The rest of our Christmas Break

St. Helens... We then spent the evening with my family (dad, siblings, grandma, aunts, uncles, cousins, cousins kids etc.) at my cousin Jenni's house. My family throws routine impromptu parties. Our extended family is like most people's immediate family. We all talk on a regular basis, gather what seems like several times a month for Birthday parties and holiday's. Luckily, when I come into town everyone usually gets together somewhere so we can see everyone in one place without having to zip from house to house in a short amount of time. My family has its wacky sides, but I wouldn't want to be part of any other family. You always know you'll be taken care of and that everyone is always there for you in every situation!

We went to visit my best friend since kindergarten, Angie, and her family (husband Robbie and two beautiful boys Hunter and Levi). It's always good to see her and to catch up. I think it's so neat that our friendship has lasted so long, she's a keeper!

Next stop... Kent. We drove up to Kent late Wednesday night and pulled into Rob's sister, Shelly's house around 11 or so. On Thursday Rob's other sister, Suzy came over with her two boys, Weston and Logan and we just spent the day hanging out.

Is this silly or what, I can't remember what we did on Friday. Hmmm. Oh wait, I remember! We went to visit one of Rob's very bestest friends, Steve and his wife Heather and their 9 month old son Micah. I'll post pictures. We always look forward to getting to spend time with Steve and Heather. These are two of the neatest people anyone might ever meet. They love the Lord, they love each other and they love people, it's so obvious!

On Saturday Rob's brother Dan, and his Dad and Step-mom Stephanie joined the rest of the gang for a Christmas Eve Christmas Party complete with a customary $10 gift exchange. I left with a Costco sized bag of pistachios! We had fun, again, it's always great to be with family, I look forward to getting to see everyone when we go up there.

Sunday brought Christmas with Rob's siblings and their families, his mom Janice, and step-dad Carmin, his mom's brother Doug and his family and her parents, Stan and Martha. Christmas was packed full of fun, family and food and lot's of presents too! Titus got a cross-stitch wall hanging from his Great Grandma Deardorff in John Deere colors with his name on it. Titus also got a really cool wooden puzzle with his name on it. Uncle Doug makes them http://www.dougspuzzles.com/. So now I have at least two items each with Leeann's name spelled right and with Titus's name. I may never find anything else that has that, but that's okay!

In all Sunday was a pretty tough day for me though. It was the day that my thrush was at it's worst and I spent part of the day simply in tears, part of it trying to find how to get relief on the internet so I wouldn't have to bug my mid-wife on Christmas, and the other part of the day on the phone with my mid-wife when nothing on the internet seemed worthwhile. She ordered in a new prescription for me and promised me relief in 24 hours. It helped just knowing that it would be gone soon.

That evening Rob, Janice, our niece KayLee and I stayed up way too late playing "Trump" a new game Janice got for Christmas. It was fun! Rob and I are big board game fans!

Rob headed home on Monday so he could attend Winter Youth Celebration with 10 of our high school students. I was so jealous that I couldn't be there! Leeann, Titus and I stayed at Shelly's so that we wouldn't have to be home alone. It was a huge blessing to be able to spend a few extra days with Rob's family. Suzy and her kids spent several more days hanging out with us too. Suzy, Shelly and I got in several additional rounds of Settlers (a board game that we LOVE) and Leeann got some much loved time with her cousins. Titus got held for almost 10 days straight and I got treated like a princess by aunt Shelly who fed me (well--I might add), didn't make me clean and even did my laundry! It was such a blessing to be there! I also got in some 'shopping' time with Rob's mom and my kids. It's customary to go to Jo-Ann fabrics together whenever possible!

In all, the trip was great. It was nice to come home, albeit to a whopping mess that still isn't anywhere close to clean. It's always nice to see Rob after being away from him for a couple of days... I can't help it, I like the guy!

We spent New Year's Eve attempting to clean our a house a little and catching up on some much needed sleep. Leeann spent a couple of hours with Grampy and Mimi (Kyndall's dad and step-mom), Nanay (that's what she calls her birth mom Kyndall), and Kyndall's siblings Kendra and Kalen to celebrate Christmas. Leeann got a cool travel magna-doodle and 5 or 6 Veggie Tales DVD's, including Lord of the Beans (which Shelly's kids got for Christmas and we must have watched a good 10 times while we were there!) She has fun when she's over there. It really is quite a neat arrangement that we have with them. Leeann is one of the most blessed girls I know with so many people that love her and care for her!

We went to the YMCA for a couple of hours New Year's Eve. Our church rents out the facility and we play games, use their gyms, courts and pool and eat lot's of yummy food. It's always a great time! Rob and I then headed over to some good friends of ours house, Craig and Mandy for some additional food and fun. Another couple, Jennifer and Ryan met up with us there and we had some of Craig's famous nachos, and some apple pie, ice cream and sparkling cider as we rang in the New Year over a rousing game of Beyond Balderdash. Bottom line-- we like friends and we like board games, so it was a great night!

New Year's Day was pretty uneventful. We had church, lunch at Wendy's, a nap and then youth group. Fun day I suppose, but nothing too out of the ordinary (except meeting up with Rob's old youth intern John and a friend of his, Kristin for lunch... it was good to catch up and its always nice to see him!)

Yesterday I spent pretty much the whole day with my friend Eroica editing a Newsletter for our church's potential building project. It was fun but time consuming. I always enjoy spending time with Eroica though, so that makes work less tedious.

And that brings us to today. Rob isn't feeling well so he's staying home from work for at least the morning. He's in our room hence the fact that I have Titus and Leeann hulled up in Titus room (with the computer) trying to keep any of us from making too much noise. Our house isn't exactly big and when someone's sleeping it generally means a measure of intended quietness on the part of those who are not enjoying slumber.

Again, I must say, if you are still reading at this point, I question why. I really said little of significance in this super-long post, but now I'm up to date!