We celebrated
Jemmie’s 11th birthday on 1/21 with yummy brownie sundaes, then celebrated
Abigail’s 18th birthday on 2/2 with Mississippi Mud pie. We had her party
during halftime of the Super Bowl when all of the Denver fans had already given
up.
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| Jemmie with her presents |
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| The brownies for the sundaes |
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| Happy Birthday Abigail! |
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| 13 + 5 single candles = 18 |
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| Levi and Cody are more excited than Abigail :-) |
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| She definitely likes her presents! |
Congratulations
to the Seahawks and us fans in their total dominance of the Broncos! I
almost felt bad for poor Peyton—almost but not quite, and definitely not enough
to want him to win! Did any of you out in the Seattle area go to the
Seahawks parade? I looked at pictures online, and it looked like a wild
time!
Anyway, back
to birthdays: Today is Caitlin’s birthday, but since she’s in
Philadelphia, we’ll just have to wish her the best and celebrate without
her. We’ll see her and the rest of the family later this week as everyone
arrives for Ella’s wedding this Saturday. I wish all of you could be here
too, but I know that just isn’t possible. Maybe those of you in the west
could come halfway and meet us in Minnesota in June for Kortney’s wedding!
On January
25, we went to see Les Miserables at Roberts Wesleyan. A friend at
church had bought us tickets. It was another snowy day, and the roads
were kind of tricky, but we made it there and back safely and really enjoyed the
play. It was done by the community theater associated with Roberts, and I
thought it might not be too impressive given that, but they did a fabulous
job. I was impressed.
On February
1, our church hosted a regional Awana competition. For the past several
years, we’ve been going to Binghamton, NY, for this competition, but we
rebelled this year and hosted our own instead. A church from Syracuse
came, and we had sort of an unofficial event, although our Awana missionary
came and helped us with awards and hosting. It was kind of thrown
together in about a week, but it turned out really well. We did Bible
quizzing, Fine Arts, and Games, and our church’s teams did very well. The
Trek team (7th and 8th grade) that Zach is on came in first in Bible quizzing,
and the Journey (9th – 12th grade) team that Abigail is on also took
first. We had Fine Arts judges from our church that gave very good input
to the teens on how they can improve their talent for God’s glory in
ministering to His people.
On February 8,
we went to the Awana T&T (3rd – 6th grade) Bible quiz. Levi and
Jemmie participated in that, and they both did very well. The both got
the highest individual scores, and their teams did well too. Jemmie’s
team took 1st place, and Levi’s took 4th (they are in different books so they
weren’t competing against each other). The other teams from our church
also did very well. Abigail and Amelia helped coach the teams.
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| Jemmie (left) getting ready... |
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| And she's right! |
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| Levi (fourth from left) concentrates... |
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| And he's right! |
Cody (Ella’s
fiancé) had his birthday on February 11. We had a party at our house for
him on the 14th. Ella made him a cookie cake that was very good, both in
looks and taste! We also opened presents that day that Hannah and Kevin
had sent us: perfume and a movie for Abigail and Amelia, a Valentine
Barbie for Jemmie, and candy for all of us.
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| Zach made Cody the nice hat |
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| We're intently watching as he s-l-o-w-l-y opens his presents |
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| Happy Birthday Cody! |
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| The yummy cookie cake |
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| Jemmie with her Valentine Barbie, and Levi with some of the candy |
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| The girls with their Valentine presents |
We’re all
working hard at getting ready for Ella’s wedding this Saturday, and it will be
an exciting day. Your prayers are appreciated! I’ll tell you more
about it next month.
Until March!
