Ten Years Ago Today...

Derek and I met bringing in the year 2000.

Derek had been invited to The Happenin's New Years' Eve party.  (The Happenin' was/is a non-denominational young adult Bible study...kind of like youth group for college age and beyond, and I was a regular.)

Yep.  We met.  I learned he was 19 and a sophomore at Penn State.  Hmm.  I was 23.   Doesn't sound promising, huh?

We spent the night playing volleyball, a game called Mafia, and eating.  That's what I remember.  I'm guessing that is all he would remember, too.  We talked little, but not much.

We didn't see one another again for about six months...

Happy 2010!  

Family Christmas

Great Grandpa and Grandma with Evan and Meghan
















Amy taught Meghan how to steal noses.
















Tetianna, Evan, Jadyn, Drevin, Amy, and Meghan. Yes, Evan is there!  (And yes, that is a lot of -n names.)
















Evan hanging out in the beautiful, old typewriter box. (We gave it to Amy. It was her favorite gift.)

Dragging...

Evan was dragging our library books around quite a bit.

These days he will do more than just eat books...but he still doesn't sit for a full book very often.  We try though.  We have several "touch and feel" books that he really likes.  I have even caught him reading in his crib!  We have learned the hard way that pop-up books are his favorite.  He likes to pop the pictures right off the page...riiipppp!

Morning Breakfast View

This has been our view recently while eating breakfast.  Unfortunately, after a bit, the sun is in M's eyes...and the blinds on our double doors go down.  It's still a nice winter scene.

(Photo taken from our back door....I really appreciate where we live.)

Brother and Sister

Evan adores Meghan.  Meghan tolerates Evan.  Sometimes she is friendly.  Sometimes she gives hugs and kisses (especially when he is going to go to bed and let her play).  It is not often that we see this.  It was picture-worthy.

In case you can't tell, we were traveling north to visit our families.  (We had a lovely time by the way.)  Notice the pile of coats and hats?  Well, Meghan noticed them, too, and decided to try out Daddy's hat and gloves.

She would not open her eyes for a picture.

Christmas Morning

Meghan certainly enjoyed digging in to her stocking.

Then she proceeded to open her gifts while sitting on the toy box with a full view of the rest of the family.

Evan had to be almost forced to open his gifts.  He just wanted to play with Mommy and Daddy's new water bottles.  Seriously.

For a man who doesn't like to wrap presents, I thought Derek did a fabulous job wrapping this!  I now have a canning pot so my water won't boil over when I can my applesauce.

We had a lovely morning with just the four of us.  Actually, the children even slept in until about 8 o'clock.  By mid-morning we determined that we needed to leave after lunch instead of after dinner to travel to northeastern PA due to freezing temperatures and rain.

Merry Christmas!

From our family to yours...Merry Christmas!  May you know how truly blessed you are this Christmas and always!

Love,
Derek, Annette, Meghan, and Evan















(Photo from Thanksgiving at my cousin Lynda's home.)
P.S. George Washington seems to be more popular than Columbus when it comes to Rudolf!  Columbus got a fair share of votes, too.  I (Annette) am the one who claims GW!

Help Us

Derek and I do not always agree.  As we teach our children things that are important (and not so important) to us, we have come to a problem.  We do not agree about who Rudulph goes down in history like.

You know the song...
You know Dasher and Dancer
And Prancer and Vixen,
Comet and Cupid
And Donner and Blitzen.
But do you recall
The most famous reindeer of all?


Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer
(reindeer)
Had a very shiny nose
(like a light bulb)
And if you ever saw it
(saw it)
You would even say it glows
(like a flash light)
All of the other reindeer
(reindeer)
Used to laugh and call him names
(like Pinochio)
They never let poor Rudolph
(Rudolph)
Play in any reindeer games
(like Monopoly)


Then one foggy Christmas Eve
Santa came to say
(Ho Ho Ho)
Rudolph with your nose so bright
Won't you guide my sleigh tonight?
Then all the reindeer loved him
(loved him)
And they shouted out with glee
(yippee)
"Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer
(reindeer)
You'll go down in history!"
(like ???????????????????)

Would you please tell us who you think Rudolph goes down in history as?  One of grew up singing Columbus, the other grew up singing George Washington.  Even if you have never left a comment before, it's simple.  Just click the word "comments" below.  Please!

(I fear that I am wrong...I usually am when I disagree with Derek.  And that all of NEB Class of 1994 were taught wrong.  How in the world does a song get changed, anyway? Who knows, maybe it's because he is nearly four years younger than me and grew up an hour from me.)

Thanks for your help!

Sledding Fun

Like most people on the East Coast, we were hit with some good snow beginning late Friday night.  During Evan's morning nap, Derek and Meghan went sledding.  Meghan came in happy, but with a red face!

Derek also used the snow blower twice on Saturday and again early on Sunday morning.  I am happy to tell you I shoveled the sidewalk after the kids went to bed last night while Derek worked on the driveway.  Some of the snow was to my knees.

With church canceled we had a nice, quiet Sunday at home.

Evan was waiting.  His boots are a bit big, so he couldn't walk, even in the house.

Yes, we like blue.  Most of Meghan's blues are pretty feminine though, I think.  (We purposely wanted neutral snow pants and boots though.)

Can you tell there are three people on this sled?

At this angle, the driveway looks really long!

Evan and I took a quick ride down the driveway, too.

Derek and I have been married for 6 1/2 years, and this will be our first white Christmas at our own home.

Our local school and Meghan's have a two hour delay, which means she is home for the day with no preschool.  I am hoping she's back to school tomorrow so I can run some errands without two children with me.

Christmas Drive Through

We live pretty close to the Herr's Factory.  If you are not  familiar with Herr's they make snacks like potato chips and pretzels.  Friday night we took the driving tour.  (We have yet to go through their factory tour, even though it's free.)

Each Thanksgiving Eve they turn on their incredible Christmas light display.  It is on every evening until January 1, from my understanding.  It's lovely, and must take an incredible amount of work!  We've been told that they do leave some of the lights up year round.  These pictures are a tiny fraction of their display.

The pictures are a bit blurry, but I think you get the idea...so I posted them anyway.  They were taken in the car, and there was certainly some pressure for me to be quick, though cars were not usually behind us.

Cheesey

These are the faces that Evan now makes when the camera is pointed anywhere near him.

What??  You think my hair-do is cheesey too?  You can bring that up to a little girl who tried to give me a ponytail.  When it didn't work, her dad (oh-so-painfully) helped her! 

Posting that picture just confirms 1.) I can laugh at myself.  2.)  I love my daughter!

(Evan has been doing really well with a sippy cup in the past week.  More goes in than gets spit out now, so he is being weaned from the bottle, though it is slowly.)

Sock Puppets

It was a long trip to Grandpa's funeral...we were detoured through downtown Reading (no fun, but fairly simple).  We were thankful for our road atlas.  The temperature was between 32 and 39 throughout the ride with rain falling.

The rain put the kids to sleep for a while.  Upon awakening, Meghan decided  it was time for a puppet show.

Yes, the socks came from her feet.

This is the face Evan makes when the camera comes out now.  He is such a ham.  (Oh, we don't keep a bib on him all the time now, but after he was sick in the car when we traveled at Thanksgiving, we thought it'd be safe.)













The only icy road was when we turned on the road where Derek's parents live.  It is a dirt road and was covered in a solid sheet of ice...no cinders or salt had touched it.  We went a short distance up the hill when Derek knew we wouldn't make it.  We backed down the road and took the long way around.

We've just spent the weekend less than 24 hours with Derek's family. His Grandpa W. passed away Friday, and we traveled north to be with the family for the viewing and the funeral.

This is Grandpa at Thanksgiving with Evan and Arden.

















Grandpa was 91.  It's still hard though.

Annette and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Actually the title is a misnomer. It was a tough and long morning, but really, my day wasn't awful. (The title comes from a children's book, in case you didn't recognize it.)

When I came downstairs the refrigerator had water under it. The water had spread all the way to the island...and under it. When I called Derek, he was able to instruct me in turning off the line of water to the fridge. Whew. All of my kitchen towels were used to clean, and I thought I was done dealing with water for the day.

After seeing Meghan get on the bus, I picked Evan up and learned that the bottle he'd been drinking in the stroller had been leaking the whole time. He had milk up and down himself.

Upon cleaning Evan and getting his clothes and mine changed, he was finishing breakfast in the high chair. I thought I heard water. It sounded like a stream.

So I went to the basement to see quite the sight. Where our well water comes into our basement water was gushing in. Gushing might be a slightly strong word. According to the buckets that I filled which caught about 2/3 of the water, I was emptying 3-4 gallons of water every 10-13 minutes. I only had to move a couple of items (which is amazing in our unorganized-stuff-thrown-everywhere-in-piles-basement).

That was all I could do since I have a teething child with a cold who was really, really miserable. I decided a bath was in order to waste some time while getting crusted boogies out of his hair and off his face while giving him something he might enjoy. Thankfully it worked even though the basement was ignored.

Once he was down for his morning nap, I got right to work. Derek suggested that I remove the sump-pump cover, so I did. Then the water could (mostly) go right into that. I also took the pipe for the sub-pump outside and attached it. (As far as we know today is the first time it ran. Our water table is extremely deep.)

Thankfully, I got all of that done before Evan, in all his misery, awoke. He was extremely unhappy until he awoke from his afternoon nap, but we got through okay. By the afternoon water had stopped pouring into the basement.

In case you are wondering, it has to be fixed from the outside when the ground is not so wet.

So really, it could have been much, much worse. At least our basement is unfinished and nothing was damaged. It may have been a rough morning but at least this is all that happened.

Santa

Our little town had a Downtown Country Christmas on Friday night. The lighting of the tree was disappointing (for me), but there were carriage rides (I think most were Amish) that we didn't take, Santa Claus at the local bank (warm inside), and businesses were open late. Some free items were handed out, like jingle bells.

We started off in the double stroller, only to take it back to the car. There just wasn't enough room to get around with it. Meghan did a good job of holding our hands. Sometimes she refuses.

These are the same Mr. and Mrs. Claus we saw last year at a different location. Once again, Meghan chose Mrs. Claus to sit on. She wouldn't even talk to Santa.

The next day when I asked Meghan about who we saw the night before, her focus was not on Santa. She was thinking about seeing Ashley, her former SLP. The best part is Ashley is visiting (okay, babysitting) Friday for us! I wonder how Meghan will like sharing Ashley. Hmm.

The kids are still enjoying their jingle bells.

Correction

Derek reminded me that Meghan said, "Best I ever had, Mom." (No "the.") It's still a great sentence for her with a great variety of words. And we are still thrilled, even if my cooking is still mediocre, despite her lovely compliment. If you are confused, you can read the original post here. We are continually thankful for all of her speech progress. I need to do a real update soon to tell you some other new things that she is saying.

A Compliment

Saturday I wasn't really allowed in the kitchen much due to Derek painting it. (Oh, yes, pictures to come!) So I quickly made a batch of ziti for dinner. The pasta and meat were cooked and cheeses added to it when I learned I didn't have any pasta sauce. I searched and came up with pizza sauce (though I now make homemade) and tomato paste. I combined the two and called it good enough.

The ziti tasted different, but good. Derek told me so, then Meghan said, "The best I ever had, Mom."

We have no idea where she heard that phrase before, but we were pleasantly surprised that she said it...and glad she ate her dinner happily. She repeated the phrase several times, also saying "Dad" instead of "Mom." Wow! What a great sentence for Meghan!

My First Snowman

While Derek was painting the kitchen, it was snowing. Yea! Since we moved to southern PA, we especially appreciate four distinct seasons. We tend to have fairly mild winters without tons of snow, so snow in early December was refreshing.

I woke Meghan up early from her nap. It took a while, but we finally got ready. Since Derek couldn't tend to Evan or play in the snow with us, we let Evan nap longer.

Though it appears that we were outside for hours, we were outside for about half an hour.

The carrot never got to be a nose. Meghan ate it. Unwashed. Unpeeled. Yum. We used raisins as eyes, and other than that, they didn't want to stay. (I didn't want buttons to be left outside.)

Meghan was thrilled with the snowman experience, yet ready to go inside despite the fun. The snow was really wet, so we were fairly chilly, though it was about 30 degrees.

Not bad for MY first snowman, I think. Yep, that's right. I have no memory of ever making a snowman. Yes, you can call me deprived, though I'm sure it was by choice. Though I enjoy being outside, I get cold easily.

Added later: My dad told me I used to make snowmen. I guess I just don't remember.

Finale!

Today Derek completed his semester! Yea! We now have several weeks of our evenings as a family.

Not only that, tonight the series finale of Monk is on! Woo-hoo! We will learn lots, I'm sure. I'm even tempted to stay up late and watch it instead of recording it. By the way, "late" is until 10 PM.

If you've never watched Monk, it's a pretty clean detective show on USA. We like it enough that we own each season on DVD. We highly recommend it.

New Camera!

So we got our new camera! Ours died on Meghan's birthday...in mid-October. Since then, Derek's mom had loaned us hers. I spent a lot of time reading reviews. After I had narrowed it down to this one, I found out it was a Consumer Reports' Best Buy. I hope we are not disappointed!

(Evan was picture happy; Meghan was not. These photos are not edited and the one of Meghan was without the flash.)
























So we still have lots of learning for the camera, but so far we are quite pleased. It's always takes some time to learn a new camera, but hopefully we will like the results.

Why...

This is why I wear petite pants.


















My sister, Amy, gave me some jeans and slacks that didn't fit her any more. I am the shortest, by far, of my siblings. My brother is over 6 feet...and I am just 5 foot, 1/2 inch. (I suppose I should explain that my brother is actually my half-brother, but still...)

I guess I have some hemming to do!

Getting Better

If only Evan would give himself his medicine. He still fights it. (Last night Derek was upstairs doing schoolwork, and he knew I'd given him the medicine since he could hear the crying.) We can say it is improving though. Some days he doesn't cry at all.