New Babies!

New little Lydia being enjoyed by her sweet sisters!

Lydia is Aaron and Naomi's little girl. 

Last night we had a baby shower at church for Rebekah and little Ilana. Great Auntie Linda got the honors of holding Ilana.

And Ilana will be one well dressed girl with all the fun clothes she got! Happy Mama, happy baby!

Tomorrow our family is on lunch at church. Hosanna is making birds nests for dessert. At least we can pretend it's spring!

With three fairly new little babies in the family, we've been doing a lot of babysitting. 

Arthur got me a new sewing machine for Christmas and I finally had time to get it out and test it out. It has an embroidery feature that I can't wait to learn how to use. Meanwhile, I just made an apron to test it out.

Okay, I know this was a short post but I really felt like I needed to do a post, even without a lot of words!  Have a wonderful day enjoying God's blessings everyone! And if you don't have a place to go to church tomorrow, visit ours!!

All in Their 20's!

The 'kids' were all over tonight with their families so we took a "All in our 20's" photo.  I am so thankful for these young adults!  I'm really happy that they get along including spouses and grandchildren! They've been talking about getting this photo for a few years now, and it won't be long before Naomi turns 30, so then it'll be another ten years before this happens again.

Left to right, oldest to youngest - Naomi, Amos, Isaac, Miriam, Hosanna, Silas, and Priscilla. (Samuel would've been between Silas and Priscilla.)

Our Family Christmas

We had Christmas with our immediate family on Saturday. I made sure to get a picture of each family this year and so here's Silas and his family.

Isaac and his family.

Amos and his family.

Us!

And Naomi and her family.

The last few years we've gotten together for brunch but this year we did a noon meal. These four loved that they had their own special table, customized with Arthur "made" stools!

Remember all those stockings? Well, the kids had great fun finding out what was in them. 

Sunday night we headed west to go to Aaron's church's Christmas program where they had two of the cutest angels around!  Anna did have a crown and sash but I caught her after she was already taking them off.

So, that leads up to this week and next, which are going to be really busy. We have some overnight company coming so we're cleaning up the house, finishing wrapping up gifts, etc.

Yesterday we had a cow get her leg stuck in a round bale feeder. Not sure how she pulled that one off. Anyway, Arthur got her leg out, and it doesn't seem to be hurt bad, but the cow won't stand up now. If you think of it, would you mind praying that it gets up? We sure would like to save this cow.

The weather has warmed up for a little bit, and so we're getting a little more snow. It's actually nice having it too cold to snow!

Have a wonderful Christmas this week, everyone! Remember to take time to celebrate the baby, our Savior, the one who left His home in Heaven, came to earth as a little baby. Lived, and died, and rose again for us!

Quick Post - For Lack of a Better Title

Things have been busy enough around here that it makes it hard to post.  I wanted to let you know what we've been up to though.  Last Sunday we gave Isaac and Aimee an open house for those that couldn't make it to the SD wedding.  We used some of the decorations that they used at the wedding.  Isaac and Aimee made it back from their "down south"  honeymoon and are settling in their house while Silas and Karen are settling in their house. 

Naomi came by with her children and we just had to get a picture with little Julia.  She is so sweet and looks  a little like little Aaron.

Arthur and Isaac shipped their fall calves yesterday.  It sounds easy but it took a few days to bring them home, separate them from the rest of the herd, and vaccinate them. Then a semi came and loaded them two levels high and brought them to the auction.  While the guys, and Aimee went, we girls stayed home and enjoyed watching it online. 

Well, that's it for now.  Have a great weekend wherever God has placed you!  Don't forget that you are where you are for a reason!

It's a Girl!

Julia Ruth
8' 5 oz.
Born to Aaron and Naomi yesterday, November 1st!
It was a fast delivery for Naomi but it went well and Mamma and baby are doing great!



This precious little girl has some very doting aunties! 

She has more blond hair than any of their other children had.

We took the girls down to see their new sister after church yesterday.  She will be one happy little sister with such good big sisters who adore her! Little Aaron on the other hand will need to be watched!  It's so fun to poke eyes you know!  Ever wonder why that's the first thing children do when they get a doll with eyelids that move? 

Congratulations, Aaron and Naomi! We love you all and think little Julia is an adorable gift from God!

Keeping Busy - Farm, Trapping, Home, and Church

Isaac has been busy since the rivers opened up doing some beaver trapping.  I can't help but love those long teeth they use to cut down trees!  Hopefully Isaac and Matthew M. are okay.  They've been out in the woods since early yesterday morning doing a really long trapping route.

Arthur has been working almost nonstop checking on beef cows, helping cows calve if they need it, making sure the new calves get the hang of drinking from mama cow, vaccinating them, keeping up the records of which cow had what calf, and so forth.  

Aaron and Naomi and the little ones are staying at our house while they get Isaac's trailer in livable condition for the summer.  We had a birthday party for Naomi and some watched Aunty Ellen win many rounds of Boggle :)  Naomi had a good birthday!  The little girls aren't feeling good and just want to be held so we all keep busy passing them around along with sharing baby Aaron Joseph.

This is a posed picture of Priscilla taken right after her piano recital.  She played her solo beautifully and then did a nice duet with her cousin Elizabeth.

Yeah!!  Our church is getting new carpet!  A bunch of the guys showed up to help take out the old carpet and move pews and stuff around.  If anyone needs some used carpet they could probably get some. Talk to Arthur or my father-in-law or Mr. J.  Lots of the pieces don't hardly look worn at all.  Mr. J. and sons painted the walls earlier since that needed doing as well so everything looks so nice. 

There's a little snow in the forecast so when that's done I'll change the header!

I need to go.  You all have a wonderful day enjoying God's blessings! 

It's Been a Long Time...

...since we've posted on the blog.  We have been really, really busy, but not so busy that Arthur couldn't take a morning off to do a little of his very favorite hunting with Mr. C. and Matthew C.  Lots of geese and ducks.

The maze is over.  It rained five of the eight weekends but it still went good and we're content.  We'd try to be content if it didn't go good too!  I liked this photo of Priscilla and a bag full of popcorn balls.  I don't know the exact number but I know Hosanna made way over 1,000 of them and used over 11 gallons of unpopped popcorn!!  Miriam filled over 5,000 water balloons, and Priscilla made hundreds of pretzel sticks and cookie dough brownies.  

Aaron and Naomi and the girls came up for a visit that we enjoyed greatly!  The cousins enjoyed being together and having Naomi read them books.  It gets pretty wild around here with six little people having fun together!!!  I love it!  Such sweet memories are being made!

Amos and Rebekah, and Aaron and Naomi and the little people all enjoyed the maze and hayrides.

We enjoyed a visit from Cora and Andrew B.  God sent them at just the right weekend when we were short of workers and some of this family was sick.  They were a great help at the maze and we had a lot of fun with them playing games,  watching videos and visiting of course! Thank you Cora and Andrew!

We finished up the maze with a clean up day with most of the maze workers.  In just a few short hours they managed to take down things and put everything away so it's ready for winter.  THANK YOU EVERYONE!!!!  Most years we clean up by ourselves and it takes us days to get it all done so this was a really blessing.

Yes, we will do the maze again.  Yes, we have an idea of what we'll do next year! Yes, it's a secret!

Isaac has been helping with the sugar beet harvest west of here for the last few weeks with Silas helping a couple of days. There's thousands and thousands of acres of sugar beets grown in the Red River Valley area and harvest time is pretty intense for those involved and the people living in those areas.  They came home today.

Arthur has been dealing with cattle lately - moving and feeding, trying to finish up some flax straw, and spends quite a while everyday chopping corn.  He graciously took yesterday, well, most of the day, off to head north with me to go to one of my great uncles funerals.  He was 98.  Uncle Detray was one of my favorite great uncles and he had kids that were my age so as kids they were like cousins to us and we saw them quite often.

 I enjoy heading north to Canada once in awhile and I told Arthur I kinda feel like I'm going home when we head up to that part of the province.  So many people with the same background as we have and people with the same last names as our families eating the same food we grew up eating.  We did have one lady tell us she liked our accent.  Ha!  If we go too far south they think we have a Canadian accent!  Funny how different people talk that live just miles apart from each other.  We get a lot of Canadians at the maze and we see them enough in our area that you can always pick one out before they even talk!  I'm sure they do the same to us!

Well, you all have a wonderful evening enjoying God's blessings!

Busy Weekend

 

It was a busy weekend!  We picked Naomi and the little girls up for a few days.  We had a lot of company including a family get-together to celebrate Jeriah and Anna's birthdays.  It was so fun to see all the little cousins playing together.  We also had a friend stop over for the night.  Mr. A. and his wife were missionaries for many years to France and I had the privilege of staying with them for a few months after I graduated from high school.  Anyway, his wife went home to heaven this last year and he is continuing on.  Amazingly, he had some churches to visit not far from here so he stopped by. Amazing because no one really comes this way in the country!  We had such a good visit and I look forward to seeing him again someday, hopefully on earth, and his wife too, not on earth! Mr. A. still goes to France every year and shared about how things are going politically over there which should be an eye opener to us over here.  Anyway, the cure for this worlds problems is God and nothing else.  No candidate or law will change hearts or eternity. 

Well, he left today as well as Naomi and the little girls. All the sweet visits we had this week makes me awed at how sweet the fellowship will be someday at the feet of Jesus and all the saints that have gone on before us!!  May the Lord return quickly!

4th of July

Well, another 4th of July is past.  One of my favorite things was watching David pick up candy at the parade.  All the kids were cute but he was extra fun to watch.  Sometimes he'd bend over and stare at the candy before picking it up.  Often someone else would grab it out from under his stare because he was so slow in deciding when to pick it up. 

Jeriah was sure cute too.  Someone handed him a little flag and he was so happy about that flag.  Ah, I love my grandchildren!  Naomi has also been here so we've enjoyed having little girls around as well!

And then there was our maze float.  The cow (Elizabeth M.) was a real hit as was the corn cob.  The guys and girls did a great job passing out around 1,900 maze cards!  We loved how people really, really, wanted one of those cards!  Hopefully that is a sign that people will come out this fall.

And here's a close up photo.  Thanks, Matthew, for being the corn cob!  And thank you to Alexis, Dallas, Jonathan, Abby, Ronnie, Jessica, Krystal, Elizabeth, Rachel, Matthew, Silas, and Priscilla for all your help!!!!  We could not do it without you!!

We're Done!

It took three long days to cut the maze but we're done!!  My legs are so sore today from all that walking but it's a good feeling to know the maze is cut.  It doesn't look like it in the photo, but in the three days it took to cut the corn it grew to over knee high in most places.  Now that may not seem like much in most parts of the country but up here the saying is, "knee high by the fourth of July" so we're ahead of schedule.  The girls and I marked the trails then I walked them with Arthur as he cut them with the weedeater.  I believe today Silas is going to start mowing and dragging them.  It's almost unbelieveable how Arthur buzzes the corn down to the ground and by the time we were done, the first corn cut was already about eight inches high again!  I'm also excited about all the boxes of things the UPS man has been bringing for the maze.  Banners, new worker teeshirts, store things, etc.  Thank you to everyone that "liked" us on facebook.  Arthur says he feels like a sixth grader again wondering if people "like" us :)

We had an enjoyable, very short, visit from Aaron and Naomi a couple of times this week with their adorable little girls.  They were up near here with a group from their church to help out another church.

Miriam and Hosanna have been helping out a mother who just had a baby yesterday.  I know a lot of people think they should go to college or at least have a full time job.  However, because they are home, in addition to doing a lot of farm and house work, they are flexible enough to help out different ladies when they need it, something they enjoy doing.  They very much have a full time job!

Priscilla is excited because the UPS guy delivered a box of 250 "180" movies she bought to give out.  If you haven't seen it, she would want you to.  I'm sure she'll have a copy if you ask!

Silas is excited about his Explorers graduation coming up.  It's been a great program at an important time in most of these young men's lives.

Isaac has been doing the farm work this week while Arthur's out in the corn field.  Both he and Arthur and Silas have been fencing (a never ending job) and cleaning out the hayshed to put new hay in.

So it goes.  Have a great day in the Lord!

Trip to Tennessee

Since Arthur had school, and I'm not much of a driver, Isaac graciously drove Hosanna and I down to see Naomi and her family down in Tennessee.  He read lots of books and played ball with Esther.  Naomi would want you to know that we were going through clothes and that's why it looks like a mess!  We managed to organize all the girl clothes she had so it will be easy to find different sizes.

We planned our trip so we could be with Naomi while Aaron was gone.  It worked nice and Esther got so excited to hear Aaron talk on the phone.

Baby Anna is so sweet!  Isn't she adorable!!

Hosanna and Isaac both practiced their trick roping and Esther thought it was pretty neat.

Naomi and her two sweethearts! And just for the record, Naomi is feeling good and pretty much back to normal, at least as normal as having a new baby can be!  We also enjoyed visiting Aaron and Naomi's church. 

Esther is already taking after her Mommy and wanting to play piano.  It's so cute to watch her! Can you tell I'm a proud grandma? 

So, we had a good trip.  Aaron got back early and I had a funeral to attend so we came home a few days early.  The funeral, today, was for one of my highschool friends dad'. He was also my boss at a mink ranch during my highschool years until I got married.  Both he and his wife treated my sister and I really good and we have lots of great memories of those days.  As always, funerals are a good reminder of the brevity of life and the importance of being ready.  Meanwhile, Silas has lots of pictures building up on his camera so I'll try to make another post one of these days. 

Anna Elizabeth

Anna Elizabeth
She is so cute!!  Thank you Naomi for letting me post these for you!  (She's kinda busy!)  Naomi said the delivery was harder than with Esther, but it went good.  Esther is enjoying her Tennessee grandparents and gets to meet her little sister tomorrow.  I always was surprised at how grown up the "baby" seemed after having another baby and I'm sure Naomi and Aaron will notice that Esther seems to have grown up overnight!  How nice for her to have a sister!

And the happy daddy!  We look forward to seeing you all soon! It might sound trite to say it so much, but God is SO good!!! 

Naomi Says...

It's a girl!  Anna Elizabeth, 7# 2 oz, born yesterday afternoon.  All went well and she will post photos when she can :)  Congratulations, Naomi and Aaron!!!! We love you all!

Twin Calves

Cute little twin heifer calves were born this last week. Blessing indeed!

We wait for the little one to be born to Naomi and Aaron.  We will let you know when it happens.  Please pray for her safety, the baby's safety, and an uneventful birth!  In all my years of married life, I don't think there's many more things as depressing as going overdue.  I know some ladies don't seem to mind, but I really had a hard time with it.  It is so nice to know that
GOD HAS A PLAN
even when we get impatient!  His timing is ALWAYS best.
That applies to all things in life!

Thank you for the nice comments about the dolls.  I do plan on making shoes for them when I have time.  Taking a break from dolls, I am working on making some reversible vests for boys - one side is denim western with sheriff badge, the other side an Indian / frontier look.  My boys had them when they were young and had fun with them so hopefully some other little boys will too.  I'll post a picture sometime.

Have a GREAT evening!