December in Texas

we're finally back online. and at&t is sending us a brand new modem for our troubles.

it was over 1,200 miles from mechanicsville to frisco, but all without incident. actually, our entire 2 wk + trip was without incident, praise the Lord. and worth every mile. you should have seen the car on the way home. we bought a car top carrier, and patrick and david did an amazing job getting things to fit. we hosted an office party on saturday, and now it's back to work.

these pictures are from our holiday activities before we left. frisco had something called Merry Main Street, a little street festival kind of thing. they had games and a tree lighting and performances and fair food, and carriage and train rides, and all kinds of stuff. they even had snow machines. it was really neat. the lights are blurry, but it was beautiful.

we never got around to watching any christmas movies, but hannah got to meet the grinch and Cindy Lou Who at Merry Main Street. They were giving away free hot chocolate. then on Sunday we realized the Grinch was actually the pastor of the church we're joining. He apparently really takes outreach seriously! on a side note, we also found out he studied under our pastor from alabama, whom I absolutely loved, while he went to auburn many years ago. that was what sealed the deal for me, for this church.

self portraits never work well, this one i cut hannah off. but she was there!

we went to the Children's Parade in Dallas, which was really neat. They had almost every character imaginable, from Raggedy Ann to Dora. and all kinds of bands and dancers and everything. even though hannah didn't recognize any, she still enjoyed looking. next year will be even better. (she got her first curious george book, from brett and jes. very exciting!)

after that we went to the farmer's market, then to the mall where we mostly windowshopped. (other than lunch, i got lipgloss from sephora with an $8 gift card) a word of advice: no matter how it looks, how important you think it is, it is simply not worth wearing 3" heels when going to watch a parade, the farmers market, then the mall in december. just don't do it!

the next week we went to Grapevine, a picturesque (albeit commercialized) downtown experience. It was all decorated, and they had a train and everything too. I took Hannah to see all these little displays of holiday and scenes, and she just wanted to play in the dirt. next year, maybe?

in true texas form, it was about 30 degrees warmer the next day. we had a family trip to the park, which is at the top of my favourite things. she's getting so big, she sometimes goes down the slide by herself. but today it's freezing rain :-(

I am trying to actually use my adress book, and send out a spring update. right now i have about 3 adresses in it, though, so i need your help. if i even know you remotely, would you mind sending me your adress? if you feel comfortable doing it as a comment, that's great, or if you'd rather email it, it's janacrisp@yahoo.com. Thanks!