A Merry Little Christmas

We had a wonderful Christmas. On Christmas Eve, we attended church service with Deb's parents at Grace in Grantsburg. It was good to see many of the people who we attended church with five years ago! The church looked beautiful, the music was inspiring, and the tradition of different families reading parts of the Christmas story brought back memories of our time at Grace.
The church was lit with candles and lights, which reminded us of our wedding almost 12 years ago (Dec 30th). Boy how time flies, and life changes!
Noah started running a slight fever at church, which caried over to Christmas Day. He was bummed, and spent a good portion of Christmas Eve resting and watching tv. We enjoyed eating and visiting with grandpa Henry, mom, Jill, Tom, Taylor, and Jordan.
On Christmas Day, we celebrated with Dennis, Sue, Patty, Trent, Brody, Jim, and Aubrey all at our house. It was good to see Jim and Aubrey! We all ate too much, and then a crazy game of Catch Phrase broke out. Everyone enjoyed some good laughs!

Watch out Grandpa Henry...Here comes the troops!

After church today, We (mom, Jeff, Deb, Noah, Jake, Lydia, Jill, Tom, Taylor, and Jordan) all headed over to Grandpa Henry's house for lunch. The kids had a great time wrestling, which provided entertainment for grandpa. No blood, and only a few tears. After lunch we tried sledding and snowmobiling. The "Kitty Cat" that Jill and I received as a Christmas present in 1974 is up and running again. Not quite the same power it had back then, but the kids enjoyed driving around grandpa's yard. It brought back lots of memories of the hours Jill and I spent driving around our house in town. One on the snowmobile and the other on skies or in the sled behind. Many tanks full of gas were spent on that little machine. (Jake is driving in the picture)
We all cheered on the Vikings at our house, but they could not prevail. Now it is out of their hands. They are at Denver next week and need a win along with a Washington loss. The kids had a great time playing and we look forward to another fun filled evening tomorrow night!

Basketball and Chritmas Programs

We got our first taste of an all day HOOPS basketball tournament. It was a lot of fun, but a LONG day. We headed out aout 7:00 am and returned home at 7:00 pm. The team played well. However, they lost a close game in overtime to Hudson, WI. in the first round. The team came back and beat Rush City in the second game. Prescott, WI was a tough team and really pounded on our guys. This put us in the 5th / 6th place game. The guys pulled out a close one against Somerset to take the 5th place game.
Jake and Lydia commented on how boring the games were, but liked the idea of eating between every game : )

Sunday brought the Kid's Christmas program at Joourney North Church. Noah, of course, would not smile. But Jake and Lydia did a great job of singing! We then headed over to aunt Pat's for the Lindquist Christmas. We decided not to do gifts this year, which was a great idea. So we sat around and ate while the kids played. Lots of good eatin'!

ROCK ON!!!!!

The kids, and Deb too, have been giving Guitar Hero a work out. Lydia can play 'Slow Ride' while walking around the house and not even looking at the tv. Lydia went to a "Happy Birthday Jesus" party tonight. She had a good time and likes to be the social butterfly.
Jake is doing such a great job in school. We are very proud of him. He absolutely LOVES math! His teacher has made him a packet of extra Math problems to work on when he finishes his assignments, and he does these 'extras' whenever he gets the chance. He is working on some multiplication at home and WANTS to keep learning more. I sure wish kids would stay this inquisitive and have that desire to keep learning - by 8th grade, most of the students want to do just enough to get by. Very few WANT to be challenged. - Guess I didn't have a stellar day today. Just cannot believe how the work ethic of students has changed over the years....So keep up the good work Jake!
We are all looking forward to Christmas break... only 7 more school days!

Let it snow, Let it snow, Let it snow!

Well it has been almost two weeks since the last entry. Since then we have accumulated quite a bit of snow. Enough to plow the driveway twice! Last weekend we got dumped on, so we did not travel to Noah's basketball tournament. That was a good thing since as the day went on the roads got to be in terrible condition. We even cancelled our church service on Sunday morning. The township finally plowed our road at about 6:00 pm Sunday night - yeah, so we could be on time to school. Then Tuesday night we got a few more inches, and again the roads were horrible. Many cars in the ditch on the way home from Negotiations with the school board.
You may have noticed that there are no pictures lately. Lydia fell while looking at pictures on the camera and bent the shutter pretty bad. I thought I had it fixed, but now the flash doesn't work! We decided to get a new camera and picked one up today (the battery is currently charging). This one is shock proof, water proof (you can take underwater digital pics), freeze proof (ub to 14 degrees), and dust/sand proof. This is our third digital camera in five years, so we will have to see if it can withstand our family!
Noah had his last 4th grade basketball tournament yesterday. They played well against two of the teams, but fell apart in the middle game. Oh well, 5th grade tournaments begin next weekend. He is looking forward to playing with the older guys.
Last night we had a relaxing evening. We are cuddled up on the couch and watch National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation with Chevy Chase. We all had some good laughs, but I forgot about some of the language in it. The kids repeated lines from the movie today, but luckily none of the lines had those 'four-letter words' in them!
We went to Orchestra Hall in Minneapolis today for a Christmas Concert. It was a special concert for families featureing the Minnesota Orchestra who just this past week receive a couple Grammy nominations. The concert was great and the kids enjoyed the music and other entertainment. They also enjoy walking around the skyways in downtown Minneapolis. I need to get them down there more often to experience 'City Life'. : )

Journey North

Journey North Church launched yesterday. What an exciting day! After months of planning and practice, Journey North started its official services at Pine Technical College. It will be good to get together on a weekly basis again.
Grandma Judy only has four more days of work left until retirement! She is looking forward to haveing more time to herself - she deserves it!
Noah had three hours of basketball practice tonight and is exhausted. Tomorrow night the boys varsity team is hosting a get together for all boy b-ball players 7-12 and their families. Should be fun!
Jake and Lydia have been dressing the cats in pajamas. Joe Meower doesn't care for that, but Squirt will let them dress him and rock him in Lydia's doll cradle.

Give Thanks

We enjoyed Thanksgiving lunch at Grandma Judy's house yesterday with Grandpa Henry, Jill, Tom, Jordan, and Taylor. We stuffed ourselves and then I relaxed in front of the tv watching football. At one point Deb and all the kids were awake, but the rest of the adults were snoozing! Thanks again dear for keeping track of all the kids! We then ventured over to Papa and Grandma Sue's house for Thanksgiving dinner. Both meals were delicious! Grandma Sue dropped her pot holder in the oven and it caught fire...just a little added excitement for the day. A lot of smoke, but Papa got to the smoke detector and removed the battery before it could go off!
Today, Mom, Jill, and I made our annual Black Friday shopping trip. We left Pine City at 4:00 am and scored many deals! I am almost done with the shopping! It was a crazy day but we survived the crowds! I just got in from putting up the Christmas lights outside. It was chilly, and windy, but it is done!

Falling behind...

Well...I haven't been very good at boggin'. My plan of twice a week fell by the wayside a long time ago, and now it is less than once a week! We all survived conferences week, but we were sure tired by Friday. The Mall of America, along with an electronics recycling company put on a 'turn in your electronics for free' event in Bloomington. I was able to get rid of four old tvs, three computer monitors, two computer towers, a DVD player, a copy machine and two printers! It was a great event, but by noon they had to close it down since they received many more electronics than they ever expected.
We are looking forward to having Thanksgiving with all the relatives this weekend. The kids (and Deb and I) enjoy getting together with our families and hanging out...oh, yeah, and eating too. We also need to get up the Christmas lights on the outside of the house before the snow flies. Mom, Jill, and I will make our annual Day after Thanksgiving Christmas shopping trip. I will post more this weekend anfter I take some more pictures.
We also have a new Guitar Hero - and guitar hog in the house - yep, Deb jams and the kids have to fight her for a chance to play!

Supper with Aunt Nancy

We were able to get together with Grandma Judy, Great-grandpa Henry, and Aunt Nancy for supper tonight. Grandma Judy made the BEST popovers to go along with the spaghetti! We always enjoy getting together with the relatives when they are in town, and we thank aunt Nancy for working around our parent-teacher conference schedule this week! Deb and I have conferences tomorrow and Thursday night after school until 8:00. Sure makes for some long days! One of Jake's teachers stopped Deb today and said that Jake is a math wiz! He loves math and is always asking us to drill him with problems. Noah had his second basketball tournament this past weekend. The boys played well and showed a lot of improvent over the past week. Lydia is busy chasing the kittens all over the house. They let her do anything to them. She carries them around like a football, wraps them up in her doll blankets, and carries them in her doll carriers. The cats just attack the rest of us, and we have the scratches to show for it!

B-ball time!

Even though we finished up football last Saturday, that doesn't mean you will now find us at home on Saturdays. Basketball has begun! Noah had his first tournament yessterday in Turtle Lake, WI. His team has a lot of players who are playing competetive ball for the first time and they really did a good job. They beat Somerset, WI in the first game, just edged out Spooner, WI in the second game, but then fell to a tough Turtle Lake, WI team in the last game. It was a fun day!
Jake is also busy with basketball camp after school two days a week. He got up this morning and went out and shot some baskets in the cold. He says he cannot wait to play competetive ball too like his big brother.
We went out for Pizza last night with grandma Judy, grandma Sue and Papa, Pat, Trent, and Brody to celebrate my upcoming birthday. Yikes -39! We had many good laughs and saw the Biedermans (minus Donna) too!
The cats continue to entertain us ( and so does Jake!)

BOOOOOOOOO

Happy Halloween! The kids dressed up and we headed out on our usual route for trick-or-treating. First to Grandma Judy's, then Grandpa Henry's, George and Tonia's (Noah's caycare provider from when he was little) and then off to Grantsburg to see Papa and Grandma Sue along with Aunt Pat and cousins Trent and Brody. Lydia decided she had enough of being a princess and chose to be apumpkin. Jake has turned to the 'dark side' and was a Packers football player. Noah was a Twins baseball player. We enjoyed pizza with papa and grandma, and were able to see many of the 2nd cousins in costume when they stopped by.

It's Fall...

Even though we have had a stretch of some great weather the last few days, the reality is here that it is fall. I winterized the pool over the weekend, football came to an end for both the high school team and Noah's 4th grade team; there is yard work to complete, we carved pumpkin's with grandma Judy and great-grandpa Henry, and we attended a family Halloween party. Yep, fall is here. I just hope we have some fall and don't jump right into winter!
We are also ending the first quarter of school. Boy has the time gone fast. The month of November always goes really fast with parent-teacher conferences, end of the quarter workshop, and Thanksgiving all in there. We have a 5-day week with students this week, but it is the last 5-day week with the students until after Thanksgiving! Yikes!
We bought "Guitar Hero III' for Noah's Wii this weekend. The whole family is becoming addicted to that game. I love it that so many of the songs are ones from when I was growing up! Rock On Baby!

That's my leg, not a scratching post!

The kittens have been a lot of fun and entertainment. However we all have the claw marks to show from them! Thanks again to the Kloeckl's and Jacksons for feeding them while we were away. They have gotten so big, and now are able to get over the barracade we had set up to keep them in the basement. I think they had a great time while we were away in Florida!

What a great time we had!

We are all a little tired, and glad to be home, but what a great time we had the past week in Florida! We spent the week with Jill, Tom, Taylor, Jordan, Grandma Judy, Grandma Sue, and Papa Dennis. Thanks again to Jill and Tom for sharing their time share with us. The kids enjoyed swimming, mini-golf, playing Legos at downtown Disney, and even more swimming. We have a bunch of fish!
On Sunday we went to MGM studios and saw some amazing stunt shows. Jake and Noah really liked the Indiana Jones stunt show. Jake, Papa, Jeff, Jill, Taylor, and Tom also took on the Rock and Roll rollercoaster. WOW. That was the wildest ride I have ever been on! Tower of Terror was also quite a ride!
Monday brought us to Animal Kingdom and breakfast with the Disney Charachters. The food was great and we were able to get many pictures. Noah, Jeff, Grandma Sue, Papa, Jill, Tom, and Taylor all rode the new ride Expedition Everest. Lots of fun - but we really liked the safari and being so close to the animals!
Tuesday was a 'rest day' - just swimming and then dinner at the Rainforest Cafe. Papa and Tom also played a round of golf in the morning.
Wednesday we were off to EPCOT where we all rode Test Track a few times. Lydia liked having her hair blow all over the place as we cruised at 65mph. The kids all got passports to have signed at each of the countries. We also took in Soarin' which was also an amazing experience - flying over California! We topped off the night with fireworks.
Thursday brought us swimming in the morning and Trick-or-Treating at night at the Magic Kingdom. We all went in costume and had a great time! Noah and Jake braved Space Mountain and we all stayed awake until we closed the park at midnight.
Friday was the recovery day - swimming, last minute shopping and packing to come home. We caught a 7:45 flight and were back in Minnesota by 10:15. We took naps yesterday, mowed the lawn, worked on laundry, and school work.
What a great time we had, but it is good to be home again!

Congratulations Jake!

Jake recieved the 'Good Citizen' award at school today for the first month of school. We are proud of how he is a helper, a good model for others, and the hard work he does in first grade, always trying his best. He said it was a great week since he also got to go to his buudy Justin's house to play yesterday too!
We have reached the mid-term mark for first quarter at school. Time is flying! I have one more tennis match left on Monday, and then my 8 1/2 week junior high tennis season will come to an end. They are a great bunch of girls, but it is time to be done for this year.
We have survived the first week with the kittens - no sneezing attacks yet from any of us, so that is a good thing. However< I have claw marks where they tried to climb my pants leg - only I was wearing shorts! I will post pictures of Joe Meower and Squirt soon.

Another Win

The fourth grade football team played a tough defensive game and ended up winning 6-0 against a BIG Chisago Lakes team. It was an exciting game and we have seen so much improvement in all the guys over the past weeks. Noah has made some great new friends, and we have enjoyed getting to know all the parents. Thanks to Grandma Judy, Papa, and Grandma Sue for coming to cheer on Noah and the Pine City team.
Noah has been saving all his money and yesterday bought a Nintendo Wii gaming system. We have had a great time with it. Jake is the master at boxing, and Lydia is pretty good at bowling. Noah beat me pretty bad at tennis - tough on my ego! The system work using body movements - so in boxing, you have a controller in each hand and to thow a punch, you need to throw a punch with your arms. Sure beats the old Atarii system I had as a kid!
We are hoping to pick up Joe 'Mewoer' today. We will post pictures when he gets here.

The rain ends and the party begins

Noah celebrated his 10th birthday today by having 12 buddies over after school. With all the rain we had this week, mom and dad were in a slight panic, trying to figure out what we were going to do to keep the guys entertained if they needed to be inside. However, the rains ended this morning and the afternoon turned out to be nice! The boys played football, ping-pong, basketball, foosball, etc. The guys even commented on how good of a b-ball player Deb is after she kicked their butts in lightning!
We then headed off to the Homecoming game where the Dragons beat the Braham Bombers 14-0. Noah said he had a great day! He has his game tomorrow morning and then we are having a few families over to bbq afterwards. Hopefully for a celebration lunch!

Rain, Rain, Go Away....

We are still behind in our rain totals for the year, but we do not need to catch up in one day! The storm woke up everyone but Jake in the early morning hours (poor Deb couldn't sleep with all the wind, lightning, and thunder). When I left for school we already had over two inches of rain, and my rain gauge read over another inch by the time I got home. I just had to go and pump some water out of the pool. By the way, our pool does not look like the picture anymore. I have vacuumed it and put the solar cover on it. We are now up to 66 degrees! Looks like the weather will be warm again after last weeks cold spell. Noah has 14 buddies coming over after school on Friday to celebrate his birthday, so I hope the weather is nice so they can play OUTSIDE!!!!

Brrrr.

When we left for Noah's football game this morning, it was only 29 degrees! Yikes! But the sun was out and the 4th grade team played a great game against North Branch, winning 14-7. Noah was an animal on defense with 3 sacks and a dozen tackles! He played end for one series today (the picture with noah being closest) and had a carry of 10 yards. He is loving football, so one more sport to fit into the year.


Well, my goal of blogging twice a week has already failed. I hope to get better once tennis is over. We have a very small team this year, but still have many matches coming up. (Three a week for the next three weeks)
We finally have the pool cleaned out. I forgot to tighten a hose last night and when I was backwashing the filter, I became coated with all the dirt and iron we had vacuumed out! Noah thought it was funny, I did not!
The picture of the pool is the 'before' picture - before cleaning, that is. The water is clear now! Noah has been driving his four wheeler around, dragging the yard. We hope to plant grass still this fall.

Birthday Party

We had the family birthday party this afternoon over in Grantsburg for Noah, Elly (Deb's cousin Casey's daughter), and Andrew (Deb's cousin Kelly's son). We had a hot dog roast, hayride, and campfire. The weather was nice, and the food was great!

One week down...

We survived our first week of school, but we are all exhausted! It was extrememly hot on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. My classroom was 87 degrees at the end of the day on Thursday. The students were dripping sweat onto their desk tops!
Lydia was excied to be back at Jenny's house and made some new friends. She also accompanied me to Noah's football practice. This morning she sang out loud to all the songs at church.
Jake had a very good week of school and caught a bunch of grasshoppers up at the high school during Noah's football practice. He is our nature / animal guy.
Noah had his first football game. He did a great job and felt pretty good about how things went. His team lost 7-6, but they played hard!
Jeff and Deb spent a lot of time on school work and we both helped out with the children's ministry program at Journey North Church. Our church has branched off in two directions and we have chosen to go with the Journey North 'branch'. We held our first sevice this morning at Pine Technical College, and things went well, with a few wrinkles to work out.
The pool was also installed on Thursday and Friday. We still have a few things to do. The kids want to go swimming, but I think we will need to wait until spring - the water is soooooo cold!

A good first day

We all had a good first day of school. Jeff has some large 8th grade classes, but a smaller biology and anatomy class. The high school was very warm and the students were tired and sweating by the end of the day. We really need air conditioning! After school then was tennis practice. Deb had a pretty good day in her new classroom. Noah came home all smiles. He really had a good day and has lots of buddies in his class. Jake came home and told us about some 'new' friends (girls) in his class and how he and one of the girls lost their two front teeth on the same day! Lydia had fun at Jenny's house but was exhausted. She could not even finish her supper and went up to bed.
Noah's football team scrimmaged the 5th grade students tonight. They made some great plays and made those older kids work hard. Noah is a maniac on defense. He made a number of tackles and caused a few fumbles. He likes being rough and tough and making tackles. We are looking forward to his first game this weekend.
So we all survived the first day back. It was a warm one, but we made it. Only 3 more days until the weekend, and 174 student days until summer vacation!

Just like Thanksgiving...

Thank you grandma Judy for the delicious turkey dinner yesterday. As the kids said,"This is just like Thanksgiving!" However, instead of football, we had a mean game of baseball in the backyard. Jill, Tom, Taylor, Jake, and Jordan vs. Jeff, Deb, aunt Deb, and Noah. It ended up a 6 to 6 tie due to the relief pitching of Jake! He pitched tough so that our team couldn't go ahead! We had a great afternoon with a skit and some singing and dancing performed by Taylor and Lydia.
Jeff and aunt Deb have run the last couple mornings. The weather was beautiful on Saturday morning, but muggy and humid this morning. Yesterday was a great 9-mile run, but today was a 5 mile 'recovery' run. We will have to see what tomorrow brings!

The school year begins...for Jeff and Deb

We completed our workshops for teachers this week. Tuesday was jammed full of meetings and Deb was recognized as an outstanding educator in our district by the superitendent. Wednesday was more meetings and a little time to work in our classrooms, and then open house for students and parents until 8:00. That was one long 12 1/2 hour day! Grandma Judy took the kids in to meet their teachers and put their belongings in their desks. Yesterday all the staff went to the Audubon Center of the Northwoods for sessions on Environmental Science. It was an informative day, but I really needed to work in his classroom to get things ready for students on Tuesday! Guess I will spend some time in there this weekend!
We had all the stumps removed from our back yard on Monday, and then leveled off. The yard looks so much larger now! We have been busy picking up sticks, roots, rocks, etc. to get the yard ready for the next steps. We are hoping to have the pool installed this next week if everything works out right. However, I am guessing that the water will not warm up enough for us to swim this fall. We are also looking into different options for fire pits, landscaping, ...horseshoe pits?

Happy Birthday cousin Taylor!

We celebrated Taylor's 7th birthday today at her house in Maple Grove. Taylor had a 'magic' theme to her party with a magician who performed tricks for the kids. They were amazed at the things he made disappear and then reappear again. (The adults were amazed at a few of them too!) The magician was pretty entertaining and not to bad of a balloon animal creator! The picture is of Noah, Jake, Jordan, Taylor, and Lydia all in their magicain hats and wands. It is always fun to spend time with Tom, Jill, Taylor, and Jordan.
After three years of work on the backyard, we are scheduled to have all the stumps removed and the ground leveled off on Monday. Then comes the pool contractor the following week to start putting up the above ground pool. We hoped the yard would be ready earlier in the summer, but that just didn't happen. Oh well, end of the summer sales on pools made up for it. We may not be able to use it much once school starts, but everything will be in place for when the weather warms up in May!

The Count Down to School is on...

We spent many hours this week getting ready for the start of school. Deb's classroom is almost ready. Since she has the smallest classroom in the school, her class size will be limited to 20 students. She is very happy about that. Jeff's room was finally put back together yesterday afternoon so he spent the rest of the day hooking up his computer and getting things straightened out. The kids have been a big help with unpacking materials, cleaning, rearranging cabinets, etc. Jake and Lydia especially enjoyed looking at the dissecting specimens for biology, zoology, and anatomy. Their favorites were the frogs, fetal pigs, and large pig hearts. Noah is busy learning the football plays. The coach stopped by this afternoon to let him know that he will be the quarterback. He is very excited!

Fall is in the air...

After many weeks of warm weather this summer, thing have cooled down and it feels like fall. Kind of fitting since Noah had his first football practice tonight. Real football weather - cold and drizzle! Noah loved practice! He said his favorite thing was making tackles. Guess he has had enough practice doing that to his little brother. Noah has some great coaches and some good kids on his team. All the elementary teams and the high school team were on the fields tonight so it was good for the little guys to see the High School team working hard too!
We also know it is getting to be fall when we need to go get all the school supplies, clothes, and new shoes! The kids had fun picking out all the stuff they need to begin the year.
Amother sign of fall - we have a couple trees whose leaves are changing color! Yikes- its not even September yet!!!!

A new addition?

Aunt Pat offered to give Lydia a kitty once her cat, Scribbles, gave birth. Well, the kitties arrived yesterday, so Deb and the kids went to visit and see which one Lydia wants. Of course, Lydia and Jake want differnt kittens. However, they did agree on a name for the new addition, "Joe Meower" (Joe Mauer is Lydia's favorite Twins player). Lydia has also bought the kitty a dish and coller. Since Deb is allergic to many cats, this could be an interesting adventure for the Adams family. At least we have a few weeks to get use to the idea.
Noah starts football practice on Monday. He is very excited. He has tried on his pads, pants, and helmet numerous times.

Summer vacation is winding down

Tennis practice has begun....and so has preparing for the new school year. Deb has moved to a new classroom (on the other side of the school) and will be teaching 2nd grade again. Jeff will be teaching eighth grade Earth Science, Biology, Anatomy/Physiology, and Zoology. The kids are anxious to get back to school - we are so lucky that they enjoy school! Lydia is excited to see her friends at Jenny's house (her daycare). We need to get back on our school sleeping patterns - the kids like staying up late and sleeping in!

Welcome to our Blog

Well, we are going to give this a try - technology and Jeff so not always mix.
We had a great time at the cabin the past few days with the Biederman family (Leea in the middle and Aaron on the right). All our kids caught their largest fish of the season! Noah and Jake caught bass (15.5" and 12") and Lydia caught a good size sunny. And we put them back so we can catch them again next year. The weather was HOT - so we spent a lot of time by the lake. We were all pretty tired after the swimming and fishing. We all love the cabin but it was good to get home. Today we spent the day cleaning up after the hail storm that came through last night - trees and leaves down, broken outdoor lights, no power for 5 hours - yikes! Check back soon to see what is new with the Adams family - "snap, snap"