Christmas 2009

This year was a little different for us. Adam and Laura stayed in Boone where they suffered an ice storm Christmas day but luckily we got to talk to them on Skype the night before when everyone was at our house. The Smiths and Cupps come over after church and then we eat together the next day too. We kind of live together for about a week - a packed house with lots going on...video and card games, food and more food, movies, etc. We also had our faith family over and went caroling as a group to Mary's house who we met last fall when we helped with some things around her house. This year we met the rest of Jay's family a couple of days after Christmas which was nice cause most made it except for some with stomach flu. We repeated our measurement of all family members which we do every few years. Blake is now one of the tallest growing 15 inches in seven years. The sheet with the previous years needed to be lowered though cause I know I haven't shrunk 4 inches yet! Almost everyone got socks this year - Keen's and Smart Wool - nice. Blake got a lot of fly fishing equipment including his grandfather's things which is extra special so if you own a stream stocked with trout, let us know...Jacob wore this hat four days straight, guess he liked it! We were glad Austin was here because he will be deployed with the army next month for 6-8 months. Alex brought his friend Kate home to visit too.

Science Project

Time for the sixth grade science fair! Jacob's project was the color wheel. He showed that when you mix all the colors together you get white. He used my good hand mixer to do this of course and I'm glad it still works afterwards! Anything for the cause....

O Christmas Tree

Ok, so our tree's been up for a couple of weeks now but here's the pictures! We went out to our usual place at Nichols Iowa but they were flooded out this year so we picked up a nice tree from the Optimist Club. If anyone cuts their own somewhere close that has nice trees, let us know for next year. Now I need to get those presents wrapped.

Happy Thanksgiving

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Everyone was home this year except for Austin, we missed you! It was a full week.Monday, Laura, Blake, Adam and I went up to Cedar Rapids to take the rest of the Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes to the collection center from our relay center in town so they could go on the semi to Minneapolis. That was fun to see how that part of it works. The van had every inch full of boxes!

We visited Gma and Gpa Struve in Van Horne to say hi after Gpa's surgery. He's doing fine now. Thank you Jesus!

We spent some time outdoors doing the traditional every time we see each other wiffleball game over in the park. Alex's girlfriend Kate came so everyone has now met her finally, she fit right in and survived all of us and the humiliation of our torment of her (really we were pretty nice!). We played cards, 88, pictionary, speed scrabble (I think Blake was going hunting later...?)

We had Thanksgiving at The Smiths. Beautiful table set by Penny. Great food and everyone enjoyed it except Jacob who was green and not feeling well that day (fine the next). My mom and Penny's mom were there too.The boys didn't eat as much pie or drink as much eggnog as they usually do, hmmm....don't think it's our cooking, Laura and I made some good pies.

We got to spend some time with the Cupp family. The kids have all changed just a little since last summer!

It was a full week and went quickly and we got way too little sleep, but glad the kids could come home!