Birthday Boy (and Other Updates)

We have not posted in a while, but all is well in the Herron household. At Christmas time, we traveled to Michigan to visit Erik's family. Erik took a quick trip to Washington, DC in January. Kansas experienced a blizzard that shut down almost everything for two days. Most importantly, Carter celebrated his 6th birthday. Photos and comments follow.

While in Michigan, Carter and several cousins worked with Erik to produce the Lego masterpiece below: Lego Zombie Apocalypse. The pictures speak for themselves.

Following the holidays, we returned to Kansas where we enjoyed several snowy days. Locals are not used to the snow and treat it almost as though it were toxic. Although he is a native Kansan, Carter loves to play in the snow just like his parents did when they were kids. Erik and Lea recounted the "great blizzard of '78" story. Although Flint only received around 10" that year, Erik remembers the huge snowpiles and drifts in Eldorado Vista Park across the street from his house. Lawrence received around 8" during its blizzard this year, a respectable amount. Without the resources to clear snow that more northerly cities maintain, it took a while to dig the town out. Below you can see Carter enjoying the snow following one of his frequent snowball attacks on his parents.

Erik traveled to Washington to participate in a fellowship review panel. While he was only in town for a couple of days, he had an opportunity to stroll around and snapped this photo of the US Capitol.

We just celebrated our first major event of the year - Carter's sixth birthday. He has been playing piano for a year, and we decided to upgrade his practice instrument at home. He tried out his cousin Ivy's electronic piano when we were in Michigan and he received a similar version of the piano for his birthday. The instrument is really impressive - weighted keys that react like standard piano keys, an incredibly realistic sound, and several nice built-in features (a metronome, recorder, and others).

Carter shared cupcakes with his classmates (chocolate with turquoise frosting and dinosaur sprinkles) and then with the family party at home. Carter reports that he had an "awesome" birthday!