Grandpas!

Last weekend, we took a trip to Missouri for John's cousin's wedding.  It was fun to be a part of the celebrations and to meet many of John's relatives.  Many of them had come to our wedding, but there were also a good number that I had never gotten to meet before.  John's parents and siblings came as well and we enjoyed getting to spend time with them!

Another cool part about the trip was getting to have lunch with my own dad who was on his way to Kansas City.  To have the opportunity to get caught up with him again was a lot of fun!  So Thomas got to see both of his grandpas on the same day!

 

Before dad left, we took a picture (or two)! In this one, it looks as though Thomas is having fun and eager to tell us about it!

This is his serious - I'm looking at the camera now face.

Finally!  Smiles!

When I joined the picture, Thomas just wouldn't take is eyes off me!

Enjoying some Grandpa time!

Dad with his littlest grandson

That night we attended the rehearsal dinner and then gathered after that in the hotel lobby to celebrate Lisa's birthday.  By then, Thomas was pretty tired as you can see in these pictures!

He's still curious and was staring fixedly at the camera as his Grandpa held him.

Grandpa tells hims some amazing facts :)

What a joy it was to be with family!

Busy Christmas Week!

Because of our baby due in less than six weeks, John and I had decided this fall that we would stay home for Christmas. We thought this would make the Christmas season less busy and more restful:) Well, we did stay in town, but instead made our Christmas week really busy:

On the Tuesday before Christmas, we closed on a house! The above picture is our first meal in our new house. The house is in great shape and was move-in-ready. The former owners had made everything clean and neat and ready for us. They even left curtains for us - so everything was ready for new occupants. This was a really good thing, because our first night there on Wednesday would find not only us, but 11 members of our family in the house!On Wednesday, with the help of many friends from church and my family who had arrived the night before, we moved everything out of our apartment and into our new house!
We had worked up an appetite by lunch time and had our first big meal with friends in our new house.
By evening, most of the boxes were unpacked, our new table and chairs had been assembled and we were feeling comfortably settled in the house. We enjoyed chili and cornbread for supper and had a nice evening with my family. John's family arrived later that night, so we had a lot of fun Christmas eve with both sides of the family playing our favorite game this year Ticket to Ride (Both US and German on different tables - the German version is even more fun as it has additional ways to earn points!)

After many games, we were ready for some exercise and so headed outside where my sisters had made snow people to represent me and John and our future children! I somehow doubt though that we'll have 15 midget children!

We paused for a group picture before the walk. Some neighbors seeing us all assembled probably wondered how many people had moved into that house!

The walk didn't remain calm for long! Soon almost everyone was involved with a snow ball fight. There was just enough snow along the road to refuel occasionally.

The walk felt really nice!

We sang some Christmas songs that evening and opened our gifts before bed.

Christmas day brought more good food as everyone pitched in to make a wonderful turkey dinner.

On Saturday, my brother Luke and his family arrived to bring even more energy and fun to our gathering. We enjoyed some Indian food prepared by John and his dad for lunch!

Our nieces and nephews are growing up fast so it was great to see them once again!

So, that was our week of Christmas! It was definitely a bit of a whirlwind week. My family had to leave early on Sunday and we spent a lot of time Sunday and Monday sleeping and relaxing. Now, John is back to work and we're enjoying spending a few more days with his family before they have to go back home.

New Years with Miriam's Family

After Christmas, we went down to Alabama to visit my family. When we got there, John immediately got out his camera to record our normal family life.



Jubilee was busy reading a book (but John caught a picture of her by surprise)!

Anna was busy making pasties (a family favorite)!

Lydia was helping out and hanging out with everyone.

As soon as the pasties were in the oven (shown cooked here), there was enough time for a game.

We begin with take-2 - a great, much faster alternative game to play with your scrabble pieces. John enjoys the game though he has had to learn a little humility as the girls typically with fast games like this.

(What are they looking at?)

Soon the game was over and it was time for some supper!

Fun with Family

We enjoyed our time together with family over Christmas. We ate a lot of good Indian food!


I don't remember if everyone was trying to ignore the camera but me during this picture or if I had just eaten fast and was telling a story while everyone else was finishing their food.

Anita and I

Lisa and I enjoy the Apple Crunch

Hiding behind a book!

Suri during family devotions. Each evening ended with a reading from the Bible and prayer.

First Visit from Family

It's been some time since I've updated this blog. Somehow the days keep slipping away. The outside world no longer has its layer of snow as the temperatures reached the 50s last weekend and melted it all away.



This past weekend my parents and sister were able to come for their first visit to see us in Ohio. After a short night of rest due to getting here really late on Saturday night, we had a "sibling-breakfast type" breakfast. Of course we were missing five of my siblings (and John's three siblings as well)! Then we were off to church.

Some church friends invited us all over for dinner after church which was really nice! My family enjoyed the opportunity to get more acquainted with some of our Ohio church family.

That day quickly passed and on Monday John and I had to be at work so my family took the opportunity to visit our workplaces and see the products being manufactured.



We enjoyed a quick supper of chicken curry which I had made and frozen some time ago.



I received this bowl with side containers as a wedding gift and have found that it's perfect for all the curry fixings.

After dinner we had some fun learning a new card game from Jubilee, playing ping pong and . . .

having John show off his speakers with some good classical music!

Soon the night was getting late and we had to head to bed. It was a nice visit!

Birthday Dutch Blitz!

On Monday (my birthday), my family had me over for pasties and birthday cake. Actually I should say birthday brownies with chocolate ice cream, chocolate sauce and chocolate chips! I do have a picture that I should upload at some point.

Well, after all the wonderful food, we played a couple games: take 2 and Dutch Blitz. While playing dutch blitz, we thought it would be fun to take video clips of the games to see how fast we were playing. If you like fast card games and have never tried Dutch Blitz, you should definitely try it. It's much like nerts, but uses special cards. I learned the game at a summer music camp 12 years ago, and it has been a family favorite since then.

It's a bit long, but fun (to me) to watch. Thanks Anna for putting the video together!

My Sister Anna

My sister Anna is doing a series on siblings by writing about each one of us in turn. Being the third in my family and 5th to be written about, I've had several months to wonder what she would write. I like to think of myself as having been (and being) a good older sister - not too bossy and a lot of fun.

I know of course that there are many days in which I am far from ideal. I don't always want to spend time with my siblings. Often when they were younger, I would rather spend time without them than play with them.

As Anna mentioned, sometimes I did order them around and make them work a lot. While in high school, I read many of the books my mom had about homeschooling and kids. Those books talked about discipline and organization and how to get your children to do chores around the house. Well, I didn't have any kids, but I did have my siblings. They were my "Guinea Pigs" as I tried out some of the things that I read. Many of the things I read worked well - giving out rewards for doing chores, making lists so they would know how much they had to do before they would be done, or working with them. Other ideas were too hard to maintain - there was one in which you gave each one a jar of coins. If they ever were mean to each other they would have to transfer money out of one jar and into another. I don't think that one worked very well since it was sometimes hard to figure out who was at fault.

So there are plenty of negative experiences Anna could have written about. But overall, I had fun with all of my younger siblings (and the older ones too!). The younger ones were my ever present (sometimes too ever present!) admirers and friends. It amazed me that they often thought it so much fun if I would play with them. Each time I would come home from college for Christmas or summer break, they would all be bursting with constant news and requests to "come see this" and "look at me do this." After hanging out with friend my own age for months, it was always a shock to have four younger ones so talkative and excited to see me.

Anna's post makes it sound like I was the "perfect sister" - that I was not. However, I am so thankful for Anna's kind words - they mean a lot to me. She is very complementary and so good at bringing out the best in people. What she writes is very positive and amazingly nice.

As all who read her Blog or know Anna no doubt realize, she is indeed also a very awesome sister. It's been a privilege to see her develop so much talent in many areas especially in the last few years. Her ability and desire to do each task well from cooking to teaching to directing plays to blogging to sweeping the floor is an example to me. Of course we do each have our bad days, so don't think that we expect perfection from you, Anna.

I am glad that I was able to share many of my hobbies with you. I do want to say that you have learned what I did and surpassed me in how you have continued to learn and do each thing. I may have sewn a few dresses while growing up, but you've probably made over a hundred (especially if you count all the things you've sewn for various classes and plays). I may have made of lot of meals in highschool, but you've taken the few recipe's I've used and found and tried dozens more.

I had fun with little crafts with kids I babysat, but Anna's gone from simply babysitting kids to teaching young and older kids things like ballet and drama. Now that each of us siblings are older, I'm enjoying learning things from "the kids." Without their examples, I would have never started blogging or had the courage or ability to try to make a website for my church. I'm so thankful that they are willing to spend time with me when I'm over at their house and are willing to get up early to drive to my house for breakfast each week.

I have enjoyed seeing all the amazing things that Anna has been able to do and look forward to seeing what her future will hold! Right now neither of us knows exactly what the next year holds for us. Trust God as I am reminding myself to do. Know that God is sovereign. Though we may be tempted to worry and wonder about what is to come, God already know and we can trust him with our lives.

Today's Top Pictures!

We begin the evening by eating dinner with Grandma and Grandpa at their retirement home dining room. They live in a very nice place and the meals are always good. This evening we were given a choice of veal or lemon fish. I chose lemon fish - it was good. John says that the veal was good too.

After a dessert of chocolate or strawberry ice cream, Grandma demonstrated a tried and true method of getting rid of hiccups. She says that it's worked for the last 83 years! I've never seen it done before - but next time I get the hiccups, I will definitely try to take a sip of water between a spoon handle and see if it works!

We enjoyed our evening with Grandma and Grandpa watching a Christmas show hosted by a Japanese violinist from Branson and looking at old pictures.

Now we're back at our cousin's house, finishing up the day by letting all of you know what we've been up to! Tomorrow we have to get up early in order to get to Little Rock. We get to spend some time with two of my best college friends - Ivory and Tamra!