happy groundhog day! looks like punxsutawney phil didn’t see his shadow, so we can look forward to an early spring! in celebration, i woke up early and watched groundhog day, which is one of my favorites!

– ryan

happy new year! we made some black eyed peas today and packed up our holiday decorations.

– ryan & gub

we went to see the lights before christmas at the riverbanks zoo in columbia, sc! there were lots of lights to see and a petting zoo where gub met a nice lama.

– ryan & gub

we have been busy wrapping our gifts and getting ready to head home for the holidays! we are very excited to see everyone.

– ryan & gub

we took a lot of photos last december for our friend kristen’s blog, beauty everyday, that she runs for r. wood studio ceramics. she was doing a post on southern homes decorated for the holidays. i really liked how our photos turned out so i’m posting them here in our first big photo entry. i’m also learning how to grid a bunch of photos while i make this post.

be sure to check out the handmade soap and shoe shine kit photos. we decided to create handmade gifts for our families since i was losing my job at the end of the year. we went with shoe shine kits in stained wooden boxes for the gentlemen and handmade soap with ceramic dishes for the ladies. gub had just taken a class on soap making and had access to the ceramic studio at her work, so it all came together.

– ryan