And we lost her ...

I'm not going to try to catch up on my lack of posting ... too much time hanging out with family and not enough time sitting in front of the computer ... that's a good thing.

Anyway, I happen to be sitting here in front of the fire reading a couple of articles about the Vikings qualifying for the playoffs, and I just realized that we won't actually talk to Cyndie for the next several days. She received a package in the mail from her dad today ... a new camera. The battery just finished charging about 5 minutes ago. And now all she wants to do is play with the camera. I think she will actually interact with us, but only to get us to pose for pictures, not because she's actually interested in us!

Needless to say, she's very excited!

The snow is here

So it snowed for probably around 9 hours in the end. I think the net result is about 12 inches of snow. It was enough snow that had there been another inch, I wouldn't have been able to "get" all the snow with one pass of the snow blower. As it was, it took me about twice as long to do the blowing and shoveling as usual, and that was with Cyndie's help for about a half hour.

Timmy is feeling quite a bit better today, but is pretty low on energy. Probably because he didn't eat anything yesterday. He went outside for about 5 minutes in the snow, but all he wanted to do was lay in it, so in the end he went back inside and watched some TV. Strangely, Emma was similar. She went out for 20 or so minutes, but when she found out the snow wasn't really good for snowmen, she decided to head inside. So Cyndie and I sledded for a little bit by ourselves!

And then there were none ...

Days until Christmas Break:

Additionally, Emma had school cancelled today since we've gotten about a foot of snow since midnight ... and it's still coming down. My office (on site) is closed, so I'll probably only work a couple of hours too.

Timmy seems to be feeling quite a bit better last night. He last threw up just before bed yesterday (sorry Grandpa). My dad was over to watch him so that Cyndie and I could both attend Emma's cute Christmas concert.

Surprising wisdom

Every once in a while Timmy totally surprises me by doing or saying something that totally seems beyond his years. Just now, when we finished watching the Phantom Menace, he turned to me and said, "I think I should go upstairs and take a nap". Good for you Timmer!

So the rest of the day should be interesting. Tonight is Emma's Christmas concert/show at school. Hopefully she'll be feeling well and won't get whatever bug Tim has. She'd be crushed if she had to miss that. And more so, hopefully Tim will be healthy, and the rest of us stay healthy for the Christmas season. It would be sucky to have the time off and family around and be in bed!

Typing with one hand ...

So I'm sitting here typing one handed because Timmy is laying on me. He woke up around 5 am with a flu of some sort ... throwing up and diarrhea. Fun stuff. Fortunately, I realized that I have some sick time left, so I'm going to hang out with him this morning while Cyndie is at MOPS. Due to that physical limitation I'm not going to say much but ...

Christmas Break Countdown:

Kids singing video ...

Beware all who receive this via email, you'll need to go to the web site (wildwooddevries.blogspot.com) in order to view this vid:

Recent Pix

Okay, here's a few pictures from the last week ...

Here's the kids singing a couple of songs at church ... I'll follow this post up with a post which has a video of this ... Auntie Karen beware, it's a big file.


Monday, the kids make "Gingerbread" houses (with graham crackers)

Here's Emma and Tim, ready for his show (and after Emma had spiffied him up) ...

Tim, the wiseman ...

Emma sat with her friend Anya and was very good during the show ...

Here's Timmy with Teacher Sally ...

Tuesday Times

It was COLD again yesterday, in the teens. By evening we had a nice snow going, and when I went out to blow off the driveway is was powder baby! I think we got about 4 inches in the end.

The big event of the day was Timmy's Christmas show at his pre-school. It was a lot of fun. Before hand, Emma really felt like Timmy should be dressed up, so all by herself, she took him up to his room, got out his suit, complete with light green dress shirt (thanks Mavric!), did his hair (complete with gel, and with a little help from Dad to get the gel right, turned Timmy into a dapper dandy! The kids sang some songs, played a hand bell song, did a little bit of acting out of the Christmas story (Tim was a wiseman), and gave gifts (ornaments they'd made) to their families. And, of course, afterwards there were cookies, which we all ate too much of!

So we move on toward ...

Christmas Break Countdown:

Yes, that's right, there are two more days until vacation starts! And only a week until Christmas!

I'll drop another post with some pix in a few minutes.

Cruisin'

We're cruising along ... toward:

Christmas Break Countdown*:*I should take this opportunity to remind everyone that this countdown does not include today, or it does not include Friday which will be "zero" ... maybe because the vacation actually starts that day?! Or maybe I just mis-counted. Regardless, I'm not going backwards because that would be too depressing, so we're stuck with "3" ... we'll call those three Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, then Friday, the break begins (even though there is school and work that day).

Yesterday was filled with normal activities ... school, work, grocery shopping, etc. The kids built and decorated "gingerbread" houses (made from graham crackers) after Emma returned home from school. We did the normal Monday evening library run, had some hot chocolate in front of the fire, and then got to bed!

Tonight we're looking forward to Timmy's little Christmas show at pre-school.

Administrative

Just wanted to let all my faithful readers (via email) know that there is a new blog post up this morning ... it did not get delivered to you because I screwed up and somehow sent it before I had typed anything!

Weekend highlights.

Well, here are the high lights (as I remember them).* Hopefully you who receive this via email will get it. I accidentally hit some keystroke combination and the thing published before I actually had a body to this created.

*The weekend went by rather quickly, as did the last week. I guess all this waiting for Christmas vacation is perhaps a good thing!

• Friday = pretty normal day. Cyndie did a lot of baking.
  
• Saturday morning we slept in until almost 9. The kids had a very fun time doing their own thing, making Christmas presents for us, playing. There was a bit of a mess in the kitchen when we went down there, but it was worth it to sleep in!
• We spent some time cleaning the house for the open house on Sunday (see below).
  
• Saturday afternoon was cousin Sarah's birthday party. It was a Build-a-Bear home thing that the kids totally enjoyed. We hung out there until after dinner and made it home for a late bedtime.
• Sunday the kids sang some Christmas-y songs in church. They were both very cute!
• After church we had an open house and Cyndie sold some Thai bags that some missionaries in Thailand are helping local ladies make. (the thing about the bags is at the bottom of that linked page). That was fun ... helped us clean the house up a bit.
• For dinner, Grandpa came over to babysit and Cyndie and I went out to Japanese and then ran a couple of errands.
• We got a lot of rain yesterday. Much of the snow that was on the ground is gone. It's supposed to be very cold for the next week or so. I haven't seen any weather forecasts to either confirm or deny a white Christmas.

Have a good week all!

Just a week of work/school remaining!

Christmas Break Countdown:

The countdown continues ...

Days until Christmas Break:

Six days ...

Christmas Break Countdown:

Friday ... t-minus 7 days.

Days until Christmas Break

Not a whole lot new to report today. Emma had swim lessons yesterday afternoon and then we hit the McDonald's to use her reading coupon for a happy meal. She and Tim were both excited about the loot that they got from their meals ... Emma a small My Little Pony, and Tim a Bionicle guy (don't really know much about that, but it looked sufficiently like a Transformer to excite Tim, plus it shoots something ... which he will promptly lose). I did a little Xmas shopping both before and after that, and with that trip, I think wrapped up most of the shopping we'll do.

The only other thing of note on our minds now is the house in California. The rental agreement is up at the beginning of February so we are deciding whether to sell or rent again. Pray for us on that one as it's a big decision!

It's Friday, yea!

Pictures! and Snow (of Snow?)

Here's a few pix of the recent snow related activities ... mostly Timmy based because Emma was a school when Cyndie was out with the camera.


How cheery, right? This is in our neighbor's yard.



Here you get a little feel for Emma's new short hair. I'll try to get a better picture at a later date.

The week moves on

So the week is nearing an end, and the Wildwood DeVries are dutifully trudging along. I think we're all pretty excited for Christmas to come with the perks that surround it definitely in mind ... vacation from school and work, family time, extended family in town. The larger than usual (or so it sounds) amount of snow, and its fluffy goodness, is also contributing to our general holiday mood. That plus our kids, especially Emma, are in the sweet spot for Christmas excitement. All of which means, we're ready for the season to officially begin, that beginning being marked by Emma's last day of school and my last day of work on the 19th. Let the countdown commence ...

Days until Christmas Break:

Today is a pretty normal day of work and school. Timmy may have a play date after school. Tonight we'll probably head over to the library for a showing of Madagascar, then Cyndie has her normal "Second Thursday" women's outing.

Two items of "interest"* in sporting news today:

1) Timmy is doing very well in his swimming class. In fact, he's getting to the point where he'll jump off the starting blocks thing** in to the deep end. Go Timmy. This is quite a change from last summer when he was hesitant to even get his face wet.

*I use that term loosely. Because while I am interested in these things, you, my faithful reader, may not be.

**You know, this thing ...
2) I had a fun, I think, night of bowling last night. The first game (we play three each league night) was one of my worst ever ... harkening back to the first night of league when I hadn't bowled for a LONG time. I think I rolled a 112 or something. Then the second game was my best ever. I'll remember the score for a long time (especially because I don't think I'll duplicate it any time soon) ... 199. It's especially memorable because on the last ball I had three pins left which I needed to get all of them in order to get the magically 200. Well, I missed one. Oh well. The last game I think I rolled a 159 which is probably the second best game I've ever rolled (and shows how much better than normal I did in the second game). It could have been even better if I would have score more than 38 pins in the first four frames.*

*Look at me using all these bowling terms. I am totally a Wisconin man now what with my bowling league-yness and all.

This night also marked an improvement for the Ham Fighters* in that we picked up 5 of a possible 7 points, this against one of the best teams in the league. Perhaps this will move us out of the league cellar!

*Did you forget the name of our team? Go Ham Fighters Go!

Delinquent again ...

The blog has fallen on hard times, due in large part to the excitement being experienced by the head blogger over a couple of Christmas presents he is currently creating.*

*Yes, I have no excuses, but I have been pretty wrapped up in some projects that I've been working on. I've been spending all my free moments on those instead of blogging. Hopefully the end result will be three cool presents with the sum total cost of exactly $0.**

**I'm very happy with that price tag since Cyndie and I decided this year to try to cut back a bit and make some things!! Oh, and I just remembered that I actually did but two things at Home Depot for a grand total of $3 and change. I stand corrected.

So, news of note (or perhaps not of note, but I'll ramble on here anyway since there is no one to stop me!):

• We've had quite a bit of snow over the last several days. I think I was out shoveling and snow blowing 4 or 5 times. It makes the trees (especially) look awesome though ... all of them are covered with snow and it makes a quick look out the window seem like a scene from White Christmas.
• We've had a few sniffles here and there, but no one is getting sick, which is great!
• We've had some troubles with obedience lately, so we've instituted a points scheme where the kids are rewarded for good behavior. So far, so good ... obedience levels are up across the board.
• Cyndie spent some time with Mom working on a sewing Christmas present. Aren't we crafty!
• It's cold today, but the weather is supposed to warm as the week progresses finishing at 45 or so degrees by Friday. I'm hoping that will take care of the layer of ice that's currently on the driveway.
• Sunday night we went over the Auntie's Karens apartment and helped server soup for her Christmas Soup Supper. I also played the guitar for the caroling. That was fun.
• Saturday morning we had Auntie Karen and my mom and dad over for breakfast to celebrate Mom's birthday.

That about does it. I make no blog frequency promises, but hopefully we'll be doing better the rest of the week!

Typical Days

There's not a whole lot exciting to report here. School, work, play. Last night Cyndie went to a women's Christmas dinner at the local mega-church* with one of her friends from sailing and my mom. She had a really nice time. Dad came for dinner and to hang out for a bit. He helped me work on the Christmas present that I'm making for Timmy. I think I'm almost done!

*I think mega-church is a relative term here ... perhaps how I should have described it is as the biggest church of the area ... 600 - 800 people.

Today Cyndie has a play group from MOPS over this morning as well as Timmy having a play date with the neighbor girl, Ari.

So that's the story!

Snow and driving

I'm in at the office today to meet with the project lead and go over status and a few other things. This means that the nice snow that I see out the window will make my drive home ... shall we say ... challenging? We're supposed to get around 4 inches of snow, some of which is turning to slop on the wet roads. Should be a fun drive home!

On the kid front, Emma asked yesterday if she could get a hair cut to around chin length. I'm not sure where that originated, but Cyndie gave her a hair cut*! It looks cute ... kind of sassy (to steal a word from Auntie Laura).

*Pictures will be provided at a later date ... when we've actually taken one, and when I'm at home to upload it.

Yesterday held more sledding for the Timmster. That boy loves to hit the slopes. He was pretty pooped by dinner time though.

Enjoying the snow

So not a whole lot new to report on this Tuesday. Mostly it's been the normal work/school/errands/etc. The kids sledded for an hour or so yesterday after Emma got home from school ... until it got too dark. Timmy was previously out a bit during the day. We did a run to the library and got some new books and checked out a copy of White Christmas* to watch and get us in the holiday mood.

*Someone has stolen my copy of this classic movie. Whoever has done so will be sure to pay a large price ... that's one of my all time favorites!!!

So that's about the extent of it!

Catchup ... I guess

I'm not going to spend a lot of time trying to document the entire long weekend. There was lots of food, family, football ... and of course, fun.

Thursday was the progressive Thanksgiving dinner ... appetizers at Auntie Karen's, dinner at Mom and Dad's, dessert at our place. Friday we put our Christmas decorations and did some work outside in the yard. Saturday we went down to Dave and Amy's for the day. Yesterday was church, then a bit of rushed work in the yard as the snow started and we tried to get all the cut trees picked up and the wood stacked ... mission accomplished! I also cleared out the kids sled run in preparation for several months of sledding.

We got about 6 or 8 inches of snow last night, so this morning was getting the snow blower out and started (took a little effort!).

Here are a few pix from the last day. I don't have any from Thanksgiving ... Cyndie must have already taken them off the camera.

Snow has come to Wisconsin ... and the Dragon's Lair shows it!

This is the teepee I made for the kids at the end of their sled run. Emma is very into Native Americans (didn't they used to be Indians ... I'm so politically incorrect) right now. She's been studying them in school in conjunction with Thanksgiving. As a result, she was doubly excited.

As a time killer between dinner and bed time, we decided a dip in the jacuzzi might be fun ... so in we went!
As I sit here and type this, Cyndie and Timmy are outside sledding. Timmy LOVES to sled. He'll stay out there for hours. I can see that he's picking up right where he left off last year.

It's official ...

Timmy is transitioning stages. I say this because yesterday, when I was cleaning out my office and re-arranging it a bit, I found a bunch of pre-school, K, 1st grade workbooks. Reading stuff, math, matching games, etc. Anyway, I brought them down at lunch, and after lunch, Timmy sat for somewhere around 2 hours and just did stuff in the workbook. Of course, that's totally his personality. He can do things* for hours at a time and not get bored. However, this is certainly something he has never done before.

*Other things he has done like this before: cars, super heroes, soccer, computer games, movies.

The other thing he's totally into at this point is dinosaurs. He's got a couple of books about them that he likes to read, and he's starting to memorize some of their names. The other day I was reading him a dinosaur book and as we passed certain of the dinosaurs, he'd say, "I have that one" (referring to the 5 or 6 dinosaur action figures he has). So we'd have to check out the underside of the dinosaur action figure (where the names are imprinted) to verify if indeed that was the same dinosaur. More often than not, he was correct.

So there you have it ... the next stage of Timothy David DeVries.

In other family news, we all took a trip to Target last night to get some slippers for Timmy and gloves and boots for Emma. The trip was a success, and confirmed for me that Emma and Timmy are cut from the same cloth ... they both love shopping and trying on stuff ... cloth which does not come from either Cyndie or I!

Following our shopping trip we stopped at Emma's school for an upper elementary play that one of the neighbor girls was in. It was cute, and the friend, Olivia, stole the show.

Feels like Wednesday

For some reason, today totally felt like Wednesday when I got up. Perhaps that's just wishful thinking!

Not a whole lot to report on today. It's sunny and it looks like most of the snow we got will probably be melting today. Timmy and Emma are both at school this morning, so Cyndie worked some on some graphic design business she has. She's doing a logo and letterhead for a friend who is starting a business, and also doing some branding type stuff (logo, letterhead, poster, mailers) for a Covenant Harbor related ministry. The best news is that both jobs are paying jobs!

So that's about it around these parts!

A Few Pix ...

Here's a few random pictures from the last week for your viewing pleasure ...

Here's Emma and Grandma and Grandpa D at the Pilgrim Feast.
Emma and Tim all blanketed up while watching the movie at the library last week.

Timmy swimming during Emma's swim lesson ...

Here's Emma this morning building her snowman on the deck at 7 am.

Odds and Ends

A few random thoughts regarding the weekend:

• Emma (and Cyndie) had a great time at the girl scout Sup and Sing on Friday night. Emma can home with a patch and singing all the different songs that she learned. I think girl scouts (actually Emma's age group is Daisies) will be right down Emma's lane. She loves the acheivement that goes along with earning patches, so I think she'll really excel. Cyndie and another mom from Emma's class are trying to round up enough girls from Emma's class at Woods to start a troop. So we'll see.
• I split quite a bit of wood over the weekend ... and I was pretty sore! I think I'm getting old. Mostly my hands hurt and my lower back is pretty sore. I think I'll wait a couple of days before I attack the "to be split" pile again.
• More fall yard cleanup was accomplished on Saturday. I think we're pretty much ready for snow, which is good considering the whiteness which is blanketing us this morning!
• We're all excited for a short week of school and work this week. Auntie Jane arrives on Wednesday late. Her arrival will officially mark the start of the holiday season.
• We had a fun time on Friday and Saturday spending an hour or two each day over at the art show for our art class. It was fun to talk to different people about both the paintings, and life in general.
  

White Monday

As foretold by the weather.com forecast yesterday, we woke up this morning to about an inch of snow on the ground. When I went into Emma's room at about 6:50 and opened up her curtains to show her, she was VERY excited. She promptly went downstairs, got all her snow stuff on*, and went outside and made a snowman, complete with carrot for a nose, all by herself.

*I should take a moment here to compliment Emma. When I went into her room, she had already made her bed, cleaned up half her room, and was halfway through getting dressed. That's progress for her. We're really working hard on keeping their rooms clean. And by that I mean Emma and Timmy keeping their own rooms clean.

The snow looks to be pretty wet, and I think it will get warm enough over the next couple of days where it will melt fairly quickly. However, it was still fun to get. The first real snow of the year!

How much wood would a wood chuck chuck?

So Dad and I have spent much of the morning and afternoon (with a trip to the class art show and a bit of work thrown in in around that) cutting down dead trees around the yard. So far we've managed to get down almost all of the trees that need cutting, with the only damage to the little yellow slide on the Dragon's Lair (and a near miss of a tree on Dad's head, but we won't go there). Perhaps the better quote would have been something about a beaver, but a wood chuck will have to do.

Tonight Emma and Cyndie are heading out for a girl scout event (I think they put it on to try to recruit new girls) and so Timmy and I invited Grandma and Grandpa D over to help us eat the extra pork chops. *

*We may have also invited them because rumor has it that there was a freshly baked apple pie over at the senior DeVries house that needed eating.

Total Cuteness

So I had to take a break and share a cool/cute little scene that happened this morning. Emma is almost always the first one up in the morning* (of the two kids). Today she comes down stairs while Cyndie and I are working out and finds a basket of books. Anyway, I didn't really notice what she was doing until I came up from the basement and was starting to put together her lunch and breakfast, etc. There she was, sitting there reading to herself for like 20 minutes or so. Totally cute, and exciting that she's into the reading thing. I can easily see her becoming an avid reader. She loves the stories, plus she's developed a nice bond with the kids librarian at the LG library who is always suggesting fun new stories for her.

*Note to self and spouse. Perhaps we should think about making Emma's bedtime a little later to see if that equals out the rise times of the kids.

Pilgrim Feast

So the whole fam just got back from the Woods School Pilgrim Feast. Every year, the week before Thanksgiving, Woods School puts on a Pilgrim Feast for the students and their families. It was pretty fun, and a nice way to build community. Grandpa and Grandma D came with us. We met up with Emma and her class and were seated and served by the junior highers. It was a full Thanksgiving meal with turkeys, ham, and all the fixings. Cyndie cooked two turkeys (getting up at 4:30 am to do so) and some rolls. Emma and her classmates had made/decorated place mats and indian style ponchos. All in all, a fun time.

This afternoon will be a bit crazy with Emma's swim class, a bit of help setting up for the art show, dinner at McDonalds (Emma's free compliments of a McDonalds reading program), Cyndie and the kids to the library for An American Tale, and me back home for worship practice. Phew!

Oh, and since I know you're all dying to hear how the Ham Fighters fared during last night's bowling league, we took 3 out of a possible 7 points from the defending league champions. Not too bad. I had my best night yet including my all time high of 164. Go Neal, go Neal!

Random Pix ...

Alrighty -- here are some random pix from the last several weeks. We'll start with when Papa Lee was here. We did a little Christmas early ... here's Tim with the Hulk he received from Papa.

Emma got a doll and a doll outfit. I'm not sure what the deal is with pictures that I rotated, but again they aren't showing properly.

There's Emma, Papa, and Ruby Robyn, Emma's new doll.
Cyndie painted a painting of Half Dome in Yosemite for Lee since they went there a lot together.
Emma happy about something ... probably the thought of opening presents!

Here's Tim and Emma working on some plans.

Papa and Tim.

This is when Emma brought Papa to school as show and tell.

He told the class about all the big trucks he works with.

Here's the game Emma made for us to play last night. It probably needs a little explaining. The orange part is the game board. You move by closing your eyes and pointing on the white piece of paper with a pen or your finger. There are numbers 1 - 10+. If you hit 1 - 4, you move that far. If you hit 5 or more there's a little line marking that you don't get to go ... because you got too greedy! The board "squares" have labels ... W is for water, if you land there, you go in the water (the blue paper) ... M is for mud, you go in the black paper and lose a turn ... T (I'm not sure what T stands for) means you write (copy) a word on the white piece of paper. It was really creative and original, and actually pretty fun to play!


Here's Timmy's preschool class. His friend Lukas is the third from the left in the front and friend Joseph is fourth from the right in the back. I hear a lot about Ben too, but I don't know which one he is!

Okay, here are some pictures from the weekend away. Here's Rico, Eric, and I playing Blokus.
Emma and her friend Jasmine (Rico and Julie's older daughter).

Here's the gang dressed up for the murder mystery.

Here's Cyndie and I as Rocco and Tara.

Art Pix

Here's the latest paintings that Cyndie and I finished today ... just in time for the coming art show.

This one is Cyndie's Christmas themed painting ... I'm calling it "Winter Door" for now ... she'll have to add her own title later!
This is mine ... we'll call it "Shared Malt"

Here's Timmy hanging out with me while I paint!