Christmas Day

Christmas suspense was building. This little watcher kept a tree-side vigil patiently:

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Well, mostly patiently.

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We enjoyed Christmas music from family musicians old:

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and new:

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One of the best parts of the day was a father-son Jingle Bells duet. Alexander has been taking clarinet lessons for about three months.

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Keeping time:img_1981

Little brothers-my favorite.
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Daniel and Dominic sweethearts. Joseph is not amused.

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Grandparents visited:

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Dominic and Claire love to play ‘puppysitting’

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Landon won the originality award for wrapping presents for himself:img_6610

Merry Christmas!

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2015

2015, have you flown by already? The older I get, I realize that a year really isn’t very long at all. Looking through all the photos the family has taken over the last year, it  does seem that we fit a lot into 2015.

January I began actual nursing classes, after two years of wading through the prerequisite science and psychology classes. The one-month interim course at my school fits a whole semester’s material into three weeks , so bitter January passed quickly. The class finished with a role playing presentation that was fun to work on and present to the class:

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Through February and March, both Mom and the excitement for our newest family member grew steadily:

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April brought the welcome spring, with flowering bulbs, spring sun, and crazy baby chickens in the mail:
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May was filled with celebrations following one after the other. Benjamin arrived safe and sound shocking us with his head of curls.  Landon graduated from homeschool life, and several members of the family received sacraments:

Maria was confirmed:

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as well as Johnathan:

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and Alexander:
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In June Benjamin also received his first sacrament!

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In July I flew with an amazing group to Alaska on a two week mission trip through FOCUS (Fellowship of Catholic University students). This was my first trip away from home by myself, so it was very new and exciting experience:

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The family spent August enjoying the last warm, school-free days of Summer:

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And this must suffice for September, October, November, and December, as I only narrowly escaped being buried alive in homework this semester. I passed a lot of exciting nursing milestones such as first injection given, first patient cared for, and learning to understand a million different lab values.

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 Now, forward on to 2016!

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These pictures are from the Fourth of July (was that almost a month ago already?). I’ve never been able to take pictures in such dim light before, so I was really excited about the way these turned out. The camera is a little tricky to manage at an aperture this wide open, so some of them are a bit out of focus, but the moment is captured nevertheless.  Here, Dominic gets help from John to hold a flaming fire sword.

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Alexander:
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This one of Joseph is the best photo only lit by a sparkler: IMG_3064

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Daniel also loved waving around fire at the end of the stick:IMG_3024

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Odds and Ends

Hello, everyone!  Monday I had my wisdom teeth taken out, and the surgery went really well, but recuperation has felt really slow.  I’ve been existing on a pretty much liquid diet, and I’m only just beginning to get back to regular foods. I’ve had enough milkshakes and pudding to last me a year!  Also, everyone around the house can’t wait for me to talk better again.

All that sitting around has had me searching for things to do.  I went through some recent photographs and found ones from several events from the last couple months:

Alexander and his friend from my ballet class’ recital dance at the end of May.  They danced to ‘Danse Macabre’.

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May and June brings a bunch of birthdays: Claire’s first:

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Daniel’s fifth:
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Alexander’s tenth,

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Dominic’s third,

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and Joseph’s eighth.

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Joseph also got to receive his First Holy Communion

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Probably the first photo of our entire family together (including Claire):IMG_2114

 

 

 

Garden Journal-II

The snapdragons I planted from seed are doing very well, and are beginning to flower.

 

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The cosmos I grew from seed have normal sized flowers now that they are big:

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These lilies are some of my favorites, and they didn’t bloom last year because the weather was so odd. I’m excited for them to open.

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Coneflowers and shasta daisies:

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Pea vines cover the fence, and they have lot’s of pods on them.
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Banana pepper just before picking:

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The raspberries have a bumper crop, and Alexander has been my faithful raspberry picker.

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He is very proud of himself for being able to tell which ones are ripe.IMG_6952

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New Chickens!

 

The baby chickens sure are getting a lot of attention around here! They are so cute though, so who could resist picking them up and petting their silky soft down.  There are four of them, and they’ll be beauties when they grow up! Chickens8

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This is what they’ll look like when they are big:

A barred rock:

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A speckled sussex:

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A gold laced wyandotte:
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A columbian wyandotte:

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We’re working on naming them, since so far only the gold laced has been named (Victoria). Chickens have ended up being a really fun and rewarding project, so everyone is excited about the new additions.

Pictures from Minneapolis

We spent the last weekend of February in Minneapolis. Dominic was pretty excited about the hotel where we stayed, and he crawled over every inch of his new territory.

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When we arrived at the hotel, we had Chinese food delivered to our rooms. (Daniel ate as he was getting into his pajamas)

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The next day, we went to the aquarium underneath the Mall of America.

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We petted starfish and sea urchins, and neither of them felt like I expected. The starfish were velvety and squishy. Sea urchin spikes were not sharp and pointy, and they were much softer and more pliable than I thought they would be.

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Daniel was way too scared of the starfish to even put his hands in the water, but he was very impressed by the sharks, manta rays, and sea turtles we saw.

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Why You Never Tell a Secret to a Six Year Old

Alexander (trying to get onto the computer): “Mom, how do you spell Boba Fett? That’s the password on my settings.”

Mom: “I think it’s B-O-B-A F-E-T-T.”

Alexander: “But I tried that already and it didn’t work.”

Johnathan (who had been standing nearby the entire time): “Alexander, I know how to spell Boba Fett.”

Alexander: “Hey, how do you know my password?”