Stearns'

Above: Stearns' lemon tree by moonlight

 

Ok so when I looked at the temperature and saw max of 20 degrees during this trip, I thought, cold. But I had no idea--that doesn't take into account the windchill, which puts us at most points around 1 or 2 degrees. 

This morning we opened some Christmas presents. We ate Stearns' delicious granola. 

We headed to a McDonald's play place, where the kids took out some of their energy. 

Below: Stearns' wreath with her own flowers. 

In the afternoon, Stearns and I slipped away while the kids watched Peter Pan. We ended up in a real dive and psychoanalyzed our personalities and our childhood relationship. 

Stearns' husband smoked two kinds of meat, plus Stearns made an amazing pasta with delicata squash that they grew!

Here's one sweet nephew helping himself to a treat. 

I love seeing the cousins running around playing. (Right now it's a lot of boat playing because we're still reading Mr. Bowditch.) We played UNO. We got to watch my niece play the piano--and Blaze played Yankee Doodle for them. 

And I've gotten to read tons of books to my nieces and nephews, which is my favorite thing. And my five-year-old nephew, who is quite a reader, read a book to me. So glad for this time with family!