Tuesday: skiing

Today we went downhill skiing. I've been downhill skiing once before and it was a bad experience. This time was much more fun. Ben gave Jamie and I "lessons" while Travis helped Jacob.

After several runs on the bunny hill I tried the easy green hill with Ben. It was ok...I got down without running into anyone or falling. :) It was the first time I was on a lift and the person in the chair in front of us was also apparently a beginner. He fell while getting off the chair lift. Instead of trying to get out of the way he proceeded to spread his arms out and stay there as long as possible. I ended up going in front of Ben but he is luckily a good enough skiier that he could deal with that. He also decided to turn 180 degrees half way down the hill and scared me out of my wits because I thought he was stopping and that I would shortly be plowing into him. However, he was just skiing backwards for a bit.

Back to the bunny hill for a few times to have the family all together and then lunch. I was warm before lunch but unfortunately lunch cooled me off somehow. I never quite warmed up again. But anyway...

Then Jamie, Ben, and I went on the green hill again. I starting going to fast so decided to ..uh.. sit down. :) Luckily I had learned how to fall correctly. The next two times going down this hill were much better. Ben stayed a bit closer and I did a better job of snowplowing. But then I was too cold so Travis and Ben nicely brought me home. Travis pulled my poles for a bit so I didn't have to try and ski on the flat/uphill part. Our lift tickets were almost done anyway and they're going back tomorrow so it was ok they didn't do any of the harder runs.

So...the day was fun enough that Ben can probably get me to go again. I'm a little sore though. (especially my arms...it is really hard to go uphill even a little bit).

Monday: water park

Today we went to an indoor water park. It was nice and warm with several largish slides. They were fun to go down and it was fun to watch everyone else play in the water too.

As we were leaving my throat started to hurt. I think I was sick the rest of the night. (Spoiler: I felt fine the next day.)

Sunday: Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday to Larry! Today was a nice relaxing day with several games, naps, food, and a movie.

Here's a picture of the family watching Larry open presents; the one with him turned out too blurry.

Saturday: Betsy and blanket

Well, I was going to go to Betsy's bridal shower and then go up north tonight or tomorrow. The problem is that the weather was supposed to get really bad tonight and stay bad tomorrow. So Betsy nicely came out to lunch with me so I could leave earlier in the afternoon. :) We probably got to talk more than we would have at the shower, so that's good at least.

The drive wasn't too bad, although it was really foggy. When it wasn't quite as foggy it was rainy. The worst part was at the very end when I think I had a few hydroplaning moments, but nothing too bad. I was happy to arrive though.

I also managed to finish half the grey on my baby blanket. I have decided to edge it in a burnt orange, so I'm not really half way done. But I am getting close.

Friday: boxing day

Happy Boxing Day! Except I didn't really box anything up since I'm not at home. Ben and I did repackage a lot of gifts though into few bags and sort into what can stay in the car and what can't. I guess that can count as our Boxing Day activity.

Not a lot happened today. Ben left. :( The bed will be cold without him. Dad and I went to the mall...it was incredably busy. We parked rather far away because it was at least a little less busy and then walked on some roads to get to the mall. My problem was that the elastic in one of my socks has died, so every 5-10 minutes I needed to stop to pull up my sock (depending on how fast we were walking). It was annoying. So these will get retired once we get home.

I ate lunch with the Menkveld clan; it was nice to see them again since it's been a while since I've seen most of them. Oliver isn't feeling well though, which is sad.

Thursday: Christmas

Merry Christmas! Ben and I spent the day with his family. I got a nice sewing machine...I think I'm going to make a table cloth first. There were lots of other wonderful presents too...Ben and I are excited to use them!

Jacob hiding under paper
Grandpa and Ashlyn opening presents.

Tuesday: Christmas with DeYoungs

Today we started out the day with a delicious breakfast followed by opening presents.


Here is a picture were we're sorting the presents but it looks like Nathan is trying to steal them away. I think it is my favorite picture of the day.

We all got these body-blanket things that have arms and zippers...specifically made for using them at them computer. However, they also make us look like penguins or Jedi (depending on whether we're walking or not). We can also only zip the top and have a cape. So many options. :)

Oh, it didn't stop snowing the entire day today. There is a lot of snow. Going to Holland the highway looked plowed, but most of the roads (even the main roads) had not been plowed recently.

Monday: we made it

We made it to Hudsonville today! We got in around 3:30. It was really nice to see the family for a while.

Sunday: Erie

We ended up leaving today at 3:30pm for Michigan. It was earlier than we had originally been planning on leaving, but the weather was going to be good for a while. We got to Erie, PA before the weather got too bad. It wasn't incredibly snowy, but the wind was causing white out conditions. Hopefully it will be a lot better in the morning!

Saturday: work and Flurry

Work went well this morning. The thing we had to do we pretty much had one shot to do it...else there would be a huge schedule delay. But we did it and it went smoothly. :)

Tonight I was telling Flurry that plastic bags are not for children and small animals to play with. She proceeded to put her head through one of the holes and sit down inside of the bag. Needless to say, she needed help to escape.

Friday: work, tree, and snow

Well, I had a record number of hours in at work: 53. I realize that this could be worse, but it was rather annoying all the same. However, I do feel as though I got a lot done. I need to go in for a few hours tomorrow :(, but I'm hoping for not too long.

We got a ton of snow today! There was pretty much nothing when we went to work, and at 2 when we came home there was about 6". More has fallen since then too. It is very pretty.

Here is our tree!

Thursday: lists

So Ben likes to "make fun" of my lists. I, of course, have a list of things for work. The funny thing is that I've started making a list of "really do this" things from my to-do list. That's right! Lists from lists. I might never hear the end of it, but found it too funny to not share.

Wednesday: 13.7

...is the number of hours I worked today. I know that might be normal for some of you, but it is not normal for me! I got swamped this week and with trying to be on vacation next week, I got even more swamped. But now it is time for bed.

Tuesday: lunch and party

Today at work we were given an appreciation luncheon. It included french onion soup, fillet minion, and cheese cake. It was delicious!

Then we had our Bible Study Christmas party. It has been a year that we've been with this group, since I remember being invited to last year's party and deciding to wait until the new year. We've formed a bunch of great friendships within the year though, so that is awesome.

It was a white elephant give exchange. There wasn't much stealing though. I gave away some angels that someone was excited to get because they didn't have any Christmas decorations.

Sunday: Christmas cookie-grams

Today my Bible Study delivered Christmas cookie-grams. The recipients got songs and about a dozen homemade cookies. The plan was to sing 2-3 songs, but most people were ready to get back inside after one. Oh well.

Here we are putting the boxes together:


And delivering:

Saturday: cookies

Today I made a lot of cookies. About 300, although only 90 of those were regularly sized cookies...the rest were bite size. It was three batches of dough worth.

I really like the idea of bite size cookies...and I can make so many from a single batch! Below are the ones I brought to a tea I had this afternoon.


Here's Ben's response on my to-do list when he saw all the cookies...

Friday: sandwich

So today I tried making my favorite sandwich from The Good Earth...turkey, cheese, and salsa cream cheese on a bagel. It turned out ok, but the cream cheese wasn't quite salsa-y enough. Maybe next time.

Thursday: long day

I worked for longer than normal today. I think I'll be working for longer than normal (for a Friday) tomorrow too because I'm getting up early to finish the work that I didn't finish today. :( Oh well. I'm thinking about starting to mix up some of the cookie dough I need to make for the 5 dozen normal cookies and 2 dozen small cookies I need for this weekend. I'm sure weekend activities will be fun, but I haven't quite motivated myself yet. Luckily, there is still plenty of time if I don't get to them tonight.

Wednesday

Hmm, I don't have a lot to say today. I keep thinking it's Thursday. I opened a can of pop and it was flat. I was sad. At least it wasn't sharp. :D

Monday: deep thought #1 - giving

Today's deep thought is on the subject of giving money. Don't get me wrong, I oddly enjoy giving away money.

Ok, so the tithe goes to the church. But then there are so many other people asking for money. Some of them are very easy to dismiss ("how did I get on that mailing list?"). Some of them are some what easy to dismiss ("They aren't a Christian organization" or "I don't have super-strong feelings about this cause"). But then there are the half-dozen groups that I really care about because they have close ties to us (church, friends in missions, and giving away goats). I guess the goats don't really have close ties to me but there is just something about them. Maybe in heaven all "my" goats will show up in a herd one day. But I digress...

So how to choose among the half-dozen groups that we really care about? There is some extra money in the budget for extra giving so I guess we got ourselves into this predicament in the first place. And I don't really have an answer for you either. In some ways it's rather annoying because we will have to not give some people money which makes it seem like their cause isn't important to us. But they are.

Could we give up that one extra "eat-out" per week and give the money away? We could. Does that make us selfish. Probably. It's kind-of a hard truth to live with, but I'm also not sure I want to change. But I guess you have to draw the line somewhere.

Sunday: wedding pictures

I have all of the wedding pictures posted here. They aren't all great pictures, but I took out the blurriest.

Saturday: goat

I kept laughing about the goat comment, and suddenly this showed up.



I had tears in my eyes.

Saturday: cookies

So I started sharing my electronic to-do list with Ben the other week. I guess it's more than a to-do list...I keep bunches of lists there. One list is "things for christmas." And I keep finding little notes in the spreadsheet now...



They make me laugh.

Oh, I was just informed that Ben moved "make cookies" to the appropriate list since I put it in the wrong list.

Friday: camera cable

I got my camera cable today! I'll be putting up some Thanksgiving pictures shortly, but in the meantime here is Flurry enjoying the packaging. She likes to lick the air in the bubbles.

Thursday: feet

I bought a new foot scrubbing stone over Thanksgiving. It's amazing. I'll be sure to buy new ones regularly from now on.

I also wore different shoes to work today. My feet have been so cold lately and these shoes are warmer, although not as dressy. In the end, they were almost too warm as my feet were a little sweaty sometimes. But it was nice to not be as cold.

Wednesday: work review

I had my bi-yearly review today. I guess it's bi-yearly but this is the one that really matters as raises are based off it. Anyway, I thought it went really well. I'm getting another project to work which is exciting. And I'm on the schedule to get a promotion next year, which I'm also excited about.

Tuesday: laughter

So for Bible study we broke up into guys/girls to pray. The girls ended up laughing more than praying, but I know that is what I needed. It was fun

Monday: a mood

I was thinking about writing a deep thought tonight, but I find myself becoming a bit moody. Sigh. I finished my book last night or I would go read, but I'm not sure what I want to read next.

In other news, I like my haircut more now than I did on Friday. It has un-pooffed and the bangs aren't so prominent. I'm still not sure I love it, but it's ok. I'm thinking about growing it out more since I can't find a short style that I really like.