New Year's 2004 with Carissa

The frist thing we did when I arrived in Portland was to drive to our College town and meet with some friends. We ate at the Sage cafe and then walked down to Serendipity Ice Cream Parlor and ate ice cream sundays, sang christmas carols with the paino player and otherwise just acted goofy. (from left: Elizabeth, Sarah and Carissa.)

A few days before New Years it snowed early int he morning so we headed over to Cariss'a partent's house where there was more snow. Along the way we stopped at a cemetary and took this picture. I was thrilled to be in around snow because I havn't played in the snow since I was 4 years old.

After the cemetary we slowly drove up a steep hill where we stopped so I could lean out the window and take this picture. We tried to drive again we we got stuck on an ice patch, car weels screetching and burning rubber until Carissa backed down the hill until she found some good traction again. Thank God we didn't spin off the road like some other driver's we passed.

All that tough driving brought us to her parents House, where we transformed ourselves into cousin It's to her family's amusement.

Sicne it was still snowing we went outside to build a snowman. Carissa was not to happy to have a snowball thrown at her. "Carissa, did you really expect me not to take advantage of all that white fluffy snow?"

Our snowman was a little on the pathetic side because the snow was too dry. Better luck next time.

A few days later, we awoke to more snow on New Year's Day. With Cariss'a family home from work we all went outside and snowtubed down her street. It was especially fun when we put ski wax on the bottom on the tube. Now that was some realtubing!

I finally got a great picture of Carissa, although if you look closely it looks like the tree branch is picking her nose.

In between tubing runs we decided to redeem our failed snowman bulding attempt and build a giant snowfort istead. It took about 4 hours and 4 people working on it, but by nightfall it was completed. Here we are sitting inside the fort. It was about 4 and a half feel tall. and  6 feet wide. The newspaper reported one family made a 6ft igloo and another family made and 8 foot snowman. It was a great success  and lots of fun for this New Years Day!