Happy 11th Birthday Thomas!

Thomas enjoyed his day at school and at home.  He got a hunting camouflage zipper binder with some jerky hidden in it from Jeremy and I.  Hopefully he'll like having the binder for his switching classes.

Happy Birthday Thomas, we love you!

Birthday Season has Begun

And so we begin our birthday season with Nicholas and Thomas's birthdays.  They shared a party this weekend.  Nicholas wanted a tool theme and Thomas decided just a party was fine.  Grandma Susan made a great peg board tool cake for Nicholas that he has been talking about for days.  Thomas picked Mounds bars which are brownies topped with coconut filling and chocolate frosting.  Yum. (And score for Mom because they are super simple to make!)

 

Happy birthday January boys!

Around the House

Jeremy put in some handyman time around the house while he was off for Christmas and New Years.  He did wiring and other important stuff in the basement room he's working on,
Got my retractable clothes line up just in time for wrestling season.

 and put new covers over the two vents we no longer use.

And I updated my picture wall.  The top left one fell two days after I put it up so now I have to glue the frame back together.  Boo.

Also the words say "You are my most favorite" because I like to tell the kids they're my favorite Samuel or Thomas or Julia or Philip or Nicholas.  They told me they thought I was going to put a picture of my favorite kid up each week!  oops.

Happy Birthday Nicholas!

Nicholas turned three yesterday!

He had birthday lunch and cake with Grandma Susan and pizza and cookies at home for dinner.

 He opened a couple of presents

Including new Paw Patrol underwear.  He proceeded to put all  five pair on at once and then get all five pair wet about half an hour later.  Drat.

More celebrating to come this weekend!
We love you Nicholas!

SLEDDING!

We haven't been sledding at a real sledding hill in years.  Pre-Nicholas I think.  It was a good year to go though, good snow, no one too little and nice weather.

 

Nicholas loved it and everyone had lots of fun, plus no serious injuries which is always a good thing!  You can't really see but in addition to my awesome 80s snowsuit (that I got from my father-in-law) I now have added totally cool light up boots from my cousin Greta.  Apparently she outgrew them (whether in size or maturity I'm not sure).  I figure why turn down a free pair of boots?  Plus they light up.  How could I resist?  ;)

Christmas Break Fun

We made name place cards. 

 The kids did most of Rolo pretzels by themselves.

 Philip made a bunch of these all by himself.

 We worked on present tags (pre-bench cushions and hanging light)

Philip and Nicholas played with my Christmas gift.

 Everyone (happily?) wrote thank you notes.

 They've been taking turns rearranging the Advent Calendar's manger scene.

 And thanks to the Christmas Eve snow they've been playing outside a lot.

I (mostly) love Christmas break!

Best Sister Award

My sister Beth earns the best sister award for coming to our house and spending two days sewing cushion covers for our corner bench in the kitchen!

 

Timeline of bench:

2005 Got a pew when my childhood church, St. John's, remodels

Sat in Steve and Raleen's basement

2006? Jeremy rips off ugly orange upholstery.  Who knows what that church pew had seen.

2012 Got a estimate on making it into a corner bench

Estimate was pretty high, sat in Steve and Raleen's basement while Lisa saved up money

September 2013 Aunt Pat graciously tries to speed things up by helping with the bench account

Sits in Steve and Raleen's basement

September 2014 Jeremy's coworker makes pew into a corner bench!  Yay!  He charges a fraction of the original estimate so Lisa has money left over for financing cushions.

Early 2015 Lisa buys foam and batting for cushions

April 2015 Lisa chooses and orders fabric for cushion covers

December 2015 Beth makes cushion covers!  Yay Beth!

 

She also made all the piping!

I contributed by cutting the foam and making the plastic sleeves to keep spills from ruining the foam.  I felt rather ingenious.  I bought a queen size vinyl matress pad for $7 from Walmart, cut it to fit each cushion and sewed on Velcro.  I also provided moral support and sewed on the Velcro that holds the cushions closed.

 

 Here's the happy seamstress (she's happy because it's DONE!)  Also Jeremy put up the great but slightly ugly lamp so we can see when we sit there.  I think a different shade will help it.

 

 Thank you, thank you, thank you Beth.

 

It's so much more comfortable!  We've used it every day.

 

It only took me 10 years to orchestrate the whole project.  :)  Yep, that's how I roll.