I never took wind chill all that seriously until we moved here, and suddenly it is the most important thing on the weather forecast page... Thankfully we have lots of layers to wear, and our apartment has been pretty cozy, although we have used our little electric heater a few times now that the temps are regularly cold. This week, because it's slightly warmer, has been very snowy. It has snowed for several days straight, and is supposed to continue into the weekend. The accumulation hasn't been more than a few inches on any given day, but there is a slow, steady accumulation that probably won't stop until spring (probably mid-April, they say). The snow is beautiful in the mornings because everything is freshly white, but it does make getting around a bit tricky! Early this month we had "blowing snow" - it's not a blizzard, but it does entail high winds and painful bits of gritty snow constantly flying into your face. Here's how it looked outside, and how David looked when he got inside!





All things considered, we are still feeling very happy here. We are lucky to have a nice place, means to pay our expenses, and even a growing social network. I think as the winter wears on, we will have to fight a bit of cabin fever when we feel trapped in our apartment, but we are trying to encourage each other to go out and be active. We hope to plan a ski trip sometime soon, maybe when the weather comes a bit further out of the negative range! In the meantime, we are keeping busy - aside from work and school, we have finally started our French class! We meet downtown twice a week in the evenings, and it seems to be a really good group of people. So far we really enjoy it, because it's good to see new people and the class has really been pretty fun so far. We only signed up for six weeks to start, but we will likely add a longer session once this one ends.

Well, that's about all I can think of for now. I hope everyone is warm and happy!

Shannon