New Years Day- Hiking and Polar Bear Plunge

On New Year's Day, Garin and I were invited by our friends, Bryce and Franky, to join them on a New Year's Day hike. The hike was to the top of this mounthill (in between a mountain and a hill) that had an awesome view of downtown Boston. Ordinarily the hike would have been rather rudimentary, but add about a foot of snow and some icy rocks to the mix and things get a little more fun!

Us with Bryce and Franky at the top of the mountain.
The view of downtown Boston in the distance.

The hike up...thankfully it was actually a rather mild day, I think it was about 40 degrees, hence Garin's short sleeves and rolled up pants.

If we thought going up the hill was tricky on slippery stones with snow and ice packed on them...coming down was a whole new adventure. I think we all took a spill to the ground at some point on the way down.

Garin and I had been reading up on some places around Boston and the Cape that were having New Year's Day Polar Bear Plunges...and well, we thought it was a wonderful idea! Most of the organized ones required an "entrance fee" that was some sort of donation to a charitable cause (don't ask me why anyone would PAY to freeze themselves, but I guess its for a good cause), but due to the hike we missed most of those (and I might add that I'm cheap). So, I decided that, hey the beach is right out our front door, why can we not take advantage of the free freezing cold water right in front of us?! So, my bright idea lead to the following pictures:

The tide was as low as I have ever seen it...so after I ran about 50 ft into the water I was still only about knee/thigh deep. I eventually just dunked myself in to say I got completely wet.

The dash back in...my pants were so heavy and were falling off!!

Out of the four of us (Bryce and Franky were still there to witness my bravado), I was the only one witnessed to take the plunge. Garin said he would do it later but wanted to go for a run first...about an hour later he came home and was soaking wet, but I (nor any other confirmed person) did not actually witness his plunge. I'm not sure how else he would have gotten wet from head to toe (I mean, he does sweat a lot, but I guess not that much), so I guess I have to take his word for it ;)

Newport, RI Trip

Sometime around Christmas, Garin and I decided to take a drive out to Newport, Rhode Island to see the mansions out there all dressed up for Christmas. I'm not sure of the exact history of this area, but apparently, there were some VERY wealthy people that decided to build some beautiful houses there on the coast. There is a scenic route that you can drive where you see one massive house after another...all in some beautiful locations along the ocean. Here are a some pictures of a few of them:

(not the White House...I think it is called the Marble House, you can go on a tour through this one for about $15, we were too cheap for that!).

This house was actually build by the same guy (or a close relative with the same last name, can't remember exactly) that build the Biltmore house in Asheville, NC.

This is the MASSIVE gate going into the Vanderbilt's lovely house...check out how tiny G looks next to it!! You could also tour this one, which might have been worth it, but we decide to do the cliff walk instead.

So, the cliff walk is a pathway that goes beside the cliffs that are in front of all of these mansions, its quite a few miles long and would be a beautiful run when the weather is a bit more balmy.

G decided to climb out onto the rocks with crashing surf all around.

I couldn't let G have all the fun so I climb down into some of the cliffs as well...rocks were slimy and slippery!!

Us!

Snow Fun!

Right before Christmas and right after Christmas we got a pretty decent dumping of snow on the Cape (we didn't really get that much out on the Beach where we live, but they got about 6" about a mile inland). So Garin and I got a little disk sled and grabbed my friend Franky and headed out to the sledding hill on base. Its a pretty awesome sledding hill I must say...I pretty good 50 yard run that gets you going pretty fast.

This is the top of the hill...its for the more adventurous to REALLY get you going fast!

The rest of the hill...a pretty good run!!

A jump that someone had created...this is my friend Franky taking it like a pro!


Garin was off for the day so he went with us too!

Our next snow adventure was going Snowmobiling! I got an awesome deal on Groupon for a 2 hour snowmobiling adventure, so that's what Garin got for Christmas and his Birthday (it was really for both of us because I got to go too...even though I had to ride on the back). Since the area had gotten such a large amount of snow, we figured it would be a great time to go. So, we headed north to Lincoln, New Hampshire where our adventure took place (which was about 3 hours away).

It was a guided tour with a train of about 5 other snowmobiles...we were at the end of the train so we got to hold back a little bit and then "speed" to catch up. It was A LOT of fun! I didn't get to drive, but Garin did a great job for his first time on a snowmobile! And the weather and terrain was absolutely beautiful. This southern girl has rarely seen THAT much snow on the ground! There was about 2 to 3 feet on the ground and it was caked all over the trees...beautiful winter wonderland!

G and I before we hit the trails...and I WAS smiling for the picture, before I realized that you couldn't see my mouth...it looks goofy, but boy was I glad I had the face warmer!

A pretty creek that had frozen over

The beautiful terrain we got to ride through...and on the windshield of the snowmobile you see that we could have purchased our snowmobile for a mere $5,400. I think they wanted you to know how much they cost in case you felt like wrecking it!

This is how deep it was on the uncombed part of the trail...I could have gotten lost in it!

G and I on our chariot

And then to top off the day, we got to eat dinner at Chick-Fil-A on our way home!!! One of the two that are in Mass. happened to be about 5 mins off our course. They even had REAL SOUTHERN sweet tea there!!!! What a wonderful day....

Christmas Day 2010

Christmas Day Photo...yes we had a "left over" white Christmas...my first white Christmas ever!

Christmas Day 2010 wasn't like most Christmas days. "Normally" we would wake up and have breakfast with my family and open presents with them. Then we would have lunch #1 with my family and head over to Garin's fam's house for lunch #2 and spend the rest of the afternoon/evening with them. Well this year we were fortunate enough to get to see our families around Christmas and to go through most of the traditions, but not on Christmas day. When we got back from visiting NC, we were in a store on Christmas Eve and someone was talking about 'Christmas tomorrow', and it just felt weird that the rest of the world still had Christmas to go and I felt like we had already finished our Christmas.

Originally Garin was supposed to work Christmas day from 8 in the morning until 8 the following morning. However, a very nice older gentleman (they call them Coast Guard Auxillarist...aka volunteers), volunteered to work in the morning so that Garin could spend some time at home on Christmas (Garin tried to explain to him that we had already had our Christmas and that we didn't have kids or family in the area so he didn't mind working, but he said that he didn't have family around either and he wanted to bless Garin in this way...so sweet!). Thus, Garin and I got to spend the morning together. We decided not to get gifts for each other...our house (if we ever get it) will be a gift enough...but I found a great deal on Groupons for a 2 hour snowmobile tour in New Hampshire, so I surprised him with that (it was really a mutual gift because I really wanted to try it out too!).

Later in the day we went for a beach run together...this is where the day got interesting. We had had some pretty good storms over the last several days and the ocean had been churning pretty good...AND had washed up some ocean "goodies." About 200 yards down the beach from our house we found this HUGE knot of ropes that also included an attached anchor. So, because we are Garin and Lauren and are prone to random, ridiculous notions, we decided it would be a wonderful idea to drag this mass of ropes back to our cottage where we would untangle it. Thus, Christmas Day Beach Scavenge commenced.

These were some pretty big ropes, so towing this sucker was no easy task. I would estimate it weighed in somewhere over 300lbs. Anyone watching us would have thought we were the most insane, idiotic people as we grunted and groaned while tugging this up the beach (fortunately we never came into contact with anyone, so hopefully no one witnessed this). We tried quite a few methods and nothing really worked until Garin had the great idea of loading it up on our plastic disk sled that we had bought a few days before. This worked pretty good until we got to the huge dune that goes up to our cottage. After about 20 mins of "1,2,3, heave; 1,2,3, heave" we were quite sweaty but we finally got the knot up the dune and to the cottage deck. Not only was it quite a good workout, but it was a good bonding experience for us as we had to work together (haha, shocker, I know!) to achieve our Scavenging goal. So, here is a picture of our Christmas day catch:

G holding up his catch like a true fisherman

This is a better view of the mess...oh and we scavenged that black garbage barrel type thing from the beach as well.

Note: we have already untangled the anchor and quite a few other ropes...we have yet to get the big one out yet though! Garin says it is the pay day of the bunch ;) At least untangling it will give us something to do when we are bored!

After all of that excitement it was time for Garin to go to work. The mess hall there was doing a Christmas day dinner, so I also got to go in later in the evening to eat dinner with him and the other families whose husband's were on duty. After dinner, Garin took me on a tour of the hanger and I got to get in the helicopter that he will be flying and see the other plane (the Falcon, which is like a executive jet, its used for surveillance) that the Coast Guard flies out of this air station.

The HH-60...In case you can't tell...this sucker is HUGE...it was about as big as the Falcon...I was shocked at how big it was!

So, all in all, even though Christmas Day was not a typical one for us, we were blessed with some adventures and some time with one another. We also were blessed with some time to focus on the real reason for Christmas, the birth of Jesus Christ, our Savior. Even though spending time with family makes the Holiday Season special, Christmas is special because God came to earth as a baby to live a perfect and blameless life so that He could one day die as the perfect spotless sacrificial lamb in my place and cover over my sin, so that I can have a direct and personal relationship with the Maker and Creator of this earth. Praise God for His redemptive plan that was put into action on that first Christmas day!

There's Nothing Like Going Home For Christmas

When we got up here to MA we didn't think that we were going to be able to make it home for Christmas because Garin had to work on Christmas day (partly because he is the new guy and partly because he is just a nice guy). However, when we got Garin's December scheduled we realized he had about a week right before Christmas where he didn't have to work. One day Garin told me he had a plan, so we called up his sister and brother and found out that his plan might actually work out!

So, on December 17 we hopped on a plane to Charlotte; Garin's sister Meghan and her husband, Eli (who had just arrived the week before from spending a year in Iraq), drove up from Savannah, GA; and Garin's brother Shane and his wife Rebekah (who is expecting the first Kirkpatrick baby) drove in from Apex, NC; all to surprise Garin's mom with a family Christmas! We ended up surprising her at a restaurant...I wish I had my camera in action to catch her face when she walked in a realized that we were all there. There were tears, of course!

We had a wonderful weekend hanging out with the whole family (it was the first time we'd all been together since Meghan and Shane got married) playing games, shooting clay pigeons, and stuffing ourselves with delicious food (as is customary at all Kirkpatrick gatherings!). I WISH I had some pictures to show of the whole gang, but all of them were taken with another camera...hopefully someone will send them our way so that I can post them (Hint, Hint)!

Kids picture (thanks for the pics Mrs. K!)

Kirkpatrick Girls

After Shane and Rebekah, and Meghan and Eli left to go back home, we crossed the "tracks" (i.e. Hwy 74) and spent some time celebrating Christmas and my Birthday with my (Lauren's) family. I did happen to get some pictures of my adorable nephew, Mason! He is 21 months old now and just a gibber jabbering...he hasn't quite perfected "Aunt Lauren" yet (but he can identify me in a line up!), however, he has mastered "tractor", "ball", "dog", "taco", and quite a few more useful words.

This is Mason's version of dancing and an exhibition of his destructive nature ;)

Going out with Granddaddy (the things mom makes you wear to stay warm!)
Up close shot (really he is trying to get to my camera, that is why he is so close...every time he sees me take it out he wants to play with it, so with the delay, I come out with a lot of pictures like this!)
We could only get a picture with Santa if we distracted him with candy...

He's got all of the necessities...a tractor, a book (the tractor one at that!), and his "nack" (aka: snack)

Farewell picture with Aunt Lauren and Uncle G.

After 5 days at home it was time to come back to MA :( The Cape got about 10" of snow while we were gone, so it was neat to come back "home" to a winter wonderland. I'll post more pictures of the snow and our first Christmas day away from home....

It Starting to Look a Little Like Christmas...

This year it looks like we will be spending Christmas in our little rental cottage by the sea (which we are not complaining about!). However, unfortunately, every one of the 6 huge Rubbermaid containers of Christmas decorations is packed at the back of our storage unit; thus, no Christmas decorations for us this year :(

So, when I heard about the opportunity to learn how to make a Christmas Wreath at church, I jumped all over it! It was a really neat event, and I don't think I'll ever pay for a wreath again because they are so easy to make!

Here's the result (eat your heart out Martha!):

And it smells good too!!

One of my new friends here, Franky, also did the class with me!

MoVember

When we arrived here in Cape Cod we found out that the guys at the Airstation were participating in Movember. Garin figured that a couple of weeks of not shaving would be a great idea. However, Coast Guard regulations only allow for facial hair above the upper lip...ugh. Thus, even though a week behind the other guys, Garin started cultivating his mustache. It got rather creepy I must say. So bad that we would go on a walk down the road and mothers would call their children inside (j/k, but I might would have if I were a parent!). After 3 weeks of hard work, here is the scary result:

Ugh...fortunately he shaved it off right after the Airstation mustache competition (he did not bring home any prizes for his...but the others DID have a whole week of hair growth on him). Lucky for me, he didn't really care for the hairy upper lip either...whew!

P.S. Meggsie, thought I'd post this one for you ;)

Thanksgiving Apple Pie