A few pics....

I live once again in the sunny south, where we wear t-shirts on Thanksgiving and have 70 degree Christmases.

Can't you tell???

All this snow came, the day after Christmas, the closest thing to a white Christmas that any of us have seen. Princess definitely had fun!

This is our snow-covered house!

And now presenting the new kitty!! My sister went to the mall to buy a birthday present and, after not finding anything she liked for me, stopped by the pet store. She came home with this thing lol. She named him Pippin, but we mostly call him Pip. He has a very pink nose, very pink paws, and he literally cries like a baby when he is upset. He has a prissy little walk, he is somewhat cuddly, and he enjoys aggravating poor Scout within an inch of her life. He is only nine months old now, but as you can see, he is a pretty big baby!

He did not know what to think about the snow!!

We got almost ten inches!!

This is his favorite way to be -- asleep, upside down, and stretched out!!

This was taken right after we got him in October. You can see he has practically doubled in size since then!

This is one of my favorite pics ever!

Snowy Day

This was one of the few shots of her face I could get. She decided to play a new game -- avoid the camera. Everytime she was posed just soooo cute, I would click the button and discover on the preview that she had bounced away. Anyway, here she is, eating the snow. :)
Snow-covered iris leaves.

Gabrielle. I knelt down in the snow and Princess ran up and sat down beside me. That would have been really sweet if she had managed to look in the direction of the camera as well.

A snowy sidewalk. Snow-covered bushes.
Now this one is just sooo cute. Look at the snow on her nose.

I was absolutely freezing.
Awwwww. She found one of her toys buried in the snow.
Snow falling through the trees. It was really neat to see the snowflakes land on my camera. I could see all their intricate little patterns before they melted away.

Taking a break. Me again. I should have brightened this picture. It looks a little gray. Oh well.

When I woke up, we had SNOW!!!

The ground was covered. The trees were white. I was planning on going outside this afternoon, braving the freezing temperatures, to take some pictures. After all, this was first real accumulation we've had all winter. We decided to go the library to return some books before lunch and go to the grocery store. By the time we came back, almost all the snow had melted. Tell me, how does anything melt in 30 degree weather?

Hike to the Natural Bridge, Part 4

This is me just before the bridge.
And here is me and Gabrielle on top of the bridge. After we had stayed up there a little while, we started back down to find my mom. We really expected to find her waiting on a bench about halfway down because she has never climbed all the way to the top before. She's been close, but has always stopped just short of the top. On our way back down, we met her in almost the same place where I'd met my dad and sister before and she said she was going to the top this time. So, we turned around and climbed that same tenth of a mile again.
We decided to take the original trail back down. That involves going through this tiny space in between two rock walls. Not great if you're afraid of small spaces. I think it's kind of fun.
I was really hoping I could get a good picture of the bridge at a distance. I was able to one year, but that was before I had a digital camera so the picture is not the greatest. This shot was the best I could do. I think the trees have grown up so much around it that it couldn't be seen clearly in the distance like before.
This is the way back down. Again, I was by myself. I quickly remembered that the original trail has problems, too. The new trail has lots (and lots) of really steep stairs -- not fun going up. The old trail has very few steps, but it's really steep -- not fun going down. You have to pretty much brace your feet and slide down the mountain. Last time I jogged all the way down just to keep from sliding. This time I just walked fast and slid. : )

Anyway, the hike ws a lot of fun. The sign on the way out said the trail we took up was 3/4 mile long. It sure felt a lot longer. I guess that's because of all the steps. It also made me wonder how I did the waterfall hike with church last year. I know I remember that the sign said three miles. Whether it was three miles to the bottom of the waterfall and then the same back up or three miles altogether, I don't know. But, if the weather is good and I can get a lot of great pictures, I don't really mind how long the hike is.... I think.

Hike to the Natural Bridge, Part 3

Sunlight at last! My camera couldn't capture the beautiful panoramic view of the mountains I had here, especially because the closet trees were always in the way of my lens. I was really feeling lost now, though, because I knew I'd never seen a view like that until I got to the top before.

Here I'm walking beside the rocky mountain face. Just past this, I finally ran into my dad and sister coming back down. They were as confused as I was because nothing looked familiar. Two people had just passed us and overheard what we were saying. They told us that we were on the right trail and to just keep going about another tenth of mile to reach the bridge. Another tenth of a mile? That's just what I wanted to hear. Here's my dad and Gabrielle climbing some really rocky steps just before we reach the bridge. After that top step, we walked straight out onto it and realized we weren't on the wrong trail -- just an entirely different one than we had taken before. Usually, we take the original trail, which goes straight under the bridge, around, and then onto it. Somehow, we had taken a newer trail that led way out to the side of the bridge and then directly out onto it.
Our view from the top.
Looking over the side (as close as I get!).

Hike to the Natural Bridge, Part 2

It didn't take long before I was hiking by myself. My mom told me not to wait for her because she might just sit down for a while on one of the benches along the way and my dad and sister got way ahead of me. They didn't want to stop and wait for photographs. : ) I really loved all the staircases like this one. They were little, narrow stone steps and covered with slippery leaves. That's not even mentioning how steep they were.
The picture doesn't so this justice. I was walking beside this tall mountainside and came to this place where it hollows out deep and narrow inside into a cave.
Just past the cave were huge boulders.
More steps. It was really, really dark in these areas because the thick tree coverage blocked out most of the sunlight. I was also beginning to wonder to myself if I'd take the wrong turn somewhere. Nothing looked familiar and I didn't remember all these stairs. There weren't any little gazebos along the way to stop and rest in like I was sure I remembered before, and most incredible, there were hardly any people. Usually it's so crowded that you pass people constantly. I hadn't passed more than ten people.
This was like walking through the jungle. I was really beginning to think I'd turned the wrong way and ended up on one of the other hiking trails. I kept looking up and around me for the bridge, because, after so much walking, I thought I should be able to see it through the trees. Couldn't see it or anything familiar.

Hike to the Natural Bridge, Part 1

Yesterday, we drove to the mountains and hiked up a trail to the natural bridge. The leaves haven't changed colors completely yet, but the weather was perfect -- just a little cool with warm sunlight. When we first arrived at the park, I saw this pretty creek with all the trees reflected in it and had to get a few pictures.
A little bridge goes across the creek. It really wobbles when you try to cross it!
We've hiked this trail a few times before, but it's been two years since the last time we were here.
This is the first set of stairs in a very long series as we start on our way to the bridge!