Merry Christmas!

Christmas socks!

Tea for three! (Picture taken by Caleb.)

Memorial Day Picnic!

 Friends of ours have an annual Memorial Day picnic on their farm each spring. 

And they always come up with amazing group games! =D

 Stringing cheerios on a string with two members of the team blindfolded.

 The teams had to stand on one board and move the other in front, 

repeating this 5 times...without falling off...and they were timed! 

 Competition for who can start a fire and roast and eat a marshmallow the fastest! =D

True or False game! 

Mother's Day

Caleb and Ana came up for Mother's Day and took us all out to lunch at Granite City after church! 

The meal was delicious and we had such a nice day together! 

The best flat bread ever!

After lunch we went to the Gardens and took some pictures. This is where A&C had some of their wedding pictures taken and Amy and I took pictures of them in similar poses. It was good practice for an upcoming engagement shoot with a couple from church. =)

Sisters

Us kids with Mom! (Picture taken by Dad)

Christmas Gathering!

Christmas with Dad's family was extra fun this year - two of our cousins had had babies a couple days apart in November!  

It was such fun to meet Elizabeth and Olivia in person!  Such cuties!!

Great-grandma, grandma, mom, and baby!

Great-grandma, mom, and baby.....missed getting baby's grandma though.

Three cheers for 2016! =D

So much good food!

Grandma looking at books with some of her great-grandchildren.

Amy and Jade

No gathering is complete without a good card game!

New Years Eve!

We had our friend Michelle over for the evening, while Dad and Mom went to a New Years Eve event at church.
It was good to think back over the year together and the things we are thankful for, and the lessons we've learned. =)
We girls  made pizza together, played LIFE, and then watched a movie and some Sue Thomas FBEye shows. It was a fun evening!

Happy 2016!!!

Christmas Eve

 Caleb and Ana came up for Christmas Eve and stayed over for a couple days!  Ana was not feeling so well (she had pinkeye) so she stayed at our house, but the rest of us went to the Christmas Eve service at church.

 My favorite part is when we light our candles and sing Silent Night. =)

 When we got home we ate dinner and then opened gifts! 

Merry Christmas!!

An Exciting Afternoon, and a Christmas Program

Yesterday afternoon was definitely unusual, to say the least!!

Amy and I arrived at work to find CC (our boss) on the phone. That was not so unusual, but when she got off the phone she said that the mail had arrived and the carrier had given her a package.  She hadn't paid much attention to the box until the person left, since they were visiting.  But when she did look at it she noticed that it was from Israel, had a Arabic sounding name as the sender, and seemed to have been *held up in customs for a few months. There was a website on the box and she said all she could find out was that the site **sold military supplies.  It all seemed suspicious, so she left it outside and called the police to see what she should do with a potentially suspicious package.  (Another reason she was concerned was that they had been having mail stolen and wondered if someone was using their address....)

The police sent out a lady officer and she talked with CC and looked at the package. She said there seemed to be something liquid inside, so she did some checking in her vehicle and called out another officer.  This man came and asked CC more questions, (are you Jewish, have you been to Israel, do you have relatives there, etc). Both police officers were very nice. About then I had to leave to pick up "Baby Buttersnaps" and "Honey Ham" from school.  When I got back to the house there were the two patrol SUVs in the front driveway, plus a huge semi-like vehicle and another truck parked along the road, and firemen walking around in all their gear. Apparently they had sent out the bomb squad!

After a bit there was a knock on the front door from a few of the firemen.  They had opened the box and inside.......was a bottle of wine from Israel! There was an invoice and CC's brother had sent it as a Christmas gift, which was out of character for him, so she had never thought of it being from him. The wine is from Galilee and is made from the same kind of grapes used during King David's time.  So apparently it could be the same kind of wine he drank. One of the firemen had been stationed in Israel while in the military and said their wine was very good. 

All that suspense made for an exciting afternoon! =D

*Afterwards we realized that he box hadn't been held up in customs, the date was just written in the European order.=)

**Apparently the wrong website address!

All the way from Israel.

After all that excitement, we had dinner and then Amy and I took "Honey Ham" to her school Christmas program and saved seats for the rest of the family.  It was a nice program!

Worship Team Christmas Party!

 Matt, the worship pastor at church, hosted a gathering for the worship and tech teams at church this past Saturday.  

We had such a fun time!!  

 There was so much good food, fun games, and visiting!

My favorite game was where we had to split into groups of 4-5 people.  Then each team had 10 minutes to write a Christmas song and then perform it.  I was nervous about it at first, but it was such fun - and ended up being really funny as well!=D

Opening gifts. =)

My final gift - a large "thumbs-up" figure!  (Facebook in person!) Haha!

4th of July at the Lake!

The family Amy and I nanny for invited us up to their lake house for the 4th of July.  

We had such a fun day together!!

 Cooking sizzling bacon for the sandwiches!

My patriotic assistant!

 The colossal sandwiches we made for lunch.

It was fun to work in the kitchen together.

 "Honey Ham" and Dad playing tic-tac-toe!

Due to fires in Canada it was hazy out all day.  Which was nice since no one got a major sunburn!  We went tubing, swimming, played badminton, and I tried a paddle board for the first time which was great fun. =)

 The calm peaceful lake before the fireworks started.  

We went out on the boat and watched them from the water. =)

I love fireworks!

 Thanks to Mom for letting me use some of her cell phone pictures, (they are the ones without my watermark on them)!