Thanksgiving Celebrations

We are happy to report that we had an excellent Thanksgiving celebration with family. Our Thanksgiving was a three-part event, and surprisingly did not involve much turkey at all!
Thanksgiving day we started out at home... (Which looking back on it, if we hadn't had that time at home together I don't think the rest of the weekend would have gone as well.) Rory and Cecily and I enjoyed watching the parade together, and we ate baked brie and summer sausage with crackers. We also got a head start on Christmas decorations.
Thanksgiving evening we met Rory's family in Tacoma, and enjoyed a lovely feast at CI Shenanigans. Their buffet was quite the spread. The basics were available, but the seafood definitely stole the show. I got so distracted by the clams and salmon that I forgot to pay attention to the turkey. It could be said that Rebekah enjoyed a few chocolate dipped strawberries, but that would be an understatement!

Here is CJ investigating Grandpa Cliff's watch.

On Friday we headed up to Everett for a feast at Aunt Susan and Uncle Michael's. It was fun to get together- both Josh & Dorothy and Becky & Phillip were there. (Neither Cara and her Phil or Darren could make it-- so we missed them). It was funny because-- Becky is a science teacher, Dorothy is a Math teacher, Rory was a math major and is a math tutor/teacher, and Josh is a doctor. What happens when you get so many math and science minded people in a room? Naturally they start doing a scientific study that involves graphing something. Their graph helped them determine the rate that the roast was cooking and in turn were able to determine the exact time that the roast would be finished. Their hypothesis was correct, and as we sat down to enjoy the meal at the exact time estimated a jubilant Dorothy raised her fork and exclaimed, "Math wins!." A good time was had by all!
Here is Josh and Rory testing the chair to see how comfortable it would be for two guys to sit on an antique bench that happened to be placed directly under a counter.

It looks quite cozy.

Mommy and Me

I am making a conscious effort to make sure that we have pictures of me too. I am usually the one taking all the pictures, but every once in a while we remember to take some. Here are a few recent ones.

Ready for my close up!

Well, Here are a few more pics of CJ. I think she looks a lot like her Auntie Cara in the first one and then the third one reminds me of her Auntie Genesis. At any rate they make me smile.

Look at me go!

Here is our almost walking baby. She has entertained the thought of crawling, but the girl is determined to walk. She has pretty good balance, but needless to say has obtained quite a few boo-boos with all her practice steps. Maybe I'll be getting a walking baby for Christmas. Ready or not here she comes!

Bath Time!

Splish Splash I was taking a bath!

The Dread Pirate Roberts

Here is our very own pirate. What do you think of his hook and peg leg?

Bedtime Bandits!

Cecily and Jen got to stay for almost an entire week out in Yelm with Rebekah, Jimmy and Austin at the beginning of November.

It was a bonding experience for all and we were glad we got to do it!

These pictures were taken of Austin and Cecily having story time before bed. They totally crack me up!

Just Yesterday

Here are some sweet and funny moments we thought you might enjoy!

The Lion the Witch and The Wardrobe

Here we are representing a fine literary work at the church where Jen grew up, First Christian.
It took a little explaining, and required that we all stand in a line, but people got it, and seemed to like it. The lion definitely had the best costume (Nana Beth made it for her). We didn't have to explain that Cecily was a lion. We did however, have to remind people that SHE is a girl. My costume... the witch was a bit tricky. People thought I was Queen Susan the gentle. But no I was Jadis, Queen of Narnia. The problem was that I could not be too scary, and I had very limited resources. I remade this dress out of a wedding dress I found in the local thrift store. All the material I gleaned from the scraps in my mom's sewing room. And I had to do all sewing by hand. So a little was lost in translation, but I was trying to look like a snow queen. I just turned out looking like a nice snow queen. The Wardrobe was a large box that Jen drew an adapted version of the wardrobe on.

It was funny because every time a sugar high super hero walked by Rory they felt compelled to kick or punch the box. It was pretty funny to watch all these little boys walk by and automatically hit the box on their way past.

Rory felt a little confined standing in the box all night. He said it was a good social experiment. I have never seen him stand in one place for that long, especially in a social gathering.



Our little lion sure likes to walk around. Looks like she lost a bootie... surprise, surprise!

Grampa Noel was all ears. Cecily is telling him a good story.

The wardrobe got thirsty. Here he is getting a drink.

Look at all my cute teeth!

The Wardrobe was playing mini golf. Look at him parting the Red Sea with this five iron.

The Lion and the Snow Queen pause for a picture. Looks like someones getting tired.

The dress before it became the gown of the Snow Queen.

The Birthday Club

Birthday song-- adapted by Rebekah:
Happy Birthday to ... US
Happy Birthday to... US
Happy Birthday Jimmy, Rebekah, Jen, Genesis
Happy Birthday to US!

We had a fun time celebrating our October Birthdays at Round Table Pizza

The Aunties were happy to see their little niece.

Time for a family photo...Everyone Smile!
Cecily really looks up to her big cousin Austin Bear.
Here they are... the Birthday Girls with their hip purses. These purses are made out of genuine seat belts. Yes... seat belts like the ones in your car. Pretty cool.. even the round table knight is giving the ol' thumbs up!

We weren't kidding about that pink teething toy!

Got Teeth?

Take a look at Cecily's new trick. For some reason she likes to put this teething toy in her mouth and just leave it there. She has a green toy just like it, but she only does this with the pink one (so far). The other day she had it in her mouth for over a half an hour. As you can see in one of these pictures, she also tries to get more then one toy in there... while maintaining a firm bite on the pink teether. Such a funny girl!

Bittter-Sweet Beginning

As many of you know, our church building was damaged beyond repair in a fire on Palm Sunday 2006. The building was old and charming on a beautiful location. It was also unsafe, too small for our congregation and had a total of three toilets. Before the fire our congregation had already purchased some property with the hopes of building a new, more functional home in a more accessible location. Since the fire we were able to sell the old property with the damaged building on it for a wonderful cash sum. We have also settled with the insurance company and then contiuned to raise support from within our congregation. With all that though, money doesn't go as far as it used to. We will be building a 10,000 SF building that will be up to code and easy to expand on. It will have a 250-seat sanctuary and will have 9 toilets!! We hope to move in to our new building this coming summer..... or even fall would be nice. We haven't broke ground yet... so we'l see!

Anyway for those of you who have been following our story, I wanted to post some pictures of the old building. The new owners recently demolished it. It was a bit sad to see it gone. It is strange to drive by and not see that old building standing there. As you can imagine a few old-timers in the community are a bit bitter towards our church for selling it and allowing it to be torn down. However, despite their strong opinions few of them realized the extent of the damages. For our church body while the loss of the building has been sad....we see that there is sweetness to be found with our Father in Heaven. "Don't store treaseures for yourselves her on earth where moths and rust will destroy them... (Or Fire!!)... and thieves can break in and steal them. But store your treasures in heaven where they cannot be destroyed." Matthew 6:19-20