More Christmas

Rob and I have had a tradition of making lefse (lef'-sa) "a traditional Scandinavian potato-based, soft, flat bread. It is made by combining potato, flour, butter, milk, salt and water. The dough is rolled very thin and baked on a hot, dry griddle. It is a Scandinavian delight and very versatile. Spread it with butter and roll up for a quick snack. If you have a sweet tooth, sprinkle one with a little sugar and add a dash of cinnamon. Serve as a bread with meals, a coffee-time snack or roll-up with your favorite lunchmeats and cheeses." ......we almost did not this year, but having heard of my family making 3 batches last week and knowing that Rob will not be here to do it with me next year. We decided to do it on Christmas day. So as soon as the kids were down for a nap we started. Of course we were not able to finish it all during that time, but they really enjoyed helping too.

Then we had some friends from church come over and they brought a drum set for Garrett. Emma stated that the drums were "her" favorite gift. Naturally we do not have any drum sticks lying around, so they have been using wooden spoons.

Christmas

We spent this Christmas with just the 4 of us in Casper. Even though I was a little sad this morning that we were not with any extended family, I am glad we had the opportunity to do be in our home. Because our lives become so busy it is nice to have the relaxing time together, and appreciate it since we know Rob will be gone to Kuwait next year.

Since we did not have any picture to send out in our Christmas cards I thought we could share our Christmas eve picture. We had our Christmas eve service at church, full with children's pageant and all. That is the first time we have done any kind of Children's program since we have been here. We has almost 20 kids there, and about 60 people in church, the first year we were here it was about 15 people and the second year it was about 20 with with 6 of them being my family. It was a blessing to see, even though we do not measure God's work by numbers. It actually threw Rob off having so many people. We were very blessed to have our new neighbors, Brooke and Cody come. Cody told us the night before that he had only been to church maybe 5 times. So we are excited to see if in this next year we can share with him more who Christ is and how he can be saved.

The new wagon that Emma and Garrett received from my sister and her husband was a big hit. They spent about 2 hours in it after Rob got it set up. I don't know if you can tell or not but it is windy out here today, and for the last several days it has been too. It blew all our snow away. So no white Christmas.

But we are very blessed with how God loves us and cares for us, and for the gift of Jesus Christ and eternal life through his death on the cross.

Christmas blessings to you all!!

Rainbow over a "big rock"

A friend of ours took this picture near Independence Rock, which if you did not know is about 70 miles from Casper. Those who were privileged enough to grow up playing Oregon Trail on the old Apple Computers in school, will remember it was beneficial to make it to Independence Rock by the 4Th of July so you could make it through the mountains before the snow began to fly. Whenever we have visitors they usually get to go out to "the rock" on their first visit here. Seems like we have not been out there in a long time, guess we need some new first time visitors "lol". But to sum it up this is not a picture of Independence rock, but it looks similar and is near by, and has a really cool rainbow coming down over it. Some time when I can find one of our Independence Rock picture I will post it too.

Just sharing pictures

Life has been good. God is always blessing us and with us. I have not put much effort into my blog lately, but I did just get my Christmas cards send out. So I thought I would share some photos. The first one is Emma and Garrett with their cousin Jackson, Jared's little boy. Then the next one is Thanksgiving day and the kids with Rob playing some annual Thanksgiving day football. Then Emma and Trisha, making some cookies Finally Garrett getting his hands in the dishwater, he just loves to do this and I had to finally capture it. It is adorable how he rolls up his sleeves as soon he gets his chair up to the water.

Emma's prayer

Emma has been coming to church with me about since she turned 3, in June, and she loves going up front for the children's message. We have a college student (Josh) who does the message and he is very fond of Emma. He always asks if one of the kids would like to pray to close their time and this time Emma volunteered. Josh made a big deal of it and announced something like this: "OK everyone can I have your attention, the pastor's daughter is going to pray." Emma did a great job, although I could not hear her very well, she mentioned being thankful for her dad and her friends. We had just studied David and Saul being friends in Sunday school, so I seemed like she had really caught on and was thinking about that. It was on of those moments that melted Rob's and my heart.

Mmmmm...oatmeal (don't look if you are queasy)

Sorry this was just too funny not to share. This is typical Garrett eating. If you know Garrett you know he really likes to eat, but as much as he likes to eat he also likes to play in his food. If I do not take it away and he is done, he decides to make a masterpiece of it.

We like to pose...but not always look at the camera

Emma just waned to have her picture taken with Garrett. She is sporting her undershirt. Lately she has wanted to have as little clothes on as she can. Usually when I go in her room after her nap, she is in a swimsuit or gymnastics outfit. Then Garrett is holding onto his "maymay," we are not sure what that comes from, but it means his blanket. That one is his favorite he loves to rub the raggy ends between his fingers, but he will usually take whatever is available.

Our trick or treaters

Emma "Supergirl" and Garrett "Lion" in front of a store, downtown Casper.

The Saturday before Halloween we took the kids to "downtown Casper". The business pass out candy and there are hundreds of children and parents/grandparents on the sidewalks/inside stores. Even though it sounds rough, it is really quite fun, seeing all the kids in costumes, our kids really enjoyed it. Garrett learned to hold his basket out and candy would be put in it. He got to ride in the stroller since he is not real fond of walking around yet, trying to train him more before the baby comes. Espically since Rob will be gone come March.....but anyway.

Then on Friday we had "Trunks of Treats" at church and we all dressed up like biblical characters. We were then able to share a very quick version of that story from the Bible and passed out gospel tracts. It was an awesome opportunity to reach out to our community. Again the kids really enjoyed it but they were able to pass out candy this time. Later on they went around to the trunks and got some for themselves too. Garrett again showed how he knows how to hold onto his candy basket, I think we had to tear it away when we got home, to be able to get his PJ's on.

Emma "angel"and her friend Colbin "shepard" visiting with Noah, they were in his "boat".

More of Emma's brithday

I wanted to post these pictures, even though they are late (from June). Some great friends of ours invited us into their home and we had a party since we did not have a home at the time. The kids had a great time.

Enjoying the fall!

This was about the third week in September it was not super hot and they did not last long, but they did enjoy it and Emma is still asking me when we can get the pool out again.


Garrett is very content digging in the dirt. Who need grass anyway?

We are able to view this field of cat tails, or "dragon tails" (as Emma says) accross the road. And the kids have enjoyed picking some to display.

Fun in our new home

Emma and Garrett enjoying playing doctor and examining eachother.

Garrett is doing his school work, "puzzles", he is very serious about it.

Emma's tent, we have been able to keep it up in the guest bedroom and they periodically just in there and laugh and giggle with eachother. Occasionally Emma gets to take a nap in there too.

Two weeks ago we made a tent in the living room, very fun to be under and watch TV.

This was over two weeks ago, and it was a little cold. Again this is one of the times Emma dressed herself, it was a little cold for the shorts.

Emma's ever changing outfits

These were pictures from same day, I am sure that any of you with little girls completely understands. I think there were several more outfits that day, but I wanted to caputre these two because, the first one is Emma in her dedication gown, I could not belive my eyes when she came out with that one on. It was very hard to peel off around here chest, she is a determined little girl. Then the other one is some pajames that have been passed down from her cousins and Grandma Peterson was very excited that Emma now had them to wear. I do need to do a little repair on one of the seams that is ripped out they have deffintely been worn by a few kids.

All of the stuffed animals were lined up for "school" now that Emma really understands school yet but that was her version of it, and I had to give them some "lessons" as the teacher. Emma really enjoyed the "teaching" (stories off the top of my head).

Painting help

Two weeks ago my parents and my Grandma came out from Minnesota and my brother Caleb and his wife Sharon from Ft. Collins. They did an amazing job helping us get some much needed painting done on our house. The walls were all primer, and it was a bit too white. You can see we had some fun with Emma and Garrett's rooms, and there bathroom is very bright (I do not have a picture of it yet).

While they were here we had a great snow storm, the snowman is from Saturday of that weekend. Emma has been asking us all Summer when she and Rob can build a snowman again (she had a book about a little girl who makes snowmen all Winter with the same snowball "Sadie and the snowman" and it really got her thinking). So even though we were in the midst of painting Rob did not miss the opportunity to take her out and build her snowman. It must have been cooler on our deck, because the snow really piled up there first. So they were able to just use the nice clean snow on the deck. By Sunday morning we had about 6 inches all over the place, but by the end of the week it was all gone.

Emma and Garrett love to have tea parties and were able to have one with my grandma "G.G." (short for great-grandma) while she was here. She had not been out to see us in Casper since the year Emma was born (2005). Needless to say she enjoyed the visit and it was great to have her.

I love ya!

Three weeks ago on Sunday morning, Garrett overheard Emma and Rob saying, " I love you" to eachother, and he decided to get in on the affection too. Ever since he has been enjoying randomly telling us, "I love ya". Sometimes over and over, but I never grow tired of that sweet little voice telling me that I am loved by him.

New home

We have moved into our home. I realized moving is a whole different thing when you have kids. In our last house we were moved in and had the pictures up on the wall by the end of the week, and that was even with working outside of the home full time. Yes, I do know eventually everything will get into place, and we are all enjoying the space to move on our 2 acres and are watching the deer and coyotes across the road. Rob saw a coyote chasing some deer this morning, wow, that was pretty neat!

Rob worked hard on the deck the last two weeks and he will be back to work at the church tomorrow. I helped him with the deck on Thursday for the first time, it was really fun for me to do with him. Garrett was out there with us most of the time and Emma would come out, but be back in the house in a little bit. Most of the day she was in her swim suit and a bath robe, the robe was a new hand-me-down from cousins that Grandma and Grandpa brought out last week.

We were able to get 3 rooms painted before we moved everything in. Since all the walls were white. We are excited to get some more done soon. You can see some of the green and blue in the pictures. In the last picture Garrett was washing tomatoes with Grandma, he was having a great time, but he cannot resist saying "cheeee" (cheese) whenever he see the camera.

Then on Friday I was able to get away with some friends to a Beth Moore conference in Billings, MT. It was great! We are planning on going to the one in Laramie, WY May 21 & 22, 2009.

Fishing

The past two weekends we have been able to get out fishing. Emma has been wanting to use her Barbie pole, which she had been enjoying casting at home with the rubber fish on the end that is came with. So she was a little confused when Rob cut if off to put a hook on it and there was no longer a fish.

When we arrived at the reservoir for the first day of fishing she was excited and that lasted about 5 minutes and then she passed her pole off to Rob. Then is was suddenly very fun to play with the night crawlers. But as she continued to get worms for us she did not enjoy her hands being dirty and was constantly washing them off in the water. We caught 3 big carp and a little perch.

Then this past weekend we just went down to the North Platte River here in town and did catch a nice little Rainbow Trout (on the Barbie pole). Garrett got to try holding the pole a little bit this time. The first time, he was in the backpack watching over Rob's shoulder.

Update on our house: it is coming along, it arrived over a week ago and will be one the foundation on Wednesday. We hope to be moving in about the middle of September.

Quote of the day

Emma told me she was hungry this morning. Then I thought I heard her stomach growl and I asked her, "Is your stomach growling?"

Emma-"No, I don't have a bear in my stomach!"

Baby time

Yes, if you did not know we are expecting!! Ten weeks and one day along. I included the pregnancy calendar there because it is such a miracle to me to see the baby, and what it looks like now. I showed Emma earlier and she was amazed. She wanted me to show Garrett also, but I was not able to even get him to stop to look at the computer.

Home update

Just a quick update. We are now living in a home with a wonderful family from our church. It is nice to be in a house again. Emma and Garrett are very content and that makes it much easier for me. We were able to order our house last week and it will be shipped from Worthington, MN the first week in August. It is a modular home, so it will come in two halves and then have to be put together when it gets here. We paid the money for our garage today and they will order the supplies for it and, will be able to start building that on site once the house is in place. Sounds like we should be able to move in close to the end of August.

Fun at Caleb and Sharon's

We have spent the past few days at Caleb and Sharon's, we had a b-day party for Emma tonight. We have had fun seeing the sights of Ft. Collins and spending time with aunts, uncles, and Grandma and Grandpa. Then tomorrow morning we will head back to Minnesota while Rob is at Camp Gurnsey in Wyoming for the next two weeks.