Snow Day #2

I have one smart child and three that *like* the cold and snow :)

Here's Smart Margaret. . .cuddled on a cold, snowy day in her warm robe and another blanket, clutching her hot chocolate and vegging in front of PBS.  For the record I am, right this minute, sitting in that vacant bed right next to her typing this up. . .I'm smart too.  There's a feather mattress on it and lots of blankets. . .I haven't moved since Tom left for work almost three hours ago.  Pathetic?  Maybe.  Just enjoying a "real" snow day -- ha!
Here are the other three, heading down the street looking for a place to go sledding:

 

Unbeknownst to me, they were all walking in only layers of socks!!!  Well, Frederick had some slippers on but still. . .I promise they have shoes and some even have boots!!!  Ugh.  Their excuse was "we were jumping on the trampoline and we didn't think about it when we left to go walk 1/2 mile down the street".  Really?!?  Do I dare mention their ages?!?  Oh well. . .Thomas, the bright 13-yr-old, came home 1/2 hour later looking for some shoes because his toes were frozen.  Hmmmm. . .file this under "natural consequences". . .best teaching tool EVER.

Oh, proof they were on the trampoline?  Yea, I took these pictures out of the upstairs window. . .you think I'd actually, voluntarily, open a door and go outside in snow if there is a warm room I can hunker down in instead?

And yes, that *is* Margaret out there (in the pink hat) for her 10 brief minutes of insanity.  She was back in lickity-split.

Just 13 days ago, on New Years Eve, I asked Thomas to take this picture. . .

Jeanette's always hot but I didn't have a jacket on, or long pants. . .and it was December 31st!!!  We've had two "snow days" since then -- ha! Hope to be back out there soon :)

On the agenda this four-day weekend?  I don't know. . .catch up on everything that is NOT getting done, being gone all day, every day I guess.  Enjoy the time we have together.  Be productive and balance it with time to just be.

Happy weekend everyone!!!  And yes, for all who've asked, my kids *love* being back in school and they have wonderful teachers who are really inspiring them.  We are blessed.

Love,
Jenni

 ETA:  Linking up with Company Girls over at Home Sanctuary this cold Friday!  Head over if you would like to meet some new friends. . .it's my kind of party -- the more the merrier :)

First Day

Frederick 3rd grade, Thomas 7th grade, Margaret 4th grade, & Marie 5th grade

It was a wonderful first day of school today.  Tom took the younger two to their school (same campus as my school but different buildings) and then came over to the middle school to meet me in the office with the other two so he could get them situated with their schedules, lockers, etc. while I began my new life in a 7th grade social studies (geography & culture) classroom.  I have 125 names to learn -- ack!!!  I have lessons to plan. . .I'm spending huge chunks of time just trying to stay one step ahead in the curriculum :)  I'm not hooked up to grade programs, lesson plan programs, google.docs, websites, e-mail or anything else yet which is kind of a blessing. . .those, too, will take huge amounts of time to figure out I'm sure. 
I love the classroom. . .the kids all seem to love their classes and teachers. . .so far, so good. 
It's not bad starting this season with a 3-day week -- ha!
Love,
Jenni

Christmas 2011

O.K., I simply and completely give up on this post.  I started it on December 28th.  I've been working on completing it off-and-on since then, and put a couple hours into it today.  It's gone.  Completely gone.  I could cry, but I'm not going to.  I'm going to brush of the perfectionist Jenni and just move forward. 

Christmas Eve with cousins, prime rib, the *best* onion rings ever compliments of Uncle Brian. . .

Grandma got all the Bell kiddos snuggies. . .they turned out to be a *huge* hit!

 

My favorite gift to give this year were 2011 photo books that I made for each of my nieces:

And the best gift received (besides the gift of Jesus Christ, of course) was a scrapbook Tom's mother made for him.  It documents his life from birth to our wedding day.

Here he, his sister Kathy, and Thomas are looking through it the first time

This great group grew up together. . .neighbors and best of friends.  Sister-brother Kathy (UT) and Tom (TN) and sister-sister Debbie (CA) and Jennifer (OH).  Hiking together Christmas Day was always a tradition for  the families growing up but this is the first year in quite a few that it happened again.  10 adults, 4 kids, and 4 dogs. . .we were quite a parade at the park!

Oh how I hoped to have a very comprehensive post with lots of pictures and journaling but Google lost it (I think?!?).  I can't sign off until I post just a few more pictures of our wonderful day:

Max & Thomas

Margaret and her American Girl Doll that has a very special story that I will share with her when she is older (it's another one of those "most special gifts" of Christmas)

Marie and Frederick gave all the grandparents and aunts/uncles snowglobe ornaments and to-do lists

The always-elusive picture with Grandpa Fred :)

And a special picture with Aunt Kathy

And now, moving onward and forward. . .Happy New Year everyone!!!  I just got the New Years cards in the mail today and our annual letter printed up. . .hopefully we'll find some time to get those out this week :)  We are ready to begin our new adventure tomorrow -- finally.  The kids have either met their new teachers or know their class schedules. . .now it's time to put it all into action!

Love,
Jenni

January 3, 2012

Today was supposed to be the kids' and my first day back to school after staying at home together for the last 12 months.

Hey did you catch it?  Let me zoom in a little bit. . .

That would be a touch, a sprinkling, of s-n-o-w.  Snow combined with temperatures that aren't supposed to climb above freezing today equal. . .

SNOW DAY!!!!

(Or, as I saw posted on FB today, "a snowless snow day").

Ugh.

One of the reasons last year for our lifestyle change.

But I'm certain that God has placed us where we are today, in a new season, for a very specific purpose.

So we will enjoy one.more.day together.  It's 7:30 a.m. and we should all be arriving at our new schools by now. . .and yet all the kids are still peacefully sleeping, blissfully unaware of their good fortune (the school cancellation wasn't called until after they were asleep last night) today.  They have been so excited, have spent a lot of energy on the anticipation of today. . .and Lord willing, tomorrow will come with those same bright promises.

Picture I snapped with my phone on my way out of school yesterday

Guess I shouldn't have hung those snowflakes on my door?

Home!

 What an incredible Christmas Holiday we had!

 We began our Christmas with a trip to the Wilderness Lodge.  That was our gift to the kiddos this year. . .rather than shopping and wrapping and then finding places for all the "stuff" (that we don't need!) we decided as a family to make a memory instead.  My dad brought my nieces down with him. . .this was his Christmas gift to them!  It all worked out so well. . .I *highly* recommend this place. . .

Since there were 9 of us we decided to get a suite with a full kitchen and we are so glad that we did.  We brought tons of breakfast stuff (milk, juice, yogurt, cereal, fruit) and snack-y stuff too. . .chips and salsa, veggies & dip, microwave popcorn. . .I had also planned two dinners. . .we stopped at Papa Murphy's on the way out of town and picked up 4 pizzas to bake Wednesday night (there ended up being enough for lunch Thursday too!) and then I brought a crock pot meal for Thursday night.  We didn't do it so much to save money (although I'm sure we did save quite a bit) but more for convenience. . .with 9 people it's hard to coral them all at the same time to get ready, get out the door, eat, etc.  This worked out much better!

Frederick body boarding. . .

Every time the waves were on you could find Thomas in the wave pool :)

Tom & Margaret

Susan & Marie hanging out, waiting for the waves :)

 Bible quiz time with Grandpa

And on to a game of Scattergories (one of my favorite games!) -- AVJ and Marie were on the same team

A surfing lesson for AVJ and Thomas at 11:30 p.m.!

 She was up on her own -- yea!

And an "illegal" shot of Thomas. . .if I would have been given information on how to buy the prints I certainly would have -- either I don't know how to work my camera (extremely likely) or it's just not the camera for indoor action shots.

Gotta love the wireless internet for sure!  I appreciated having three televisions in our rooms so everyone could be otherwise occupied in our "off" hours :)

We headed to the Titanic museum Thursday afternoon. . .a few of the kiddos were waterlogged and needed a break -- ha!  This was an amazing tour although if we had it to do again we wouldn't take the littlest ones (2nd, 3rd, and 4th grade)

Grandpa Foster with his favorite 6 -- Susan, AVJ, Frederick, Marie, Margaret, & Thomas

 This was the hot tub area (and it continues outside too!). . .did you spot Thomas and Tom in the far back corner?

Enjoying the water slides. . .

 A view from the outside (they are also doing a lot of construction inside and out at the resort)

 By far my favorite picture. . .Frederick did not get "brave" enough to do the slides by himself until the last day (of course)

There were 90 steps from bottom to top.  Yep, I counted :)

Friday morning only two of the six kids had it in them to head back to the water -- ha!

And then we ran into friends from our town, 100 miles away, too!  That was fun.

We ended up staying past lunchtime on Friday and getting into Ohio past dinnertime.  Everyone was happy to see Aunt Kathy, in from Utah, and try to get a good night's sleep before the next big holiday treat on Christmas Eve:

 A Cincinnati Bengals game, compliments of Uncle Brian!!!  Another "experience" gift -- the best kind :)  Thank you, Uncle Brian, for an experience the kids are unlikely to ever forget.

We had lots of cousins time, lots of family time. . .a lot packed in to a couple of days.  An unusual thing has happened to my calendar this week:

An absolute blank week.  The one thing I have written down is a reminder that we're NOT having church programs on Wednesday night -- ha!  I'm sure we'll fill it up. . .my new classroom needs work, we have loads of books to return to the library, maybe some friends will come over. . .next Tuesday (and our first day back at school!) will be here soon enough. . .