The Logic of SNOW

It is snowing right now in Princeton - big, thick, frothy flakes of winter magic. Snow always puts me in a delighted mood, and it occurred to me that snow is winter's bouquet of floral felicity.

I am in the middle of a 3-week intensive J-term course, and I have been having a hard time buckling down to tackle my 15-page paper due in a week. But in sitting here and pondering the glory of this snow, I realized that this winter wonder should actually help me in me need to study. Because what else does one want to do when it's snowing and terribly cold outside but to curl up with a hot cup of tea. And once you are curled up with a hot cup of tea, then one inevitably wants to read a book. And if one starts to read a book, then one is learning. So the logic goes as such:

1. If A (snow), then B (tea).

2. If B (tea), then C (book).

3. If C (book), then D (learning) (or in my case writing a paper)

4. A

5. Therefore D.

And voila - a classic formulation of logical syllogism.

So here's to snow, tea, books, and learning!

To the New Year

Well, the blissful days of laziness, snow, sleeping, food and hanging out with family has come to an end. James and I are now back in full force at Princeton - James is working very hard on two different papers this month, and I am immersed in an intense and 3-week J-term course. But it does feel good to be back into a productive mode. And we have made some good changes in our life as part of our New Year's resolutions. Neither of us our religious about these New Year's resolutions...some years I do them, some I don't. But this year I felt beckoned to bring more discipline and order back into my life, and so we decided that the New Year marked a good time to make these changes. Here are some of the more important ones we are working at:

1. No TV.

Yes, we have unplugged our cable connection and I literally haven't watched one ounce of TV since we've been back...in our house, anyways. I have allowed myself to watch a bit if I'm with other people, but no more TV at our place for the month of January. James and I both feel pretty happy with this change for now - we always sit at the table and talk during dinner, I'm reading a fun book about a vintner in Tuscany when I need some mental fluff, and James is reading a novel. So it's good...no late night senseless hours lost to a cable abyss.

2. Better food - better workouts.

December was a tumultuous month for our stomachs. James is now engaged in a work-out program called "Belly-off '09." And I'm just tyring to make sure I work out regularly. I occasionally work out with my friend Sara, who does this crazy military-like program called cross-fit. It leaves me crawling the next two days, but it's very good. Also, we have a fridge stocked full of veggies and other healthy foods, and we're trying not to buy any junk at all. We haven't managed to alleviate it completely, but then again - dessert is one of the greatest pleasures in life!

3. Organized home and house.

I am quite pleased with our progress in keeping our house better organized and put together. If your home should be your sanctuary, we've allowed our sanctuary to be a tornado on far too many occasions. The day after we got home, both James and I completely re-organized all our closets and drawers, sorted through clutter, and did a thorough house clean. Still a few things to work through, but for the most part I'm feeling good.

So here's to the New Year! Although our resolutions are somewhat standard and mundane, my philosophy is that they will allow our lives to be more vivid and exciting. (in the long term, I guess this is true.)

And families....I know you have some of the same health goals as us. We hope you're working at them - we need your good health for years to come!

Semiahmoo - A Resort By the Sea Covered in Snow

My family had the opportunity to spend this last weekend at Semiahmoo - we did the same thing last year and had a blast. This resort is located literally at the corner of WA State - it is right on the water and it looks over to the coast of White Rock, British Colombia. It is an incredibly beautiful environment, with both the Cascade Mountains and the Olympic Mountains in sight across the sea. 

This resort has quite a lot of significance for my family - this is where my mother and Curtis got married, the beach where James proposed to me and the restaurant where we had our engagement dinner, the golf course that my brother has worked at over the last few years, and the place where my sister currently takes her tennis lessons (and where I had several lessons and camps back in high school). This is also the beach where all my high school friends used to spend our summers...there are several remote parts of the beach that are usually empty, and we started many bonfires there during our teenage summer evenings. 

Anyhow, I LOVE that we've gotten to stay here over the last 2 Christmas breaks....we have a great time hanging out and relaxing. In the evenings we usually stay up late playing board games, and during the day we split our time between swimming, playing Marco Polo and racing in the pool (even though my brother always wins), lounging in the hot tubs, steam rooms, and saunas, playing ping pong, tennis, and basketball in the indoor courts, and sitting around the fireplace eating cookies and drinking hot cocoa. Not many better ways to relax and chill out during a snow storm!

Here are some family pics we took on the hotel's back lawn.

My brother and one of his best friends, who has long joined us for various family events.

Midnight Mass....Nah, sledding!

Well, blame it on the snow storm and blizzard we've been experiencing this holiday season...but we didn't go to any Christmas Church services this year. James and I had really wanted to attend a Christmas Eve service at 

St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Manhattan, with the Boy's Choir and the full liturgy in all its glory....but we obviously weren't on the East Coast for Christmas. 

So we decided to settle for midnight sledding. Or I guess it was more like 1:00am by the time we got there. But the sledding was amazing - we went to the 

old middle school hill with all of our siblings, the hill that everyone flocks to when it snows around here. But surprise surprise, we had the whole hill to ourselves at 1:00am on Christmas Eve. And we had a wonderful reprieve from the normally incessant wind that Lynden experiences during a snowstorm. So conditions were perfect and I suppose the quiet crunch of the snow and the dim lighting that faintly glowed on the snow had its own sacred appeal...if the weather cooperated I would make it an annual tradition!

 

Christmas Eve

Despite all the snow, my family and James' family were able to make the 40 minute drive from Lynden to Bellingham to my aunt and uncle's house. I realized how blessed we are to have both our immediate families in the same area, and that we could all share Christmas Eve together. We sang some Christmas carols, read the Luke narrative of Jesus' birth, played a gift exchange game, ate lots of good food, and just enjoyed time together as a family.

Here is my uncle John about to cut into his favorite kind of cake - Red Velvet - which I made especially for this fine occasion.

My cousin Aleah and I singing some Christmas songs.

The Rienstra's singing their hearts out - Jessica, Lois, and Jennifer.

And this couch seemed to have a few troubles with their singing...there was a lot of laughing intermixed with their melodies.

White Christmas

This has been one of the whitest Christmases that NorthWest Washington has seen in a long time - and it has been beautiful! James and I got home just in time for the whirlwind of blizzards we've experienced day after day....and I realize that for people having to drive to work it's been difficult, but for us hanging out in our PJ's at home it has been wonderful.

It snowed all day Christmas Eve, and then it snowed for a few hours Christmas morning. The flakes were large and thick and glorious. We had tried playing in the snow a few days before Christmas, but it was only 15 degrees or so and the snow was like white dust - you couldn't form it into a snowball or a snowman very easily (although James claims we just weren't trying hard enough). So last night, on Christmas Eve, James and I and all of our siblings went for a late night sledding adventure at 1:00 AM. It was SO MUCH FUN!!! Jessica even rounded up a shopping cart for us try out - she had just come back from Colorado and claimed it was great fun when she did it there. But it looked more like a huge catapult machine, so we decided to stick with sleds. There are some great pics of us sledding, but I'll have to put those up in a day or so.

It truly has been a winter wonderland around here, and we've loved it. It has made for a beautiful and scenic Christmas break.