Christmas 2008

We had a lot of fun taking our Christmas photos this year! Steve's friend and co-worker, Jo, came over one evening with his awesome camera and took about 140 pictures for us. The kids did really, really well and a good time was had by all. We served Jo some Turkey Chili, perhaps his first, as a thank you for his efforts as photographer.

Also, note the chest in the photos. It is actually an old tool chest that belonged to the grandfather of one of Ian & Evan's friends, Brian Peterson. We were lucky enough to get two of them recently from Mr. and Mrs. Peterson when they were selling the old family home, just four doors down from our house. Steve gave both chests some TLC and we knew we would never part with them. I also knew that they would be part of our family Christmas photos this year!

Christmas turned out to be a wonderfully white one this year! Only to have over a foot of the beautiful white snow we had accumulated completely melt almost overnight last night! Today's temperatures were in the 50-60º range...and this is WINTER??

With Steve off from work for another week, we have plans for some work to be done in the Therapy/Fitness Room. I am sure there will be many a trip to Home Depot, some headscratching, calculating and recalculating, cutting, installing, and hopefully in the end we will have tracks in the ceiling and maybe even one or two therapy swings for Oliver too!

Ian will be hard at work on a Biology project this coming week and Ilse has yet another practice session for her upcoming Ensemble competition. Evan is enjoying having no academic responsibilities over his Christmas Break, WOO HOO! Oliver has few to no appointments, which is rare and much appreciated by all!

I will be Mom 24/7 and Nurse on Tuesdays & Thursdays as we are yet again in a state of "change" and are shorthanded in Oliver's Private Duty Nursing staffing coverage. Whenever I do get a few minutes to myself, I would like to spend some time customizing this blog. As you can see, I have figured out how to make it look a bit different already.....HOORAY! I also want to get into some more "digiscrapping" (think digital scrapbook) as Steve is/has been awesome at taking pictures to document our lives.

Our "5th, 6th, and 7th Children" Brian, Emily, and Jordyn are as you guessed, regularly found perched on one of our kitchen stools, hanging out in the "Game Room" or running around the house somewhere! We enjoy the house full of children and even filled stockings for the "3 new children" at Christmas! Brian, Emily, and Jordyn are all neighborhood kids and have been friends with our kids since the kids and I moved here in 2003.

Here are some more of our pictures from our Christmas photo shoot below, enjoy!

G'night everyone! Soon it will be time for New Year's Resolutions, if you actually make resolutions still. Goals may be more the word; "Things to Accomplish This Year" is more of the way I look at them! More on that next time.

-Reneé