{Our Valentines }

We celebrated our Valentine's all week long

and

a bit at a time.

Sunday evening we had a Valentine supper at church

and Dan joined the drama team for a funny

skit about a church van heading to church.

He was the driver and he picked up a crazy crew

including Joe who was one of the couples' kids.

We had a delicious soup, salad and sandwich meal and great fellowship.

Joe chose mini rubix cubes for Valentines this year.

He had fun putting this simple idea together.

And he had no interest in actually giving them away.

He worked hard using his Math Bowl formula to figure the area and volume of  his cube.

What a sweet memory putting together valentines with my boy.

And we snuck in a Valentine meal at home - after work and practice.

Thankful we we able to be at home together.

We grilled steaks, made mashed potatoes, salad for mom and dad

and grandma's frozen punch for drink

And we passed simple hearts around and wrote our favorite thing about that person

on the heart.  Here was the win - might have been just for mom- but there were no complaints from my crew of boys becoming men.  

And then we had a family ping pong tournament.

DH smokes us all, Sam and Joe are pretty even.

And well, I can barely return any of their good shots.

These two were also able to play with no reports of cheating - ha.  

 Brotherly Love was in the air.

Grandma stopped by and brought the boys each a Valentine cookie.

Such a sweet treat.

And grandpa took on each of the boys in a ping pong challenge.

Grandpa with the moves!

Scott and Chris also stopped by and we just had a super night of family fun.

We capped it off with angel food cake and fruit with whipped topping.

Simple Valentine Fun.  

Celebrating Drew

It's always good to pause to celebrate.

This time it was Drew's turn.

He is our newest teen.

It feels good to gather

to pause and be thankful for 

these kids and the blessing they are to our family.

Graham was blowing out the candles, too.  Loved it.

Goodness look at them, so much to cherish.

That's all.

What a privilege we have been given.

“Repeat [God’s commands] again and again to your children. Talk about them when you are at home and when you are on the road, when you are going to bed and when you are getting up.” ~Deuteronomy 6:7

Catch Up Photos!

Just some fun catch up photos!  

These little details will be the one we cherish most someday.

We had a fun day back for Jan 2nd at the pharmacy.

We hear a lot of the same things when the new year rolls around

so we made a game of it.  The prizes were a hit.

We laughed a lot when we heard one of the squares.

Made the first of the year changes that we incur at work a little more fun.

Isa took a special trip to FL and set us this picture.

We are planning a trip to visit them this summer again, looking forward

to the kids hanging together again.

A quick reminder of Friday Folders that come home for Joe.

I know these come mostly to an end next year.  

I look forward to seeing his hard work. Reviewing problems if he misses a couple.

He is a motivated kiddo proud of him.

I snagged a couple of pics from LMS twitter account.  Love getting glimpses

of the classroom, looks pretty typical. Ha

A glimpse of Joe and his buddies at the HS basketball game.

Joe has thrived this year on STEM project like Project Lead the Way. 

Look at that smile,  He loves a challenge with science/tech/math involvement.

And Sam enjoyed a night with the Berea Jr Youth bowling.

And a birthday party~

Just in case he stops sitting on the end of the couch were I am someday.

I want to remember.

A couple of cool project Sam made from school.  A neat pinch pot and a golfer (whose club fell when it was fired, but I told him he just became a putter instead). 

Taking the time to treasure these everyday memories.