Welcome, Speedy Year

My left hand hurts when I: 

1. Type

2. Touch things

3. Sit still

It's because I am in guitar class. I realize my childhood dream is actually physically painful. I just want to be a rockstar! 

But anyway, I'll continue to type and my fingers will just start to bleed- no big deal. I must tell all about my New Year's festivities! 

First of all, the Martin clan drove on up to good old Andersonburg for the weekend. Cardinal Hill if we want to be specific.

It was a weekend to relax, eat, read, eat, sleep, eat, welcome 2012, and eat. 

To make us all feel better for eating such large amounts of that delicious Lancaster County food, someone decided we were going to take a nice walk around Colonel Denning State Park.

So we headed out for a nice walk through the woods. 

Grandpa Martin led the pack and was soon so far out of sight that we started to doubt his actual whereabouts. Maria and I were scheming up all sorts of possibilities: He never came on the hike; he fell in the leaves and we all walked by him; he took off to another state; he ran the "walk" to show us all up; he was behind us... etc etc etc. 

We finally found him- at the end of the walk. 

His reasoning for the sudden disappearance was that it was a bit chilly out, so he needed to walk fast to warm up. 

I think he was secretly challenging Aunt Melanie to some kind of crazy- woodsy- marathon event. He denied it all and stuck with his story.

Between calling out for our grandfather and tripping over tree-roots, we found a bunch of random-leafless trees decorated with Christmas balls. 

It was quite cute actually.

(We were looking at our reflections. It made our faces look unusually funny.)

We kept finding these decorations, and each time we giggled and were even more impressed. All it takes is a festive Park Ranger, I guess?

Maria and MC were showing Watts the decorations too. 

Then suddenly our walk was over (grandpa was safe, we were sandy) and it was time to head back to the house.  

Soon the nearing monumental birthday grandma was about to celebrate made way into the conversation. Yesterday was grandma Martin's 70th birthday! 

I can hardly believe it- she's still as quick as ever! 

Want to know where my ability to deliver quick, witty commentary comes from? Take grandma out for lunch someday, and you'll put it together pretty quickly. She's sharp! 

It turned into story time real fast, as grandma began to recall a great deal about her life as a teenager. We learned all about how grandpa asked her on her first date when she was 16. 

It was a parking lot sort of "drive-by". 

Late 1950's style.

Want to hear a good love story with an ending that will make you smile? Ask your grandma to tell you when she met your grandpa. I thought it was better than a Nicholas Sparks' novel. 

 And then the time came for us to see what the small town of New Bloomfield could offer. We had low expectations- unfortunately. 1 year is not a long enough time to forget something so tragic as the cow drop of 2011.

We figured there was hope this year, seeing as how New Bloomfield had an actual "city square" (last year they just had a silo). Dan did research and found a pretty convincing youtube video on the event from years past, but we were still hesitant. 

I'm happy to report that New Bloomfield's Huckleberry Drop was a success!

There was a DJ- playing everything from Lady Gaga to Cotton eye Joe, a spotlight, a firetruck, food- and lots of people. 

The huckleberry was unmistakable- how refreashing? 

Then some farmer kids asked MC and I to do a dance with them- so we did. No shame in a hicktown. 

We made the following video for Maria. She had to leave early and couldn't ring in the new year with us this year. We were sad that she wasn't there to be so happy with how things turned out. So we made her a video documenting our happiness. Naturally.

Firetrucks went crazy, people were dancing, mom and dad kissed (sick), MC and I shouted- it was a great way to bring in the New Year. 

Interesting- no doubt- but great!

So that was my New Year's eve. It was no Time Square, but it worked. 

Now I think I'm finally caught up with the whole vacation! It went so fast- I can hardly believe it. 

Oh, and here's Dan with his new glasses. 

I helped him pick them out. Actually, he picked them and put them on and I only helped to solidify his decision. He's got a good eye. 

Ha. I didn't try that, promise. 

Punny. 

But for real, how cute is he? 

Representing with his Meredith sweatshirt. He's so presh. 

Little Mary Cat also started driving over break. I haven't decided if I like that or not. By this summer, she's going to be able to drive me around. 

Like, we want to go to a movie? I could be like, no MC, YOU drive. 

That's crazy scary. 

But she's doing so good =) 

She still needs to work on operating the garage door opener. She pushed it about four times, and this is what she got. 

I'm so proud. 

Any old who, I still haven't talked about my new schedule and all that junk. I'm so busy girl! 

But I better do it soon before I can't even post on my own freaking blog. I don't understand the whole SOPA thing- mainly because I couldn't find a nice, SHORT description of what it actually is and I couldn't be bothered to read those crazy long articles people have been passing around. I need Kyle to explain it to me. He's so smart like that. 

Skye and I have figured this much out: It's stupid, it's unnecessary, it's scary, it's troublesome, and makes us wonder when we moved to China or North Korea. 

Maybe it's not even a big deal. 

I'm just going to act like it's not. That's usually how I deal with things that I don't understand. 

Kyle can explain it in March. 

That works. 

xoxo