Celebrating Three

February 28, 2016 | Stacy

We’ve had the joy of celebrating third birthdays now for six children. Every birthday for every child is special. I grew up having MY birthday celebrated each year with our extended family and friends. Although there is usually a good deal of work involved in throwing a party, I’m never tempted to ignore their special event. The kids look forward to the fellowship. And the cake?

Soup, chili, salad, bread. It was yum on a dry, but chilly day.

Johanna had a lot to say to Mrs. Mrs. Fuhrman.

Katriel enjoyed her gifts. Well, maybe not the clothes that much. Somewhere in the last five kids I stopped worrying about how my little ones respond to gifts of clothes. People get it.

She got into “reading” the cards, as well.

A Bob and Larry cake. I *think* all six kids have had this at least once.

Tabby and Poppy.

No more babies in our house. Yup. It makes me tear up. I’ve been SO tremendously blessed.

Our Katriel is THREE!

February 24, 2016 | Stacy

It’s been extremely busy around here. But we know how to slow down (mostly) and enjoy a birthday!
As we were planning Katriel’s birthday, we determined she’d like a Bob and Larry cake. Then days before she said she’d like an Elsa and Anna cake. I did not have the time for an Elsa and Anna cake for her party, and I somehow convinced her that cupcakes would be the perfect thing for her actual birthday. She told me she wanted yellow and I could make that happen. Then. When I was at Walmart (I’m always at Walmart) I saw Elsa and Anna cupcake papers and decorations. Woo hoo. I could meet her request! Sort of. Hanny and Tabby helped me make her cupcakes the night before. Our family tradition is to wake up the birthday child with a song. Katriel had other ideas and was the first one up that morning! We hung out downstairs until it was time for the other kids to get up. I’m not even sure we sang. We had a yummy breakfast of strawberries, yogurt and Cinnamon buns before we headed to CBS. We stopped for a photo before we left. She wore her new bunny dress. She loves bunnies. When Nan came in the morning, she brought Katriel a Figaro book and a new Taggie. I had my camera at CBS for other purposes, but I did peek in her class to see her. The big kids had skating and then we all skipped our Wednesday evening activities so that we could celebrate our little girl. Nan and Nene picked up the pizza on their way over. And then some gifts. Puzzles from Mom and Dad. Johanna made her a telescope. And wrapped up her Figaro and gave it to Katriel. She got some clothes and more puzzles and then she opened some Playmags that the whole family found favor with. Then cake. There is always cake. My sweet baby. How did she ever get to be this big!?
She’s self-confident, and a little bit bold. She has such a BIG personality.

Haircut for Hanny

February 23, 2016 | Stacy

We’ve been busy. Painfully busy. Scheduled-down-to-the-minute busy. And Hanny hasn’t had a hair cut in 15 months. Oops.

We FINALLY had a small window of time to head to Walmart. It worked out great because my favorite stylist was there. This lady, Kathy, is lovely. She is 66 years old and works hard hours on her feet. She does a solidly great job on the kids’ hair and I like to give her our business.

Johanna is a talker. She is like a huge dose of sunshine in a small package. She’s not quite the dynamo Marie was at that age, but she equals how friendly Marie was. Johanna told Kathy all about Katriel’s birthday coming up, and how she helped frost cupcakes and how she has CBS in the morning, and, and, and…

She got about 4-5 inches taken off.

Nigel’s turn

February 22, 2016 | Stacy

How could hunks of metal make him look so much older???

A sledding some would go…

February 19, 2016 | Stacy

We haven’t had much snow this year (PTL!!!) but when we did timed out just right in our busy schedules. The youngest two had a planned afternoon with Nan, so I offered the oldest four a trip to the hill at the high school. Tabitha decided she’d rather hang with Nan, so Stewart, Nigel, and Marie gave their snowboards a test drive. The hill is big and it was a little harder than they’d expected.

I, of course, observed from the car. I ventured out on occasion to catch an image with my zoomy-zoom lens.

Thanksgiving dinner in February!

February 16, 2016 | Stacy

As I write this on March 12th, we have had only one legitimate storm this winter. It came on Tuesday, February 16th and dumped a mountain of snow in 16 hours. While it didn’t occur to me to take a single picture of the storm (because it’s snow and it wasn’t a record) I DID take a photo of our dinner. When we pulled our turkey out of the freezer to thaw on Saturday we had no idea how wonderful the timing would be for our FEAST!

I diced veggies between language lessons and simmer between math classes.

The house smelled heavenly as this

turned into this.

Marie made a pie.

And Tabitha helped peel potatoes.

The storm was a contender. I went out at 7:30 A.M. to snow blow for about 40 minutes. Later, around 2 P.M. the older three rotated in helping me as we spent another 90 minutes clearing it again. It was the heavy, wet stuff, and it took a lot of effort to move.

At 4 P.M. our neighbor knocked on the door asking for help dislodging his tractor that had gotten stuck as he tried to plow. Stewart had JUST asked me to teach him how to use the snowblower an hour or two ago, so he was ready to help. Nigel grabbed a shovel and worked with Dave and his wife, Judy, to free their John Deere.

John left work early and was pleasantly surprised to find his commute home was not painful. He couldn’t get his car through the part of the private drive that connected our drive to the main road, so he and the boys worked at moving that snow.

And then …..