Making Memories...

This past week has been very full. We've enjoyed "almost" every single minute of it:). I posted an album on facebook, due to the fact that uploading there was a LOT faster than on here. This is the link that allows you to look at them, if you're not on facebook: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150443815200976.363595.653210975&type=1&l=98fae094d9

There were a lot of pictures that I wanted to share, but I really didn't want to waste an hour trying to put them all on here. We have about 10 gift jars left over, due to some people being absent for both services. I think it's a gift that we'll repeat every couple years, but switch recipes, in order to have more variety. The ornaments were also a lot of fun, so we'll keep trying to improve our skills in that area. Each year I'm impressed with the creative, thoughtful gifts that we're given. It's inspiring and we hope to teach our kids to think outside the box when it comes to creative gifts. Reaching out to those around us who have less. Sometimes it's simply the time that is shared to encourage others. Sometimes it's the talent that is invested in teaching others. Sometimes the best thing we can do is pray and allow the Lord to do the rest.

I'm having a hard time trying to figure out which parts to share about the past week. There were Scrabble matches, new foods, a visit with Great Grandma Neilson and much, much more. The kids enjoyed all the extra excitement that goes along with visits to Nana's house. The Uncles were very entertaining and the kids had a blast playing with them for hours. We, adults, thoroughly enjoyed the time after lunch when we all took advantage of the kids naps and got some shut eye too:)!

I think some of my lack of brain power is due to the fact that I stayed up til close to 11 or later each evening. Making the most of the time we had to visit. Adelaide was a bit fussy, but once she was asleep in the evening we had about 6 hours of her sleeping before the first feeding.

We hadn't done any 1,000 piece puzzles lately and that was another very enjoyable activity. I bought it for Caleb and Grandad, but knew that we would probably all get to help with it. Caleb kept coming over to check our progress:). We did smaller puzzles with him, til he told me and Kirk that we weren't good puzzle makers:). Not sure why he thought that, but he is a funny little guy. Other games that we played were Alphabet Scoop(a kid's Scrabble game) and Hangman.

Well, I think that kind of catches me up to the present. Scott wasn't feeling well this morning, so I got things packed up and thankfully had a very helpful Brother in Law to help pack things into the van. It was raining/snowing on top of ice. We weren't sure if we'd make it all the way. It was a bit rough, but we made it home by 5. We stopped in town to check the mail, get some milk and pick up the new camera(on sale for boxing week). We got some money for Christmas and decided that this was one of the things that we wanted to invest in. Our current one is about 7 years old and doesn't have video capability. It's starting to blur some and the lighting isn't so good. Sooo, I'm looking forward to using this new one. It'll probably take me awhile to figure things out, but it'll be good.

The baby is crying, so it's time to end for now. I hope all our family and friends had a wonderful week. Can you believe it's getting so close to being 2012!?