First 1/2 of December

Derian is now 14!  Where does the time go? I wonder sometimes. She asked for a pull over sweatshirt and though we shopped quite a while for one we just couldn't find a nice one.
So we did the next best thing ... Goodwill.

As Derian opened her gift from us she said "Oh, a funny sweatshirt" and then she quickly tried to say "Thank You. Not funny Tina!" and put it back in the sack.  Only her parents knew that we purposefully got her the ugliest pull over we could find for a 14 year old so they both told her, "You must try it on Derian, it's only polite."

Kudo's to Derian as not many kids would put this on while their family and friends were standing all around.  She is a GREAT sport!  Derian told me later, "I'm going to get you back Aunt Tina."  I look forward to it too.

Derian's basketball team did very well this year and it was great to see how much she improved over last year.

Her awareness of where the ball was, her players and generally the whole court was fun to watch.

IT'S STARTED?!

Yes, Cole and his first "sport's" poster.

 Yeah, he watches volleyball...sure.

(He had no idea why I took this picture.  I'll get a lecture later I'm sure)

Zentangle

Jo's teacher at school started having the kids do this relaxation technique where they just randomly draw within a square.

I LOVE THIS!  I told Jo that people pay money for greeting cards that look like this.  I'm hoping she continues to draw and create.

Gingerbread Houses

Ms. Swift came for dinner and to help the kids build their ginger bread houses that Aunt Tricia gave them.

Fun was had by all and many candies were eaten during construction.

They could hardly wait to eat it.

I wouldn't think it would taste good, but what do I know.

Birthday Dinner with McBee's

Francis and Oma have Birthdays just days apart so we had a nice dinner with them to celebrate. (These are our neighbors from our old house)

Daughter Kristy, her son Chuck, Oma, Jo, Cole, Mom, Francis & Dale.

Oma is 45!

And nothing says Happy Birthday like a 5 Guys burger with a candle in it!

Oh, and family smiling with you to celebrate!

And we finally got to see a nice picture of Andrew.

He is in our thoughts every day.

Andrew, your eyes don't look so innocent any longer.

Second half of November

College Game Day in Eugene!

Tracy was not able to take Cole to Game Day like they did last year so Mom geared up for the crack of dawn outing.

Cole and I came up with a gimmick to hopefully get him on TV.  Meet Kirk Herbstreit Mini-Me!  For those of you who do not know Kirk, he is one of the ESPN Game Day personalities.

Cole and I got a front barrier spot and thought it was a good one. That would be a yes and no on the good spot.  The cameras didn't really pan our way so no one saw us on TV.

However Cole got plenty of attention as some college guys took a real liking to Cole and made sure the cameras came over and got close ups of Cole and his Mini-Me sign.  But no one at home saw those TV moments either.

WE DID TOO MAKE TV!  Really people, I don't know how you missed us?!

Cole was even interviewed by Erin Andrews (the woman in white above), but again it didn't make it onto the TV nor the internet.

Over all it was a great time!  Cold and wet but lots of energy and fun.  We will have to come up with a new gimmick for next year no matter who takes him.

After a shower and a hot meal Cole got a phone call from Martha & Tracy offering to give him their football tickets. (THANK YOU Martha & Tracy)

 

Oma and Cole had a blast at the game and this time Cole was shown on the Jumbotron during the game! (the huge TV where fans watch replays and such)

I think he had a FULL FUN day!  I know Oma and I did.

Love

Xena splits her sleeping time between Jo and Doug. (Doug sleeps with Cole every night)

Thanksgiving

We thought we could miss the holiday traffic by leaving at 2pm the day before Thanksgiving.  No such luck.  About 15 miles out of town the traffic was stopped!  What should have taken us 45 minutes took us an hour and a half.  I told Jill to use her GPS or the map and get us off the freeway and moving North again.

So a turn here and a turn there and we are moving North West, traffic light and then no traffic at all.  Oh joy!  I mean...Oh boy!  A sign: "Road Closed Due to High Water".  What?  Turning the next corner and there was a locked gate across the road.  NO WONDER there was no traffic.

A little back tracking and then another road leading us NW, traffic light and then no traffic at all. A sign: "Ferry Closed Thanksgiving & Christmas".  No probl...WAIT WHAT?  A ferry?  Well ok, it's not Thanksgiving yet.  Around the corner..."Oh, but there is high water!".

NOTE to self: Now we know there is a ferry, we will be back during summer.

Back to driving again this time with constant flow of traffic which we know to be a very good sign. We soon had to stop and take a phone call from our vet (middle of sporadic cell service) as Xena had been taken in that morning due to a fever and rapid breathing.  Xena needed surgery or they could continue with meds and see if she could make it through the night.

Decisions needed to be made as it was a choice of Christmas or saving the cat. After tears and discussions as a family we finally hit the road again.  Six total hours of driving for our three hour trip and we made it to family!

The kids table...

and the adults...

It was a full house of fun and a wonderful weekend with family.

Our drive home was uneventful thank you very much as the only trouble we had was finding a place to eat dinner.

And Christmas this year has brought us Xena as she has fully recovered from inflamed intestines and is back to attacking Doug and chasing squirrels.

We are so proud of our kids for telling us it was a not choice to put Xena ahead of presents.  Christmas this year the kid will exchange gifts to each other and Santa will of course come but that will be all.

This will be a very Merry Christmas, I know.

First half of November

Doug and Xena love to play with each other, sleep together and have really turned out to be good friends.

I come home to find that Xena sleeping with Doug behind the gate that keeps Doug out of the house while no one is home.

Kind & Helpful

Jo won this award of Kind & Helpful as voted on by her class.

Jo's teacher made sure to
highlight to me that this was
from her fellow students.
Jo is very well liked and
gets along with everyone.

Leafs?

Seemed like we raked a lot more this year than in the past.

However, this year I bought two more rakes, one for each little hand that didn't have one before. 

The first thing I did with those rakes is spray paint each one a different color and handed them to the kids.  "Jo, you are now Orange rake, Cole you are Blue rake". A family who rakes together stays together.

Lounging

We got in a few days like this too. Hanging out in our PJ's or comfy cloths at the house.  Nice!

This was, "Mom, no, don't take my picture!"

Walkabout with No Geocaching?

I love when we can walkabout, Doug off his leash and we can just play.

A nice day late in the fall for this walk and we also threw some rocks trying to hit the waterline on the other side.

Football Wrap Up

Cole was encouraged to keep on working with his catch and running.  He was given kudo's for being at practice on time and ready to go.  Always hustling and being a good team mate to the kids who struggled a bit.

It was a good football year and Cole and he states he is looking forward to next year, but baseball is first and he wants to make All-Stars this year.

BFF's

Karly came for a night and stayed a weekend which we all just loved!

Jo and Karly have stayed close though the distance between houses has grown.  Their friendship is one of complete harmony as they just are like two peas in a pod.

Their weekend ended at the Veteran's Parade, Karly's family participates every year and asked Jo to join them.

Jo said they ran out of candy long before the end of the parade.  She had a very good time and was quite chilled by the end.

Doug and the Squirrels

He LOVES going outside and chasing the squirrels around the yard. Actually, truth be told, the squirrels get the best of him each and every day.

They run around the top of the fence just out of Doug's reach making him run the fence line...back and fourth...and back and fourth. 

What has this created?

A VERY HAPPY MUDDY DOUG!

And a VERY UNHAPPY OMA!

Oma has since put some rocks down along part of the fence line which I must say has helped quite a bit on the mud.

PIE!

I love it that Jo LOVES to bake!

Oma and Jo make the best pies, banana bread and other yummy items.

This pie Jo made the dough with very little help by Oma.  Passing on the love!

Football - Halloween

Oma and the kids noticed that they could find many more "butt" pumpkins this year than in past.

And the kids show us their sense of humor now with said butt pumpkins.

Our picks for this year...

Were not these.

This farm has many activities and fun stuff to play around and on.

We found a safe place to lock up these Butt Pumpkin Kissing kids.

Oma and I don't seem to be growing taller...

No need to comment further.

Night Football

The last two games Cole played under the lights.

He thought that was pretty neat.  So did I.

Here are our pumpkins!

Educational year of carving as we learned that Jo's pumpkin was very heavy and thus time consuming to gut and harder for Jo to carve.  Oma picked one with lots of bumps all over the outside which turned out has an extremely hard outer skin so it was hard to even cut open let alone carve. Cole's was so green that we had trouble opening it up as the guts really were not formed yet but once it was open was very easy to carve.

All lit up.

Spooky house, standard pumpkin face minus the mouth due to hard cutting, the Oregon Duck "O" and pumpkin eating another pumpkin.

Ready for CANDY!

Two observations this year.

1. People LOVE to have children walk the neighborhood trick or treating as I could hear over and over when doors opened, "You're our first treaters, you look great, are there more kids out there?"  I wish this tradition of door knocking would make a large come back.

2. I still look at our children as "children" but I noticed while out trick or treating that evening that Cole & Jo were the oldest kids and that our children are not "little" any longer.  Just made me think is all.

And the take this year?

Lot's of good stuff Oma and I love!

The kids actually ate so much candy that night and the following day that they both were a little sick the next evening.  Live and learn our children and a memorable moment...maybe.

5th Grade

Cole & Jo

Age 10