Hello 2013!

Not sure where the last 2 months of disappeared to, but here it is March, and I figured I could write a new blog post =)

We had some rather pleasant weather in January, and on this particular Sunday, we went hiking at Paris Mtn. State Park, which is located nearby.

On January 25th, we began a road trip to Ontario to see family!  Since Andrew had received his green card just before the first of the year, we had been trying to figure out a time to make the trip north... Due to bad weather hitting here on Friday, schools let out in the morning, and we decided we should get out of town before night to try and get ahead of the worst of the ice storm hitting the Carolinas.  By the time I could get things situated at work and we left Greenville around 3pm, a lot of freezing rain had already fallen.  I drove the first few hours (thinking I would let Andrew drive once we got into worse weather, snow, etc).  Turns out, the Absolutely worst roads were through South and North Carolina =/  Ice is No. Fun.  But the Lord kept us safe as we passed accident after accident.  We had a stop to make in Charlotte, NC... after that Andrew drove and we got an hour or so further before stopping for the night.  The view leaving the hotel the next morning:

The roads through the remainder of NC were a fairly icy in spots, but once we hit Virginia we had much nicer weather and clear roads.

Cool tunnels through the mountains...

Beautiful West Virginia countryside

We had some snow fall along the way, but thankfully no further ice issues.  We reached the Canadian border Saturday evening =)  And on to Andrew's parents' a few hours later.

The view from our window the following morning... pretty...

(Joia... I took the same picture as you apparently... but didn't even notice the population =)

The next day was much snowier...

We had a relaxing week and wonderful times with family and friends... including meeting our brand new niece, Galina!

Wednesday evening was spent with immediate and extended Woodford family.  We were also celebrating Galina's birthday and Andrew's cousin Alex' birthday.

Alex couldn't be there, so Brayden helped with blowing out the candles =)

On Saturday, we went to Blue Mountain to go skiing! It was my first time... I was rather excited, but it didn't go so well... My first trip down the mountain ended like this :(

I fell, skis got tangled and didn't release, and my knee took the consequences... So I spent the remainder of the day in the cafeteria.... leg propped, icing, doing exercises... nothing like working on vacation (i.e. treating myself), lol!

My window view of the hill around middle of the day...

....and the view as about 4 inches of snow was falling through the afternoon!

Pic from the ski lift that Andrew took

The view from the top of Blue Mountain.

We had a bit of a detour for the first part of our drive back to Norwich due to an accident blocking the road we needed to travel... lots of beautiful snowy scenery along the way!

Sunday, we began the drive home!  I am so thankful that my knee actually improved pain-wise through the course of the day, we had smooth travels, and arrived home that night!

My car has never been so dirty as on this trip!