Busch Gardens or Bust

July 4, 2021 | Stacy

John left for SC June 20 for his first day of work June 21. The kids and I have been working towards the movers coming (soon?).

With the holiday weekend between John’s start date and the movers coming, we knew we’d need to be creative to make the holiday feel holiday-ish. Our pool is closed bc there was no way I was going to deal with that in John’s absence. It would be extremely hard on John to come all the way back to NY.

Our decision was to meet John in Williamsburg, VA for a very quick long weekend. Once we found the location, we decided to do a day at Busch Gardens Williamsburg. The kids have never been there and John and I were last there on our honeymoon in 1997.

The tickets were $79 per person for one day or $86 per person for two day. It only took a minute to decide it was well worth the $7 per person to add the partial day we were going to be there.

The kids and I were up long before the sun and on the road before 6AM. I’d like to say we made great time, but that would be a lie. There were way too many bathroom stops, a turn around or two (looking for bathrooms) and the DC traffic.

But we did get to our (dumpy) hotel by 4PM and dropped off our stuff and hurried to the park.

We rode the tram in and it actually felt like VACATION. A glorious feeling after being locked down so long.

We rode what we could, and grabbed a great dinner.
Staffing was a major issue (like it is everywhere these days).
But everyone was friendly and there were no mask requirements.

Stewart, Katriel and I skipped one of the roller coasters and found spots for fireworks, which while they weren’t Disney quality, sure were a lot of fun.

Another Covid Easter….

April 4, 2021 | Stacy

But this one is better than last year!

We were up EARLY for a sunrise service at the park.

Then home for some basket hunting.

When the kids heard John and I hadn’t planned for an Easter egg hunt, Katriel decided to take matters into her own hands and she took some eggs she found and her own candy and hid some eggs for her siblings.

Mama got one too.

She worked HARD to hide them. Daddy found his in the mulch!

As we are trying to eat all the things in our freezer, we decided we’d have turkey instead of our usual ham, and we went with some sausage stuffing and a pasta dish for sides. It was incredible.

Daddy helped Katriel work on two-wheel bicycling.

Tabitha made our amazing dessert.

Stewart wasn’t allowed to come home… stupid covid. No overnights away from campus and just too much driving for one day. So he went with Noelle and her family for their Easter celebrating. He is so handsome.

Egg-stra special

April 3, 2021 | Stacy

Busy = fun, right?

After some fun playdates in the morning, we headed over to church for a special event. The girls decorated eggs for a contest.

Johanna got first place for her age group.

Johanna’s egg had people from the New Testament.

Katriel’s flower was made up of her foot traced. She picked the scripture, “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path,” and she wrote it herself. It was lovely.

Marie and Tab got ribbons, as well.

Marie’s had Pooh and friends flying a kite.

Tab did a lovely Noah’s ark.

There was also chalking and popcorn and church family we hadn’t seen in ForEvEr.

Katriel didn’t get a ribbon – since I had “helped” her a little, her egg was placed in a different “family” category.

2020 Christmas… uncancelable

December 26, 2020 | Stacy

While our Christmas Eve service was cancelled, there was no stopping us for Christmas Day… and we determined to enjoy it.

The kids were up early and we waited for Stewart and Noelle to arrive (he had gone out to her town for Christmas Eve).

Ba and Poppy weren’t feeling up to the AM outing this year and we missed them.

Gifting was insane, as usual.

Tab had beautiful homemade art work for each of us.

this is mine, from our epic Disney Trip last year.

Kelly wrapped Katriel’s gift in a chip box and we momentarily had Katriel convinced she had a giant box of chips. Her acceptance level for that was beautiful.

She really had a Jessie outfit.

Daddy bought Marie, Tab and I all bags.

Loungefly bags

Daddy got the best gift of all – Costa Rican coffee.

Nan got the largest gift of all…

She had asked for it!!

Katriel made Johanna a shirt.

Mom “made” the boys each new shirts.

Tabby wanted girly combat boots.

Nigel got a computer chair.

Stewart got a desk extension.

He later showed us how it worked – he can stand and edit now to change his body mechanics.

there were games and cooking

and at 4PM or so, Noelle’s parents and brother came up to share dinner with us.

Noelle gave us two new games and we watched the instructions online.

We laughed so hard as we pretended to be dinosaurs, etc.

It was such a fabulous holiday!

July 4, 2020 (A/K/A People Make Me Happy)

July 5, 2020 | Stacy

First – I want to show the cake Tabby made on 7/3… The silly cake crumbled under her frosting efforts. So we HAD NO CHOICE but to eat the cake and make a new one.

July 4th was warm and wonderful.
We did some errands and took care of some yard work and prepared for GUESTS!

OH yes – 2020 – hear that? GUESTS. HUMANS. FELLOWSHIP. FRIENDS.

And then it was so much fun having people around, I didn’t take many photos.

Jeff and William joined us and we realized it was the first time Stewart and Jeff were able to talk in over a year!!

Oh – and there was FOOD too. Lots of yummy food.

We were joined by Stewart’s girlfriend, Noelle, and her family. It was lovely to get to know the Nortons.

Noelle had a thoughtful gift and a funny card.

Cake number 2.

Land of the free, home of the brave and NO MASKS at my house…

A Very Lockdown Easter

April 12, 2020 | Stacy

Here we are – Easter.
It looks pretty normal this time of day.

Kids looking for baskets.

The three that are awake, anyway…

We had a LOT of good things to eat, including Empty Tomb Rolls.

The other kids woke in time to join us for worship in the basement. Later, Nan and Nene broke our four weeks of no contact to join us for egg hunt and dinner.

Since we’d had a few ham dinners over the winter we opted for something different.

Salt potatoes proved hard to find as grocery stores are unpredictable during this time.

We enjoyed dessert before I took a photo!

And we play some games.

Every aspect of our lives looks a little different in light of this government lockdown. Thankfully, God remains the same, yesterday, today and forever.

Palm Sunday and a Daddy Treat

April 5, 2020 | Stacy

No church for Palm Sunday.
This lockdown stuff pretty much stinks.

Thankfully, Daddy had it in him to head all the way up to Rochester to get us a special treat.

He waited in line at Ridge Donuts for a beautiful Do-It-Yourself box.

He also had a big box of completed donuts. It turned out no one was arguing over the last DIY one, so Mama ended up with TWO.

This is my first glorious concoction…

And my second later in the day.

Goodbye 2019

December 31, 2019 | Stacy

It really was a pretty nice year.

And the weather on this last day of the decade was hard to argue with.

Five of us decided to dress appropriately and walked through a trail not to far from our house.

This is not a very Butler thing to do. But it was a lot of fun.

Muddy. But wonderful.

After dinner we had lots of yummy foods.

Deep friend Oreos…

Pork Rib BBQ.

We watched “Kung Fu Panda,” “101 Dalmatians – Live Action,” and then the little girls went to bed.

And so this is Christmas–2019

December 26, 2019 | Stacy

Love this photo from Hobby Lobby.

Everything else about this day is just extra.

The sunrise was elegant. I can’t wait for the day when the skies will be rolled back like a scroll. Almost everyday I wonder if today might be the day.

Until that time, we will press forward. I enjoy doing life with this crew and experiencing the “extra.”

Some of us wore our shirts from MVMCP.

We started our morning with the kids sharing some of their gifts with us. Tabitha made fudge with Nan, and Katriel made us all some crafts.

She was VERY excited about the gift she made Nigel.

She made him a coloring book about the Grinch.

Johanna is always very subdued….
Or not.

Miss Mary at church made this for Johanna. She pulled Johanna’s name as a child to pray for and she has gone out of her way to make Johanna feel special.