Christmas Up North

We headed north for Christmas this year. While visiting Steve's Mom, we went to a Christmas Eve service and drove around Lawrence Park looking at Christmas lights. We also tried pulling taffy and played some games. While visiting Debbie's parents, Debbie made Chinese food (including Black Pepper venison) and had homemade Ice Cream. We also celebrated our anniversary. Abby really enjoyed watching Grandma decorate three cakes, one of which was our anniversary cake.







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Most of the snow was gone in Erie, since it was warm and rainy Christmas Eve. It did snow just enough for a White Christmas. Coming home from Spring Creek, it was in the sixties. I guess winter must be over already.

Christmas Play

It has been a long time, but this time of year is always like this.

This year for the Christmas Banquet the Jr./Sr. High School put on A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. Stevie was in charge of the sound effects (with Mr. Guntrum's supervision) while Abby was a society lady collecting money for the poor and attending Nephew Fred's party.

Chicken Pox

What a week! Abby noticed them first on Monday evening. I checked Stevie and sure enough, he had them too. It was quite a surprise because they had been vaccinated for them when they were small. Stevie had them worse than Abby by far but both of them were itchy. I think that they are pretty well over them but they still have some scabs. Thankfully, the vaccination prevented them from having a severe case but it was bad enough. Steve brought their homework home from school and they are pretty much caught up but they are more than ready to get back to the real world. The first part of the week wasn't so bad. They both slept alot and took lots of oatmeal baths. As they got to feeling better, they wanted to to more things. Fortunately for Abby, the sewing machine that she's been saving for arrived Monday evening and she has had fun sewing some things on that. Stevie did alot of reading--of course, and some computer games. Friday night, we needed to do something but we didn't dare go out in public. Steve made a chart on the computer with the names of several fast food places around Salem at the top and down the side he put "sandwich, side, drink, and dessert" We bundled up and went through the drive through at Wendy's, McDonald's, and Kentucky Fried Chicken to get our supper. We actually went to Arby's too but Steve went in because he had a coupon. It was fun--and more expensive--but we kept our insanity intact. Yesterday, the kids stayed home alone while Steve and I did some grocery shopping. I was happy to get out too. I told the kids that I wanted to take some pictures of them to post and they protested. Steve said that we could zoom in and get just a spot or two but they didn't like that idea either. We did take a picture of the table with all the fast food bags and food spread out on it. Maybe I'll post that one later.

Veteran's Day

On Veteran's Day, it is appropriate to honor my Dad who fought in WWII. When Dad turned 18, he was drafted out of his senior year of high school. He was trained in the deserts of the Southwest to be sent to North Africa. He was then sent to Europe instead. He was a member of the 95th division. They landed on Normandy in September after D-Day. They traveled through France, Netherlands, and into Germany. They captured the city of Metz November 22, which had not fallen for centuries. It was protected by a number of castles and walls. My Dad told about helping relieve the troops in the Bulge during the Battle of the Bulge but I didn't see it in the histories. I wonder if his section was transferred at that time.

Dad was a medic under fire. He worked in a field hospital as well as on the front lines. He told of seeing a soldier fall under gunfire and an officer telling him "Go help him."

Thank you Dad for serving your country and keeping us free.






P.S. Here are a couple of websites I found that weren't around when I was looking a couple of years ago.

http://mathieu.gitzhofer.free.fr
http://www.lonesentry.com/gi_stories_booklets/95thinfantry/index.html

Elections

The election board prepares for their first voter of the day.



Stevie the poll worker gives directions for inserting the ballot into the ballot box.



A student excercises choice in the voting booth.



And the winner is . . .


Well McCain lost, but Cocoa won. As a family, we are happy for Stevie and his Love at First Bite Party. Congratulations to all in a well fought battle.

McCain Rally

Friday morning, Stevie went on a field trip with the government class to a McCain Rally. Rudy Giuliani was there as was Lindsay Graham and the McCain's (of course). The rally was at United High School in Hanoverton-Middle of Nowhere-OH. There were between 2500 and 5000 people there. Stevie was at the front of the crowd so he had a good view. He didn't get a handshake because he got behind Mr. Forrider and he isn't that aggressive but he did enjoy it.

The 5th and 6th grade teacher, Mr. Duvall wanted to go with his family. Since Steve's classes all went to the rally, he substituted. That was a bit of a different experience, but it went really well.

Check out http://www.McCainBloggette.com "America is Worth Fighting for" The first two pictures are of the rally Stevie was at. In the first picture, Mr. Duvall is on the left in the green sweater (I think its green at least).

New Blog

Check out Steve's new blog, Defending Genesis. Just click the link on the left.

Autumn in Grape Country

This past weekend we headed to North East, PA to visit Steve's mom. While we were there, we got to see a grape picker in action. Of course this was commonplace for Steve and his mom but Stevie, Abby and I enjoyed seeing it. It was funny how the leaves of the grapevines were yellowed and shriveled but there were still beautiful clusters of grapes hanging on the vines. In fact, some places there were no leaves at all and yet there were large clusters hanging from the bare vines. The smell in the air was wonderful. I think it was primarily the grapes we were smelling but there were loaded apple orchards too. It was a beautiful fall day and we had a nice, relaxing visit with Steve's mom. Aunt Gladys came over too and of course we had to play some games. Unfortunately, I had a headache and missed out on some of them.





Here are a couple more pictures. One is the grape picker and the other is just some of the beautiful countryside.

The Great Cookie Debate

Well,today was the great cookie debate at SWA. The two candidates, Cocoa and Chunky, expressed their views on eating cookie dough, cookie economics, cookies in the military, and cookies- a right or a responsability. Cocoa is a chocolate cookie with white chips, Chunky is a normal chocolate chip cookie.


Stevie had his first experience in politics today, as he was the spokesman for the "Love at First Bite" party that nominated Cocoa. His classmate Stephen Fish spoke for the McFlamen Party that supports Chunky. One highlight of the debate was when Stevie told of Cocoa's war experience as a member of the Cookie Marines fighting radical food. (I do wonder what kind of food is radical. Sauerkraut? Dragon eyes? Durian? Gummy worms?) Cocoa lost his leg fighting a suicide bomber. Cookies gave him the strength to go on so he wants every soldier to have the opportunity to eat Cocoa cookies. Another highlight was when Stevie decried sending millions of dollars overseas to import cookies. He also recommended dunking milk in your cookies. (The other side actually agreed with that stand.)



Stevie really did quite well and we were proud of him. Even Abby admitted he did a good job. The polls show that the debate changed a lot of minds, but they also reveal an election too close to call. Stay tuned. On November 4, we will carry the very important news of who won the Great Cookie Election. May the best cookie win!

School Pictures

Well, today was picture day. I decided that since our enrollment is down, I would be able to get pictures of the entire school in one day . . . and I would have if my camera batteries and charger had worked properly. I got a new camera this summer and it takes special batteries. I bought two batteries and a charger so that I wouldn't have the kind of problem that I had today. I was down to the last class and the battery went dead. No problem! Just put the other battery in and keep on going. Wrong! Even though the charger said that the battery was charged, it was not. After two hours, it still was not charged. AAAAAUUUUUGGGHHH! I did get the school camera and finish up the kids--except for one who had put blue highlighter on his lips and couldn't get it off and another whose picture, by no fault of her own, came up missing amidst the battery issues. I still need some pictures of the faculty and staff but I will try to get those this week--if I can get my camera to work. There are a couple of pics that I want to retake but I was happy with the majority of the pictures. Some of them are better than others but I'm still learning--and having lots of fun. I'll try to post a few of the pics that I especially liked. I don't know if I'll have sucess on this computer with dial-up but if not, I'll get them up later when I have a better connection.

Fall is Here!

Well, nothing much is happening. School is keeping all of us busy. The weather is changing. I can't wait until the leaves start turning. I've heard that we are to have an exceptionally beautiful fall this year. I hope that's the case. I want to get outside with my camera and capture the brilliance of fall. It's one of the few things that I missed while in Taiwan. Here are a couple of pics that I snapped earlier this year. One of them was taken from the school parking lot looking across Newgarden Ave. I wondered if the rays of sun could be captured on film--they were. I was happy with how it turned out. The other one was taken at the park near our house. I love the effect of the reflections in the water. I am hoping to get one in the fall with all the colored leaves. Maybe I can capture one in winter and spring too. I could frame them as a set. That would be cool. Well, I need to get a few things done before the VP debate. Can't miss that! As I heard on the radio today . . . it's bound to be the most exciting thing about the entire election.

Here We Go Into The Wild Blog Yonder

We've been thinking about this for a while. I guess it's not too difficult. We'll be posting things going on in our family as we have time.

Just to catch everyone (whoever that may be at this point) up on our summer, we did manage to keep busy. Debbie was in charge of Children's chapel for ten weeks. We had been wanting to use The End of the Spear for the continued story for a missions/jungle theme and this was the opportunity to do it.

Steve had the class at Stoneboro Youth Camp where he covered the Bible from "Genesis to Genesis." One of the thrills was the number of public school students who seemed to learn from the talks. Church people tend to be very sympathetic to Creationism, but the real test of the message is people who have heard billions of years all their lives.

Stevie participated in the Youth Quiz and won first place in the junior division against overwhelming competition. (His cousin Joel won the college division against even greater odds -- he actually had someone else competing against him.)

The girls stayed home from Youth Camp and babysat at the Strattons. Abby got her first real experience as a babysitter -- both the joys and the frustrations. Now she knows what her parents feel like.

As a family, we went to ICC08 (International Conference on Creationism 2008). Stevie and Steve went to all the sessions while the girls hung out in the hotel. The evening sessions were open to everyone. We heard Steve Austin, Russell Humphreys, John Baumgardner, and Andrew Snelling. It was a lot of fun and very informative.

Well, we are back to school, but maybe we'll save that news for the next blog.