December

What a month!!  It was full of a variety of activities.

Our month started with Kimball's elbow surgery.  He had an anterior transposition of his right ulnar nerve.  Basically he had his ulnar nerve (funny bone) moved into the muscle of his arm. The surgery went well and he did great!  He was on pain medication for five days which wasn't too bad.

This is what Kimball's bandaged arm looked like.

Kimball had his bandage removed after 12 days.  His incision looks great and I'm jealous that his scar looks so good.  Mine did not look as nice after my elbow surgery.  He has a lot of bruising, but that will go away.  The surgical outcome...he feels great!  He can tell already that he is much stronger and doesn't have anymore nerve pain.  He is eager to get the next surgery scheduled so he can feel the same relief in his left arm.  Kimball's elbow is healing nicely.  Picture one is 2 weeks post surgery.  Picture 2 is 3 weeks post surgery.    Kimball has commented so many times how happy he is to have had the surgery.

We are trying to celebrate some of the Dutch holidays that Kimball experienced last year.  Sinterklaas came the night of December 5th. I loved that Kimball put out his Frisian clogs.  I made everyone a chocolate letter--initial of their first name-- and bought some Dutch cookies from Aldi.

Lincoln and Annika had a band concert and Joseph had a orchestra concert.  I didn't get any pictures of Joseph at his concert.  We had driven to the concert in a snowstorm so all of my mental energy was on keeping us alive.  He didn't think we would attend the concert because of the weather and he was VERY surprised when he saw us after the concert. 

Middle School Chorus Concert for Annika.

Third Grade holiday celebrations.  Eden's grade did an international study where each student picked a different country to research.  To finalize the unit they had a celebration where they brought in a food from each country.  Eden researched Poland and she took in perogies.

Piano Recital for Rebecah and Annika

Rebecah's piano teacher happens to be our neighbor and great friend!  My kids play with her girls all of the time.  It's nice having a close piano teacher so Rebecah can continue with piano lessons.

Christmas Eve

We did our usual Christmas Eve traditions.  We decorated gingerbread houses and went to the Lutheran Christmas Eve service where Joseph played his violin.  In the evening we ate our traditional meal and watch A Christmas Carol, read Luke 2 and the kids opened their present from Grandma Bev and one from me.

What a great group!  I'm so glad Kimball is with us this year.  If things go as he planed, he'll be in Belgium next year, and he just plans to visit his host families in the Netherlands for Christmas next year.  I tried to soak up every moment of having all five of my kids together this year.

Ready for Christmas morning!

Joseph was on call Christmas Day.  The original plan was to get up and have Christmas morning at 7:30.  About 7:15 Joseph told me he needed to leave soon for a surgery so I quickly woke everyone up, except for Lincoln, who was already wake, so they could see what Santa brought before Joseph left.  We ended up having time for one round of presents before Joseph left so I made sure the younger kids had something to do while Joseph was gone.

Lincoln got a Lego set from Santa so he built that while Joseph was at work.  Eden did some reading and Annika colored.  When the kids were "bored" they watched a movie and then we started a game of Clue, which Lincoln got for Christmas. 

Joseph got home about 1:30.  While the turkey rested and the potatoes cooked we did a few rounds of presents.  After we ate and cleaned up we finished opening presents.

In the evening we played games that we had gotten for Christmas.  I can honestly say that this year was one of our best Christmases ever!!  Everyone loved spreading present opening out throughout the entire day.  Since we don't have family around to spend time with it helped our day feel more special celebrating this way.  We all agreed to do a gradual opening again next year.  Merry Christmas!

Our New Year's Eve was fairly calm.  I made appetizer foods and we watched a movie while we ate.  I think we played a game and everyone was in bed before midnight!  

We have gotten a LOT of snow already this winter season.  As of January 2, our snowfall total is 80.7  inches and our normal average is 42.7 inches.

November

This month has been really relaxing.  It's the calm between the busyness of October and December.  

Kimball turned 18 in August, so he was eligible to vote for the first time.

Kimball got his driver's license this month!  We put his license on hold while since he was in the Netherlands for a year and we didn't want to pay for car insurance when he wouldn't be driving.  It is nice that he can now drive to work and occasionally to school.  He does miss the one-on-one time with me when I would drive him around because we have great talks together.  In NY state you don't know if you pass your test right away.  They post the results in the evening so there was no fun photo op.  We still cheered for him!

We took the Primary Valiant activity group ice skating.  My kids had a lot of fun.

Thanksgiving Break

The kids had three days off school for Thanksgiving.  They loved every minute of their break!  Kimball worked five days in a row, including a 6 1/2 hour shift on Thanksgiving.  We had a nice Thanksgiving meal.  It was great having Kimball home with us this year since he was in the Netherlands last year.  It's sad for me to think that he'll be gone next year, too.  

We went bowling in the evening on Thanksgiving.  It was a lot of fun.  I had my best game of bowling ever with a score of 144 and FIVE strikes!  

Other fun activities from our break: 

Rebecah and I went Black Friday shopping 

Joseph took Kimball, Rebecah and Lincoln to a golf simulator

Decorating for Christmas

Watching movies and 

Ten inches of snow!

October

 October was a busy month!  

Joseph's parents came to visit us for five days toward the beginning of the month.  We had a lot of fun with them and they were here to help celebrate my birthday and Eden's birthday.

Joseph and I met them at the Palmyra temple and we enjoyed a nice sealing session together.  We had lunch at a cafe in Palmyra and it was a really nice day.

Joseph and his parents hiked to a waterfall.

We took family pictures...

This was just a fun candid shot as we tried to stay warm, but it turned out really cute!

There wasn't a lot to say about my birthday.  It was great.  We took family pictures, we ate delicious food.  I didn't have to make my own treat this year, so that was a bonus! For my birthday I asked for a pickleball set.  I was quickly opening presents before rushing off to soccer practice with Lincoln and Annika.  When I saw the pickleball set we spontaneously decided to play pickleball during their soccer practice.  It was a lot of fun.  I think we will enjoy playing this as a family.

Fall Festival at Critz Farms.

This outing was a lot of fun.  We hadn't been to this farm for their 

fall festival and it was worth the drive.  

Corn maze

Wagon ride to the pumpkin field. 

Celebrating Eden's 9th birthday.

Eden's birthday was on a Sunday.  It was also our first Primary Program practice so I was a little busier than usual with meetings before church and extra things after church.  She still had her special breakfast--cheese danish--and a special dinner.  She asked for a crustless quiche.  

Where has my baby gone?!  I can't believe Eden is NINE!  She is such 

a joy in our home and I love that she is still so snuggly!

For dessert Eden asked if she HAD to have a cake and I told her I would make her anything she wanted.  She requested a marbled peanut butter bark.  The bark is white chocolate and peanut butter melted together and then you take melt semisweet chocolate and marble that into the peanut butter chocolate before it sets.  It's yummy!

Grandma and Grandpa's last day with us was Columbus Day and the kids were off school.  It was raining outside so we decided to go bowling.  Grandpa and Kimball were with us, but they missed the picture.

We had so much fun with our parents/grandparents visiting.  We missed them when 

they left and we appreciated them making the drive to visit us.

Celebrating Lincoln and Annika's 11th birthday.

I can't believe Lincoln and Annika are eleven!  It seems like they should still be toddlers, but they are pre-teens!

Lincoln and Annika both requested very time consuming treats this year.  Lincoln's brownie bombe is a frozen dessert so I could make that a few days before and stick it in the freezer.  I just like them having individual desserts instead of sharing one cake.  They enjoyed their birthday; Lincoln was especially excited.  We rushed off to Eden's soccer practice and Lincoln and Annika both came because Eden's coach had invited them to play in the parent scrimmage against Eden's team.  They had a lot of fun.

We have come to the end of the soccer season.  The season was great this year.  Some seasons feel really long and we are either sitting through miserably hot or cold games, but this year we had very few of either.  The kids all progressed as players and love soccer.  Our weeknights are a little calmer now and our Saturdays are no longer filled with games and there are pros and cons to both.

Halloween Fun

Halloween is always an after thought for me after celebrating four birthdays.

Elementary School Trunk or Treat

Eden was excited to see some of her friends at the school party.

Costume parade at the elementary school.

I completely forgot to take pictures before I took the kids trick-or-treating.  It was raining and I was more concerned with staying dry and warm!  The kids were determined and we made it to a lot of houses, but after we finished the small 1/2 mile loop in our neighborhood they were ready to head home.  We were all wet!

School is going well for everyone. Somedays the kids have a lot of homework and other days not so much.

Kimball finished his six weeks of physical therapy.  He knew the therapy wasn't working, but had to show the insurance company that we tried other methods before surgery.  Kimball will now have two elbow surgeries to move the ulnar nerve out of the cubital tunnel and burying it into the muscle.  We hope this will help with the daily nerve pain and numbness that he experiences.  He isn't exactly looking forward to having two surgeries in 3-4 months, but he is looking forward to having a better quality of life.  His first surgery is scheduled for December 1.  No one knows why an otherwise healthy 18 year old is suffering with ulnar nerves slipping out of the cubital tunnel, but the doctor is afraid that the constant rubbing of the nerve over the elbow bone will eventually cause nerve damage.

We had our Primary Program on Sunday, October 26. The program went so well.  I was so proud of all of the kids.  They all said their parts and sang nicely.  There were a few kids who I thought might be too shy to speak, but my prayers were answered and it was perfect.  We had our second annual art gallery after church where we displayed art work that the kids had created about the Doctrine and Covenants.  The adults were very complimentary of the children's art work.  We had a cookie buffet and that was a hit, too. I received a lot of compliments on my chocolate-dipped heath bit cookies.  

Here were some of my favorite drawings that my kids did: