The Latest

The month of January and the first half of February flew by in our household, with few pictures taken. Here are several things that were captured "on film."

Our friend Alfonso came and did a few jobs around the house, including this captivating project of wall repair. The demolition was great to watch...

...but we didn't like the shop vac too much.

Ta dah! I suppose you can imagine for yourself what it looks like now, all smooth and repainted. Thanks, Alfonso! We also had some energy saving work done on the house, and had a bit of a lead scare with some paint in the kitchen that tested positive. So we had the boys' blood tested for lead levels, and were relieved that they were in the normal-low range.

This is the only picture from our excellent weekend in Iowa! We were having too much fun--swimming, eating, playing games, and watching movies with friends and family--to think of getting the camera out.

At the beginning of February I went to Pittsburgh for the Mennonite Educators Conference, where I led worship. Here's a before and after of my view from the Hilton. Before...

and after the 17 inches of snow fell! We muscled our way out of there in a chartered bus, but those who had flights either drove a ways west or waited a few days to get home.

It was great to have Grandma Jan join us for a week after her conference in Michigan. She would have had trouble returning east in all that snow, anyway, so the timing worked well in many ways. We had lots of fun, and she worked from our house so that she didn't count these as vacation days--which we assume means that she will come relax with us later this year for some real vacation! :) She brought several books, as usual, and you can see which was the biggest hit in the video below.




We did some building.

And some snow play.

On Friday the 12th Theo was home sick with a fever and cough. But it was Adam's Valentine's Day party at school, so we stopped by for a bit. Adam mostly wanted to sit on my lap and observe, but he did participate in the "Ring the Bells" song.

Adam, when asked if he wanted to have a turn hitting the pinata: No. I can have candy even if I don't hit it, right?


Here's the way to ensure that each kids gets just enough refined sugar!

On Sunday, Grandma Jan went home (boo hoo), and we had Carnival at church, where we dress up and play games and eat donuts and get balloons. That evening we went to Theo's SS teacher (last year and next year) Steve's house to get in on some homemade donut action.


Yum! After the donuts we headed to Karl and Michelle's house for some ice-skating on their homemade rink. So cool--Christmas lights and music and a fire and hot chocolate! This is where my camera chose to die, so you'll just have to take our word for it. Theo (and Mitch) got going on skates for a while, but the boys both had lots of fun running and sliding on the ice in their shoes, too. It was hard to stop "skating" and go home, but great to have the next day (Presidents Day) at home to catch up on resting, and some vacuuming, too!