Christmas thoughts

We all had a very nice Christmas. Stefan is nearly two months old and is growing and getting more settled. Since I last wrote, which may be before he was born, my friends have been through various trials and are surviving them. My life seems to comfortable in comparison.

The kids exchanged gifts by drawing names this year and that worked very well. It was far less stressful for everyone. My favorite gift of the year was the Chagal stain glass from my mom. The strangest was from my mom as well.....a japanese like printed diaper bag. The diapers are nice of course but the bag pretty loud. Wow.

Charley is working on drywalling the basement which is great. He waited till his vacation was nearly over to start but once he gets going he gets on a roll. Erik is helping.

Cecilia and Benjamin's hobby is bouncing off the walls. Cecilia does enjoy the lap harp we got her and Martin. She plays it all the time. She is playing it now.

I hope to start school back up again next week. It will be a challenge as Stefan has an appointment Tuesday that will break up the day. We will try anyway.

I guess that is all for today.

Waiting

I know it is not even my due date yet but.....I hate waiting. I have been getting up every other night with contractions that tend to go away after I wash some dishes and fold some laundry. Then.......when I lay down they come back. I hardly ever post but thought that this may be worth posting. THe suspense is killing me as to whether it is a boy or a girl. Cecilia said that if it is a boy that we could have a girl next time.......interesting.

It is 9:30 and I haven't tackled catechism with the kids yet. We shall see what sort of work we get done today.

Knitting addict

It has now become a weekend ritual to go and retreat to the knitting store to get lots of knitting done, meet interesting people, and drink cappacinnos (spelling??). It is ever so relaxing and nice to look forward to.

Musing on the gas prices......I personally think the great gas prices will all disappear after November 7th, the election, as the gas prices are reflecting well on the Republicans so.......once the oil prices get their politicians in office this will all go sour. THat is my pessimistic view for the weekend.

Charley and I commucicated more than we ever had in making a major decision last night over a bowl of Ritters ice cream. The tough part is following through. Help!!!!!!!

Time to go throw dinner together so that is all for today's thrilling post.

Karin

Life

It has been since July since I have posted anything. The last few days have been great. My dh has finally realized he needs to help the kids with their upper level math and being accountable to getting their schoolwork done. This is fantastic. I don't feel so exhausted and overwhelmed and it is a relief. I also quit my Sunday School responsibilities last night which also brings a lot of relief from trying to make everything 'right' for everyone.

Since July, we have experienced 100 degree fairweek, dh trimmed out two rooms of the old farm house, Anna painted the stairs and we ripped the wall paper off. Anna also painted the front porch which was long overdue. I painted the back room and Charley sanded and finished the dining room floor. Phew, that isn't even everything that occurred in August.

In September we started school and so far so good, we may be a little behind but things are moving along. The baby keeps me up at night but not as much the last few days which is a relief as I was getting very sleep deprived. I discovered a knitting store which I love where I can go to retreat and spend time quietly with other knitters on the weekend.

We shall see how long it is untill I post again.......7 weeks untill baby.

July 2, 2006

Since the last post we spent Friday evening delivering bees to a local vege farmer. We had trouble finding it so we didn't get home till 12:30am. Ugh. I was tired the next day. I haven't checked to see if the bees were happy.

Saturday I weeded and mowed the lawn. Charley and the boys went to build a deck for a co-worker. THe boys got to go swimming afterward in the neighborhood pool and the wife of the family wanted to adopt Martin for his cuteness.

Sunday we had my parents, brother and his wife for a picnic. My mom brought most of the food so it was pretty simple. I resisted the urge to weed so I wouldn't be exhausted the next day. Charley and I went to get a new bread machine afterwards. I am having some trouble with it so we will see if we keep it.

Today is Monday and the kids and I cleaned the basement this morning. I can not believe how much we got done! It was incredible. THe little kids are now tired and whiny so will have to go drum up something for them to do.

Karin

June 30, 2006

Got back yesterday from a great trip to Ludington State Park with friends. The weather was a bit cooler than we expected but we still had a great time. Came home to a lot of weeds and small crises that happened while we were gone. A coon got into the pullet pen and killed I think five pullets. We trapped it in a live trap and gave it to someone far away. The little kids seem fascinated by this adventure.

I spent the day weeding and doing laundry. Took Anna to the cake store to get a little help on her fair cake and found out the cake leaders daughter has six kids with one on the way as well. She enjoyed talking to us about the upcoming baby due next week.

We looked into the bees today as well and they are finally putting honey in the honey supers. Later tonight we are taking two hives to a vegetable farmer's place. Hopefully that goes well. I s hould go mow the lawn but don't really feel like it.

That is all for today!

Karin