Calvin Turns 8

I didn't quite make it to get a picture of Calvin posted on his birthday, but I'm just a few days late.  Here he is with his birthday cupcakes that Cecily and I made and decorated for him, a smiling, happy 8-year-old!

Happy Birthday Calvin!

A Smattering of Winter Activities/Photos

 A load of wood the boys chopped a couple of weeks ago.  Way to go, boys!

 Just kidding...

 Fellowship...

 ...with the sweetest member of the family.

 At one point we had a couple inches of snow.  That's about the most we've had at one time this year.

 Cute hat, eh Kathy?

 Benjamin planned a breakfast in bed for me a couple of weeks ago.  What a sweetie.

 Big boy puzzles have been happening frequently.  Recognize this one, Mom?

 I made my first batch of homemade yogurt, in the crockpot.  It was SO easy and it turned out super!  I have done several more batches now.  I'm very glad I finally tried it!  It costs about half as much as the cheapest yogurt at the store and we eat it in such large quantities anyway.  Awesome.

 Peter and I got together a date night to spend his "steak" gift certificate I got him for Christmas.  We went to Outback Steak House on a Friday night.  There was a long wait.  So we waited, in the cold and took pictures.  :)  We had a great time.

 Happiness is almost 16 years of marriage and making time to celebrate our friendship/love in the midst of crazy, normal life.

 I liked this cheesy picture too.  :)

 The blooming onion we shared was super good.  I didn't take pictures of the steaks, but they were good too.

 Winter morning in a winter white nightgown. 

 Small child puzzling after church one Sunday.

 Candy cane striped outfits!

 One child was less animated than the other.  She wasn't feeling very well.

 Sisters!

 This is what school looks like.  We've done most all of it upstairs this winter because it's warmer and I can cook and oversee school at the same time.  Calvin is doing his math worksheet.  Ben took his into his room to do it.  The oldest two boys do school in the office where Peter works.  I'll post a picture of that another time.

 Amelia is helping Cecily with her preschool pages while working on her own phonics worksheets.

 A Valentine's breakfast.

 The girls decorated their room for Valentine's day.

A lot of time indoors....  Soon I will post some pictures I took of a (finally) nice day when we got to spend some time at Cheat Lake.

Elijah Doing a Puzzle

Elijah Turns 2

 It looks like spaghetti, but actually we made Chicken Parmesan with pasta for Elijah's birthday dinner.

 "Three cheers for Elijah!  Hip, hip, hooray!"

 Little packages from siblings.

 M&M's from Amelia.

 He found a doggie on this card.

 Peter's sister sent him this soft, stuffed doggie. 

 Elijah's gift was this horse on a stick.

 Singing the birthday song with Elijah's birthday pie.

The pie was chocolate cream.  :)  A special celebration for our littlest boy. 

Fun for Valentines Day

 The other day when I needed cheering up I decided to take some fun photos of the kids.  I thought it would make a fun Valentine's Day post.  The idea is for the pictures to look old-fashioned, though we didn't really put a lot of effort into the effects.

 On the left is my grandfather, Frank Alfred Vernon, as a boy.  On the right, is our Elijah Franklin Jones, named with Grandpa Frank in mind.  After I took some pictures of Elijah in the sailor shirt, I remembered this photo of Grandpa.  I thought it would be fun to put them side by side.

Hopefully, not off to the navy anytime soon.  ;)