Florida 2011

Early March was our annual trip to Florida for the family farm meeting.  It's a tough assignment, but someone's gotta do it:-).  Our kids stayed with Matthew & Alicia S. and had a little vacation of their own, including the Science Center and the City Museum.  Knowing they were in great hands, Shannon and I flew down to Florida for 4 days and were royally spoiled by his aunt and uncle, Ray & Jeanie H.  They gave us their condo to stay in and their car to use.  It's in a great location with many good restaurants nearby, on a golf course with multiple pools.  We had a great get-a-way and even enjoyed the one rainy day we had.  We used it as an excuse to shop and relax. 

 Our bedroom in the condo

 relaxing on the beach

 another beach shot

 Out for some great seafood at Pincher's Crab Shack

 Not to be outdone by the pictures of the other couples, Parker & Trav share a "moment".

 us

our balcony at the condo

Like Father - Like Son

For some reason, ever since my brother has lived here, our girls have loved to style his hair when he is over for a visit.  They have come up with some pretty "unique" looks for him and I SO regret that I don't have a photo to prove it.  As you can see, they are carrying on the tradition for his son - Liam.  We had him at our house last month for a day and the girls went right to work with him! 

Loving on Liam

A masterpiece in the making



Lena & Hattie work their magic



Uncle Toffee w/ his favorite stylist

Christmas Pictures

The cutest Santa EVER!! (Jeff & Bethany's Liam)

Tate (Dallas), Jordan (Madi's boyfriend) and Madi holding Tyler @ Haerr Christmas

My festive father in law

A typical site at our K- Christmas~ we stay 3 nights at a Stoney Creek Inn. No cooking or cleaning, just a lot of gabbing and snacks.

This is one of our favorite spots to sit and expound wisdom, just down the hall from most of our rooms and the pool.

Our get-together this year also included an ugly sweater contest, but I failed to get any photos.

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!!!

Rare Moments

This first pic really has nothing to do with the title. This is a shot of Hattie in her school's Christmas Jr. Singers concert. They did a wonderful program about the birth of Christ, which I am thankful for as they attend a public school.

Hattie and Lena both participated in a cheer clinic a couple weeks before Christmas. Check out Lena's eyes. She was in her element!

And here was what I was referring to in the title....

As a mom, I often feel like I am giving the same advice/instruction over and over and over and start to wonder if ANY of it is being retained. Then, every so often, my kids do or say something that makes it all worth it. Twice in the last couple of months, this happened and so I just had to capture them on the camera to go back to. Thank you Lord for moments like this!!

First, Abe posted this sign on our TV. He told me that both Grandma and Aunt Peg had done this and he thought we should have it on ours too.

Then, one day after Hattie had left for school, I found this note on my marker board. It totally made my day. What great advice!

Thanksgiving & Black Frightday Specials

I really like Thanksgiving. It is much of the great food of Christmas w/o the pressure and hassle of gifts. Since Shannon has been gone a lot, we decided that spending Thanksgiving close to home sounded great. So, after our morning service we headed to his dad & mom's. It was almost the whole family. The Wegs were in Iowa. It was a wonderful, relaxing day. I am overwhelmed by the endless list of reasons we have to be thankful!!

Grandma made the kids their own special table since they couldn't be at the adult table.

The matriarch at work.

The "grown-up" table

Mmmmmm!

Scrabble has become a tradition in the afternoon. We also played Clue and Dutch Blitz.

Well....I'm not really a black Friday kind of shopper, but leading up to the holiday, Shannon and I did some price research on a few items on our kids' wish lists and decided that it might be worth it to try it out this once. Let me just give you this advice: If you are going to play the game, you need to know the rules. We didn't. The Walmart flier advertised the desired specials to be available from 5-11am. So, being very savvy indivduals, we arranged for our kids to be overnight w/ cousins and grandparents and set our alarm for 3am. We figured that would give us time for a stop at Starbucks before hitting the jackpot.

First of all, the traffic in town at 4am was like a typical Saturday afternoon. There was a long line in the McD's drive thru and the Starbucks manager informed us that they had a line out the door at 2am, although they were not supposed to open until 2:30.

So...on to Walmart where the parking lot was packed. We headed to the back of the store where the desired items could be found. There were pallets of items in the middle of the aisles and long lines for certain ones. There were people EVERYWHERE!! I couldn't seem to find any of the 3 things we came for so I finally asked an employee who informed me that they sold out at 2:30. "I thought the special starts at 5," I said. Well here is where the "rule" part comes in. Turns out you can get in line at midnight to get an armband and THEN get in line, but w/o the armband, you are not getting the item. By this time, it was probably after 5 and Shannon and I looked at eachother like, "Why are we here?!" Feeling defeated and more than a little silly for our lack of preparation, we hit a few other stores and found very little before heading home. Somewhere along the line, I had heard that similar deals can be found online at the same time as they occur in the stores. Not willing to totally give up, I crawled back into bed w/ my laptop to give it one last shot. JACKPOT!!!!! Two of the three items were being sold for the ad's price online w/ no charge for shipping! The third item I found for a better price on another site! So...next year, I will have Shannon brew me some Starbucks and shop from bed. Thank you internet.

Hunting & Ho Ho Ho

Shannon and Abe started a "tradition" last year of going for an overnight camping/hunting trip during gun season. This year, they invited the girls to go along. (Abe actually created a treasure hunt where the slips of paper found spelled out the invitation.) Well, it was so sweet, we just had to say yes. Besides, I was feeling like getting in touch w/ my inner outdoorswoman! Well...dad and mom H. had already winterized their camper, so our only option was the slide-in, pick-up camper. We packed it up w/ hot dogs, chips, soda, candy and marshmallows and I told the kids to wear something warm, because we wouldn't be changing. The girls decided that the dogs needed to go along (on a hunting trip?! really?!) and their soft-hearted dad relented. So, away we went like Cousin Eddy and the family. We got to our spot (along the levee by the Mississippi River in one of the fields we farm) about sunset. We saw one deer driving in, but it's illegal to hunt from a vehicle, so on we went. Once we got to the site, Shannon quickly headed out with the girls for the last of the daylight while Abe and I got the fire going. They got back about a half hour later, having seen no deer but bursting w/ a surprise for us for later. After we dined on some fabulous roasted cuisine (ok, hot dogs) we took off on the four-wheeler (all five of us) and headed for the dam that crosses the river nearby (the surprise!). Because the water was down, we could walk out almost to the middle of the river on the spillway, which was pretty cool. By the time we got back, it seemed like it should be bedtime, but it was about 6:30. Forget the outdoorswoman!...where's the DVD player? We actually had brought one, but didn't have the right adapter to use it. So...what does any good camper do? Run to town for ice cream and purchase the adapter:-)!! Finally all 5 of us settled in to watch "Miracle on 34th Street". (Keep in mind that this camper has one double bed and a dinette that converts into a kind-of twin size bed. So all 5 of us plus 2 dogs settled in for the night. Notice I didn't mention sleep. Shannon was up almost every hour letting dogs in or out. Abe slept between Shannon and I on the "double" bed and the girls slept on the dinette. Shannon and I hardly slept at all. By 4:30am, Lena wanted to get into our bed as well, so I let her and curled up on the dinette w/ Hattie. Now by "curled up", we are not really talking about cozy and wonderful, I mean literally CURLED UP because I am taller than the dinette is long. Abe and Lena remained wide awake at that point wondering how soon they could go out hunting. Finally, by around 6, we gave up on any type of sustaining rest and Shannon and the kids polished off the powdered donuts and set out. The dogs took off as well....and surprise, surprise...they saw no deer. (Ya' think that had anything to do w/ two hyper dogs roaming the woods?) By the time they were back and we were ready to leave, the dogs were no where to be found and we were all at a serious nutritional deficit. So, back home we went to get ready for church! I guess "hunting" in this case meant hunting for memories, and if so, we hit the jackpot:-)!! (p.s. Shannon and the kids found the dogs later in the day, waiting for us at the camping spot.)

Our fantastic accommodations!

Around the campfire

The kids get it honestly; they were doomed from birth.

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And here are a couple of shots from our Christmas tree outing on Thanksgiving weekend. The farm we used to use closed down, so now we just head to Lowe's. Somehow it just doesn't seem right. I'm ready to give up and get a fake tree, but Shannon won't hear of it (yet).

Hattie, Madison, Lena, Abe

Shannon and I

Halloween/Harvest Party

This past weekend included school Halloween parties on Friday, our annual Fall Fundraiser at HIS Ranch on Saturday and our church's Harvest Party on Sunday. PHEW! It was very busy but tons of fun. I was too busy on Saturday to take photos, but here are a few of the other events.

Lena was Taylor Swift.

Hattie chose to be Kit Kittredge from the American Girl series.

Abe wanted to be a hot dog.

(Thankfully, ShopKo had just the thing.)

I helped with Abe's class party this time and these are from a bag of party favors they received.

Abe and his best friend, Johnie, checking out their candy stash at the Harvest Party

We fell exhausted into bed Sunday night, but not before I sneakily helped myself to some of the motherload:-)!!

The Past Month...

Matthew & Alicia's rehearsal dinner

Lena w/ her new BFF, Madison, at Old Thresher's in Shelbina (Kind. field trip)

Hattie & Lena w/ their AG dolls at the store in Chicago

The whole group of girls w/ their dolls

Hattie, me and Lena on Michigan Ave.
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Well...I am supposed to be doing my Pilates DVD right now so I thought it was a good time to post:-). The last month has been filled with tons of activity. We made a quick trip to NW Iowa for Labor Day weekend to watch Wil (my nephew) and Jon G. (Shannon's cousin) play college football for Northwestern College. Despite our van puking out at 11:30 at night one hour from our destination, it was still a great weekend (that's a whole other post).

Then, on Sept. 12, our close friend and HIS Ranch employee, Alicia Steffen, married Matthew Schrenk. It was a great weekend that culminated in Shannon giving them a ride from the reception in the cart behind our Clydesdale mare, Ruby. They are now at home in St. Louis and we miss her at the ranch SO much. (and not just because I have to muck stalls now!)

The following weekend, Hattie, Lena and I headed to Chicago on the train with my mom, Renee, Jane and 6 nieces for a day at the American Girl store. Oh my! We had a blast but decided that when we do it again, it will be with more a lot more caffeine.

The next Friday, my sister and her family arrived (Nelson & Mary). The kids played and we gabbed. Mary's birthday was the 21st so we celebrated.

On Monday, September 27...my wonderful husband turned 42! He was in the combine most of the day so the kids and I took the gator out to him and brought him food and treats to celebrate.

Finally...this past weekend, we traveled to Manhattan, KS for the wedding of our cousin, Brandon Knobloch, to Sharita Lacey. It was a beautiful wedding and the kids had a blast at the dance and in the hotel pool with some of their cousins that they don't get to see very often.

It is a crazy time of year with school activities, harvest, bow-hunting and general fall clean up/yard work, but I love it! There is just something about the cool fall temps that energizes me and makes me marvel at God's creation in a new way. So...if you are a busy mom today, take some time to sit down with a hot beverage, count your blessings and breath in the fall air (and of course, read this blog and marvel at it's fabulous content). And...the pilates are still waiting to be done so I had better add some photos to the post.

LENA (need I say more?)

My kids LOVE using the camera, especially the video option. Following is some of Lena's handiwork.

(Sorry, I tried to load a video, but couldn't get it to work.)

Everybody Loves Buddy

There is a sort of tradition in Shannon's family that states that if you have the audacity to miss the county fair auction, something can and will be purchased on your behalf with little to no consultation with you. For example...a few years back, my in-laws planned to be gone over that date and made the serious mistake of leaving us with their checkbook and the instruction to "buy something". Dad H. became the new owner of a $200 buck rabbit. (He has not missed an auction since to my knowledge.)

Well, last week we were invited to attend the Global Leadership Summit in Chicago, IL w/ our cousins, Randy & LaNae M. We knew it meant missing most of the fair, but shucks...what could we do. No sweaty corn dogs for us while watching livestock shows. So (gleefully) we packed up and took the train to Chicago and proceeded to have a fantastic time. The summit was SO well done, but that's another blog post.

So, fast forward to our return. Upon arriving back at home sweet home, we find out that we/HIS Ranch is now the proud owner of a goat. The kids have named him "Buddy" and he follows them around like a puppy. The other day, when the kids came in the house, he went to the window, placed his hooves on the windowsill and proceeded to bawl at them. It was hilarious. True to the stereotype, we are finding out that he will eat almost anything. The kids were outside painting this morning, and when I stepped out Abe said, "Mom! Buddy keeps eating the paint!" We are having a blast with this little guy and I just keep holding out hope that he will soon be trained to eat only the weeds in my long-neglected garden. sigh.

Lexi W., Abe & Lena painting

Buddy going back for seconds on the green paint

After I chased him away from the paint, he showed me by eating my flowers.

Vacations,etc. (cont'd)

More shots from our week in the Ozarks w/ my family......

Shannon w/ his 2 biggest girls

Abe practicing his sweet sand volleyball skills

My dad & mom w/ all of the grandkids

the original 8 siblings

Because of the heat/humidity, we usually were under this shelter by the pool if we weren't in the pool or in our a-c cabins.