Things to Do In December

Decorate the Tree!



Run Through the Snow!



Take a Little (okay, maybe a BIG) Taste Of the Snow!



Make a "Car Bus" out of one of the many boxes that have been coming in the mail the past couple of weeks!



Wear Rudolf Clothing! It's especially fun if the nose on your shirt blinks and you have socks with reindeer on them as well!



Enjoy what Ella calls our "Beeee-yoooo-ti-ful" Pointsettia that Pake and Beppe sent to us!



So those are the fun things we have been up to lately. Hope you are having a great December as well! (:

Who Wants To Come Over?

Good luck getting here if you do! We have about 11 inches of snow on the ground right now. It's still going - but looks like it will end soon. Here is a picture I took around 10am. I don't think the guy across the street got too far this morning, hee hee.


All of the schools, government offices, and even some malls are closed right now. People are getting their cars stuck all over the place - after spending an hour or two burying them out of the snow. It's a good thing Dave has today off. He worked this past Sunday, so could pick a flex day this week to make up for it. I think he made a great choice!

There's no question that WE are gonna have a White Christmas!

Weekend Fun!

For Halloween/Reformation Day this year I was a good frugal dutchwoman and talked Ella into wearing the same costume that she wore last year. Even though she told everyone who asked that she wanted to be a sprinkler for Halloween, we had no arguments when it was time to put the old kitty-cat suit on once again.

Here she is, ready to go!


It worked out pretty well because we left to go trick or treating at the same time the neighbor girls came out with their parents, so we were able to walk along with them, which more than delighted Ella.

After many blocks, a few meltdowns (not by Ella though), donning of the glowbracelets, bags of candy getting heavier and heavier, and Ella asking "When is it time to go home?" it was finally time to call it quits for the evening.

We had a great time, and what made it a million times better was that the weather was absolutely BEAUTIFUL! Last year we went out for just a few minutes, and Ella had on her huge coat, gloves, and hat. It was freezing, and not really much fun to be outside. This year we didn't even need any extra layers. Definitely a rarity that we thouroughly enjoyed!

Then, on Saturday morning we were up bright (well, dark actually) and early, so that we could be dressed, packed, and ready in time to catch the train to Chicago. Considering the fact that we could ride the metra train an unlimited number of times for $5 each (and Ella was free) for the entire weekend, we thought that would be a great way to travel down to the big city and would be a fun and somewhat cheap day out.

Ella had a ton of fun on her first trainride. Of course she commented on and questioned just about EVERYTHING. But I think she provided a lot of entertainment to those seated around us. Once we arrived in Chicago, we found out that they had trolley busses that ran for free and would take you to any of the major areas and back. So our cheap weekend became even cheaper. Woo hoo!

We ended up on Michigan Ave, and had to go into the American Girl Store. It was pretty crazy and busy in there, so not as much fun as it could have been to browse, but it was definitely an interesting place to be. Dave called it a whole separate culture. And I would have to agree.

We walked around, found a restaurant that served the deep-dish Chicago-style pizza, and looked in a few more stores. Then we got back on our trolley, rode back to the train station, and boarded the train back home. When we finally arrived at out stop, I told Ella that she was becoming a train expert. She replied "When I grow up, I want to be a train expert." A young woman in the aisle started laughing out loud and had to tell us how cute and entertaining Ella was. Yep, that's our Ella!

Painting and Pumpkins!

We've had a pretty exciting day of crafts/special projects in our home the past few days. I must admit that I'm not one of those moms that likes to get down and dirty and messy. I'm usually not planning any type of activities that might involve finger paints, glue, scissors, glitter, or any of those other "messy" arts and crafts items. So when Ella and I made a trip to Hobby Lobby (LOVE that store!) this past week, and picked up some wooden letters, paint brushes, and paint, Ella was pretty excited to be involved in the project that was to come. We covered the table in newspaper, got out all of the supplies, and before long we had the letters E-L-L-A hand-painted to match the colors in Ella's room.

Here's my little artist at work:


And here's our finished product! (completed with just a *little* help from me)



Then on Saturday, we decided to make our way to a pumpkin farm to pick out a few pumpkins. There were goats and llamas to pet, play houses to explore, hay piles to climb on and walk inside, and many other fun things that Ella enjoyed running back and forth between. If my camera display hadn't died on me, and Ella hadn't done such a great job of running away each time we finally caught up to whatever attraction she was involved in, I would have captured a lot of cute pictures. But this is about the only one I got.



We did find a pumpkin for myself, Dave, Ella, and Pumpkin. After a much needed nap, we once again covered our table with newspapers and the pumpkin carving fun began!

Ella was our professional pumpkin-scooper-outter. (:



And here is our new pumpking family - a "classic" smile for Dave, a kitty-cat pumpkin for Pumpkin, a goofy smile for mine, and a scary-faced (chosen by her) pumpkin for Ella.


Ella was less than excited when I told her that pumpkins' home would be our front porch. She really tried to talk me into keeping them in the house where she would then be able to see them all the time. Sorry, they had to be outside where they were able to get a good view of the snow (yes, SNOW!) that we had blowing in the air today. Brrrrr!!

Colors of Fall

So I guess one of the up-sides of living in Wisconsin is that we actually get to experience a taste of the fall colors. I am absolutely in love with the deep reds and oranges that the leaves on some of the trees have turned right now. I can't remember seeing anything so vibrant growing up in California.

So, this past Sunday, Ella was all dressed up for fall as we went to church. It took some fancy talk to get my anti-tights child to put them on, but I think the number of people who commented about how cute she was in her pumpkin tights I think made her pretty happy to be wearing them.

It was such a beautiful, sunny afternoon that I decided to take her outside and try and get a couple of pictures with all of the leaves in the background. Here are a few of my favorites.








So, aren't her pumpkin tights pretty cute? (:

Ella Talk

Well, I figured it was high time to post another enty onto my "abandoned" blog. And I figured I'd let Ella do the talking on this one since she's been amusing me so much lately. Here are just a couple of our recent conversations:

The other night Ella pulled out one of her very heavy and vibrantly illustrated Bibles that we had not really looked at before. We were looking at the pictures of the creation story, and then read the story of adam and eve. After describing how the serpent had tricked eve into eating the forbidden fruit, I asked Ella if that was what God said to do. She immediately said "No." She paused, looked at the picture of the fuit, and then asked me this:

Ella: "Mom, what kind of fruit is this?"
Me: "It looks like an apple"
Ella: "But she didn't even wash it before she ate it"

Oh, how great of a sin that was commited on that day......

Then just this morning we were talking about all of the special days coming up, and started talking about Christmas. I asked her if she knew whose birthday it was on Christmas. She said "baby Jesus." I then asked her where Jesus lives. Her response: "Is it in another state?" Ha ha. I guess you could say that...... Kind of funny though since she's been talking so much about how Jesus and God live in her heart lately. I guess all of this moving and traveling and talking about the different states where different people we know live is affecting her thinking.

We're Here!!

Definitely high time for a new post!! Nope, we haven't been traveling to our new home in Wisconsin during the past month -- we made it just fine!!

Here's how it started:

As you can see in the above picture -- it just wouldn't be a move for the vb's without the use of a Pen*ske Truck! The truck was used to retrieve our belongings from Sibley. We never unloaded it in Rochester -- we just backed it up to the big moving truck and loaded the stuff right in!

The professional movers were great! It was definitely a new experience for us. The crew in Rochester was excellent. It was evident they knew what they were doing and loved doing it. We basically just tried to stay out of their way.

After all of our belongings were down the road it was time to clean up the townhouse.


We worked hard and the maintainance man that came to check us out of our townhouse was very impressed with how well we took care of the place!

One of the bad parts of moving is saying goodbye to friends. We made some great friends during our short time in Rochester. Ella too had to say goodbye to her great nextdoor friend whom she loved just to run outside and play with whenever she saw her outside.


But it was time to go ... so we packed up Pumpkin ...


... and headed to Wisconsin.

And this is what we said "Hello" to:

So far, I would say we are really enjoying it. I (Dave) am really loving being able to watch and listen to my Brewers, Packers, and Badgers!! Even though I love my Wisconsin sports teams, I still must admit that Ella looks pretty cute in this outfit:

We're just going to have to replace it with a Milwaukee Brewers World Series Champions T-shirt!!

We're Almost Outta Here!

Our time here in Rochester is QUICKLY coming to an end. Tomorrow the movers will be here. They will pack everything (including this computer!) up and load up the truck. Friday will be spent deep cleaning our townhouse, returning the "big yellow truck," and then we will do a final walk through and turn in all of our keys. Then....it's off to our next stage in life that will take place in Racine.

On Monday we made the 3-hour drive to Sibley, IA to re-claim all of the belongings that we were so graciously allowed to store there. Man, we sure do have a lot of stuff! It's amazing how you forget about some of the things you have. It really makes you think about whether or not you really need all of those things that can be so hard to part with. We were surprisingly greeted by a nice crew of men and women from the Sibley CRC who helped us move all of the boxes and other stuff out of the building and into the truck. We are truly thankful for the way they generously gave of their time and energy. What a wonderful group of folks!

Ella was pretty excited to find Dave's old bouncy horse (I think they're considered "unsafe" for kids now, so they're no longer made), his old tricycle - which is bigger and better than the one she has now - and his old red wagon, which now has all of the wheels fully attached (thanks Don!). It wasn't easy getting her to let us load them onto the truck. But she finally did, and then dutifully served as Dave's Co-Pilot of "the big yellow truck" on the way back to Rochester. So now we hav a big Penske truck full of extra stuff sitting in the driveway. We'll just let the movers take it from there. :)

Last Friday was Dave's final day as an official Mayo employee. It was definitely happy-sad for him. He's very excited about the job awaiting in Racine, but found it somewhat difficult to leave the job here behind. It was a great experience, and he would have loved for it to have lasted longer I think.

So now - it's time to finish getting ready for the packers that will be here bright and early tomorrow. It will be interesting to see how Ella reacts to the frenzy. And how she reacts when all of her "essential" items are being packed up. It should be interesting.

So the next time I write it will be from a new place. Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers over the next few days. Pray that all of the million little details that need to be figured out and dealt with during the move go smoothly.

I'll let you know....

An Evening of Celebration

Last night we celebrated. Dave and his colleagues each received certificates recognizing the completion of their four units of CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education). It was an intimate ceremony. There were three others who completed the year-long residency alongside Dave. Each of them came from very different backgrounds, and each will continue on to very different future endeavors. It was an interesting year. It was a year of spiritual and personal growth. I'm sure Dave will never forget the unique personalities of his supervisors and fellow residents. And I don't think they will easily forget him and his "Christian Reformed doctrinal firmness" either. :)


After they were given their certificates, they responded by reading Robert Frosts well-known poem "The Road Not Taken." They followed it by offering up their own Frost-inspired poem entitled "Residency: The Road We've Taken." Here is Dave reading his verse.


It was an evening of accomplishment, thankfulness, inside jokes, dancing on the stage (by the kids, not the residents), dinner, wine, and warm feelings all around.
Congratulations Dave!

Afterwards, we walked outside where we found music and flea market style booths downtown. We walked around, taking it all in. We never realized what a happening place it is downtown on Thursday nights! And Ella even got to play in the water.

We Have A New Home!!

Yay! I am just SOOO excited! I was almost scared to write the last post since I didn't want to jinx it, but the house we were so excited about is OURS! Yippee!

I am excited because it is a BRAND NEW one - never before lived in by anyone else! It has a living room with vaulted ceiling and fireplace, a family room, pretty large kitchen, nice laundry room, 2-car garage, 3 bedrooms, and 2 and a half baths. So plenty of room for us and all of our stuff. I think my mom just may be a little jealous! :)

It's actually located just outside of the city, but still super close to all of the major shopping, and still a fairly short drive to the hospital for Dave. Here are a few pictures so you can see what it looks like:








So now we just need to plan all of the details that go along with moving, including the exact date that will be. But at least I won't have to do much packing. Oh yeah, did I mention that Dave was able to make it part of the job offer that they would pay for professional movers? Oh yeah! As much as I just love to pack (NOT!), I am way more than willing to pass all of that work on to the professionals. This is gonna be pretty nice I'm thinking. :)

The Hunt for Our New Home

Well, our weekend of house hunting is over. Yay! And we survived! We left for Racine on Friday afternoon and spent a good chunk of the day on Saturday viewing different rental properties. One was REALLY nice, a couple were definite possibilites, and a couple were places where we just couldn't envision ourselves living - ever.

The second home we looked at was the one that was really nice. Both Dave and I felt very good about it, and didn't want to "lose out" should it be the one we would decide to go after in the end. So we took a bit of a risk and went ahead and filled out all of the necessary paperwork and gave a small "earnest money" deposit to ensure that we would be first on the list. And it was a good thing we did since two other couples arrived to view the home just as we were about to leave. And in the end, it was the home that was on the top of our list. We would definitely have been a bit disappointed had someone else filled out a rental application first.

We definitely got to know the area much better. And after many u-turns after realizing the roads ahead (that we had planned to drive down) were closed, scrambling to find new routes that hopefully were "closed-road" free, as well as a stop for a drawbridge, we did eventually arrive at all of our destinations. Even if a bit stressed out from all of the construction chaos.

But I think all that we went through was worth it. We did end up finding a home that will be just about perfect for us. So now we wait. We should know whether the house is "ours" for sure in a day or two. So, hopefully we will have some good news for you then! We'll keep you posted!

New County, New Fair

It must have been about a month or so ago that the TV ads began. And Ella definitely noticed them. She heard the words "fair" and "Rochester" and figured out pretty quick that the fair was coming here. The commercial was on a few times. And every time it was - even if she was in the next room - she heard it. "Is the fair here yet?" is what we heard from her just about every other day.

So, when the time finally arrived, we knew we couldn't let it pass without a visit. We had gone to the county fair last year when we lived in Iowa, so we figured we better go and see how this county's fair stacked up.

So here is our evening, in pictures:

Riding in the Hot Air Balloons:



The Flying Elephants aka the "Jumping Jumbos":



Mini Donuts (they are the "talked about" fair food around here):


Petting the "pony":


The Airplane Ride:



The whole family got to ride in the ferris wheel:



Riding the Carousel (she's petting her horse here):


We definitely made a night of it. And seeing that smile on Ella's face was worth every dollar we paid. :)