Well, I have decided to reenter the world of blogging. My silence sure is not due to any lack of excitement around here; as a matter of fact, quite the contrary is true. We have had a whirlwind of a fall, and I am sorry I blew off my blog during those months. Oh well, what's done is done. I will post a slideshow at least for those months, even if I don't fill in the details.
Right now we are getting ready for Christmas, like the rest of America. The tree is up, the stockings are hung (using command poster strips for those 5 lb stocking hangers, those things are weapons!) and the baking has commenced. We were pounded with an amazing snowstorm a week or so ago, and the kids have had a blast building a new snow fort. One day they were out there for over 4 hours. I'll post a pic of their hard work, as soon as I trudge out to the back 40 with my camera.
Thanksgiving was amazing. Our dear friends, Chris and Ginger and their girls Alex, Audrey and Lily, came for a week from Arizona. They are such a breath of fresh air, and we had a blast with them! The entire time was exactly as we hoped-the kids were so happy to be together, the schedule was clear of almost all activity, and our time was joyful and relaxing. And the food was AMAZING. Chris put together a fabulous feast, with contributions from everyone else. We hosted, with CR, Amy, their kids, my mom, and our friend Sharon and her two kids, Jason and Rachel. Despite the number of kids (13!) and adults (8), we were able to set places for everyone and enjoy a sit-down, gorgeous meal complete with table decor and real dishes. :) Leftovers were great, too, with us going back and forth between our house and the Oldhams' to munch down all the yummy food over the next few days. The only sad part of the whole thing was saying good-bye to our friends, who left on the Sunday after Thanksgiving. We sure weren't ready for them to leave!
This Christmas we will have the pleasure of hosting, and we will have all of Joe's family in town! We are so excited for everyone to come. We will have Joe's parents, grandmother, brother Kenny and wife Celia and Kenny's daughter Juliette, sister Annette, sister Theresa and husband Eric, and their 3 kids, Katelyn, Bethany and Ben. It will be the first time we meet little Ben (he was born in April 09) so we are all looking forward to that! Also, my mom will come, and possibly my family (Aunt Bobbie, Uncle Ray, Steph and Charlie), and maybe even Sharon, Jason, and Rachel. It will be a full house, literally, though the only overnight houseguests we will have are Juliette, Eric, Theresa, Katelyn, Bethany, and Ben. We are thankful for our big house, so the kids can run around in the basement and we adults can be unaware of the mess. ;)
We are hoping for no more home casualties, as in the last month we have replaced a dishwasher, toaster, 2 doorknobs, a furnace motor module, and our downstairs tv died, too. We aren't going to replace that, though. We'll just have to live without it for awhile.

Here are some pics from October, November and a bit of November.

Fall 09