Christmas in Canada

We spent Sunday (Dec 23) thru Tuesday (Dec 25) in Ontario, celebrating Christmas with Daryl's family.  It was, as it always is, a wonderful time of connecting with family that we don't see near as often as what we would like to!  We left Kalamazoo on Sunday after Church and arrived at Daryl's Mom's house 5 hours later - we made great time!  We were so thankful for dry roads and a quick border crossing.  On Sunday evening we went to Mom and Neil's Church for their Christmas musical.  It was cute and the kids did well sitting through it.  On Monday (Christmas Eve) was when all the family Christmas celebrations took place.  It was a fun day and the best present of all was hearing the great news that Rachel (Daryl's older sister) and her husband Andrew are expecting their first baby in July!  On Christmas Day we had a nice breakfast and spent some time with Kevin and Karin and their kids (everyone else had gone their separate ways) before heading back to Kalamazoo.

Angry Birds.  Need I say more?

Angry Birds and a pile of boy cousins!

Some of the grand kids eating their Christmas Eve dinner together.

Acting out the Christmas Story before opening presents.  My two little angels and my shepherd.

My other shepherd with a cute little sheep

"Glory to God in the Highest!"

A peek inside the stable :)

The whole cast :)  Uncle Rodney was the narrator.

Waiting to open presents!

Love this face!

Just a little excited!!

This little girl was pretty excited too!

Opening presents from Grandma and Grandpa

Aunt Val bought matching pajamas for the three little girls cousins - Wilona, Zahara, and Aliyah. It was getting late and none of the girls were interested in having their picture taken!!

Story time with Aunt Val and Zahara before heading to bed!

Around the house . . .

Random pictures from my camera:

My awesome new loveseat from IKEA!  We took the kids to IKEA this past Tuesday and we found this loveseat in their "as is" section for a great price! I might regret the fact that it is white but at least it is all washable and we can always buy a new cover for it!  Hope was still running a fever on Tuesday (shhhh! don't tell anyone!) but we had this trip to Ikea planned a long time ago and Daryl took the day off of work so that we could go.  We really had to get there before Christmas so we decided to just pack up the kids and still go.  Hope just hung out in the stroller for the day - she actually did really well!  Samuel and Aliyah also did great.  They all were troopers!!

Love my sunroom!  I never ever want to have to change this into the dining room (which eventually we will have to do) because it's such a great place to sit or play with the kids!

Lately we have spent a lot of days in our pajamas!  With sick kids and a lot of hanging around the house, it just doesn't make sense to make more laundry by getting dressed every day! ;)  One night this week I told all of the kids, "Alright, tomorrow we are all going to get dressed!"  Hope said, "Why? Where are we going?"  Yup, that's how it has been around here lately!

Aliyah is such a great Mommy!  This morning she fed all of her babies breakfast. Callie was having a pretty bad hair day!

A Visit to See Santa Claus

Except for some lingering coughs and snotty noses, we are saying "good-bye" to that nasty flu that has been hanging around our house for about a week now.  The kids (and myself!) are starting to go stir crazy.  They are feeling good enough to fight with each other again so I guess that's a good sign!  At breakfast today I asked the kids if they wanted to go and see Santa Claus at the mall.  To my surprise, they all got really excited and wanted to go right away!  My Mom, being the awesome Grandma that she is, volunteered to come along and join the fun.  She's also been sick and I think she was ready to get out of her house, too!  Hope was the bravest and went right up to Santa's lap. She told him that she wanted a princess coat for Christmas.  She got all excited and proud because Santa said her hair smelled good - like coconuts.  Samuel was brave enough to sit on Santa's lap after he saw his little sister doing it!  He sat there just long enough to tell Santa that he wanted a new fire truck for Christmas and then he hopped right back down again.  (What is up with my kids asking Santa to bring them things for Christmas that I had no idea they wanted?!?!)  Aliyah talked the whole way to the mall about sitting on Santa's lap, but once she got there, she stayed as far away from him as she could!  Maybe next year. :)

Sick Kids: Flu 2012!!

It's official: We have been hit with the respiratory flu!  Hope started yesterday with a fever and cough and Samuel followed shortly after with the same symptoms.  Daryl stayed home from Church with all three kids this morning while I went to Church (I had to teach Little Lambs).  Today we laid around all day and watched a lot of movies - including Cinderella . . . twice!  The kids didn't have energy to do much of anything.  Aliyah isn't acting quite herself but she just has a low-grade fever . . . and that isn't even all of the time.  Hope has thrown up a couple of times today from coughing so hard and having so much junk in her throat.  I hate seeing my poor babies so sick!  Samuel fell asleep at 4:30pm and pretty much slept until the next morning at 8!  I woke him up around 5 and he was just miserable and asking to go sleep in his bed.  I finally let him because I knew he felt horrible and sleep was really want he needed.  I was really nervous he'd wake up during the night and be wide awake but I guess he really needed that sleep.  He woke up a few times in the evening and I'd just rub his back for a few minutes until he drifted off again.  

** Hope ended up having a fever for 6 days, Samuel for about 4.  Aliyah just hung out with a low-grade fever off and on along with a little cough and runny nose.  She definitely didn't get it as bad as her brother and sister!  Daryl never got sick and I felt crummy for a couple of days and had a little cough and sore throat but no fever.

Halfway There!

Here I am!  Almost 20 weeks along with this precious peanut.  I go in for my ultrasound tomorrow and we are hoping and praying that the clot is significantly smaller.  Completely gone would be great but I'm not getting my hopes up too high!  I'm feeling pretty good - just super tired and a lot of lower back pain.  The nausea is all but gone, thank goodness!!  Tonight was the first night that I knew without a doubt that I was feeling the baby move.  I've felt tiny movements (at least, what I think are tiny movements) since around Thanksgiving but tonight it was super obvious that the little peanut was moving around and doing some acrobatic moves!

**Edited to add: The ultrasound was perfect!  Tammy couldn't find the clot anywhere - praise God!  She was surprised that there wasn't even a hint of it because as she said, "it was a pretty good size clot!"  Our God is not a God of statistics but a God of miracles and we are praising and thanking Him for answering our prayers.  Tammy also said that our baby was "anatomically perfect".  The baby had his/her hand up by its face throughout most of the ultrasound - just like Samuel likes to sleep!  We didn't find out if we are having a boy or a girl, we're waiting for May to find that out!!

Bird Watcher

This stray cat apparently found an enjoyable place to sit.  I'm not so sure the birds are enjoying it though!  She chilled out there for a good 15-20 minutes before deciding she had better things to do with her time!

The new carpet is in!

We have new carpet in our basement and we all LOVE it!  I took the kids downstairs after it was all put in and they went crazy!  The first thing Samuel said was, "Look at all this space!"  They ran around, rolled all over the floor, played basketball, had races across the basement, wrestled, and jumped around until they were all exhausted.  If only we could leave the basement like this - a big huge open space with so much room to run and play!  My goal is to limit what we put down there to still make running around possible . . . but first I'll let them enjoy it this way for a couple of days!