2019 in Review

It's that time of the year again-- time to reflect back upon all the things that happened in our lives this year, no matter how big or small they may seem. Time slows down for no one and these kids prove that every day!


January

We took a trip to the Outer Banks to visit Grandma & Grandpa. Brett went to a conference while we stayed and played, and even celebrated a late Christmas with Grandma & Grandpa.

February

February and March are usually slow months, filled with snowy, cold days in Vermont, but we managed to get in a lot of schoolwork, and some ice skating with our homeschool friends.

March

March is sugaring season, and we visited a local sugar shack to enjoy some maple treats and watch the syrup being made.

April

What February and March lacked, April picked up the slack. Abigail had surgery to have her tonsils (and adenoids-- again!) removed, in hopes that she would get some better sleep and thus be able to think more clearly. She recuperated within a day or two and the very same week she started her brand new gymnastics class, a hobby she's grown to adore. And Jacob had his annual MRI & follow up with neurosurgery. He's seizure-free for the 2nd year in a row, and developing perfectly normally!

At the end of April we celebrated our first Passover feast as a family, getting dressed up and pulling out the nice china. And of course we took our annual family Easter photo.

 May

May was the busiest month for kids' extracurricular activities! Our homeschool co-op enjoyed a trip to the Shelburne Museum. We had a lot of fun learning with them this year!

Andrew earned his red belt in taekwando-- signifying 3 full years of the sport. He's now only 6 months away from black belt!

The same day as the red belt testing, the girls had their dance recital-- Abi's 2nd recital and Leah's 6th? They both did great!

And baseball season kept us traveling all over southeastern Vermont, in rain or shine!

The kids also got awards for excellence in AWANA, each of them finishing all the verses in their books. They love going to club and memorizing God's word!

June

Summer always means a trip to Goody's for ice cream! Of course this wasn't the only time we enjoyed the summer weather with treats! We also had Vacation Bible School at church, Jacob's first year in a real group.

 July

Our first time enjoying our new camper as a family was in July, a trip close by but filled with memories and an awesome hike up Mt. Philo for some awesome views!

Andrew turned 9, and celebrated with a sleepover with his two close friends a Pikachu birthday cake.

We finished out July with a trip to Word of Life Camp, one of our family's favorite time's of year. Leah and Andrew each at their own camps, but us having a blast with the two youngest at our own camp.

 August

Fair & Field Days is another tradition we look forward to every year, and this year Grandma & Grandpa got to join us. The Maple Tent is a favorite, and the rides were a huge hit for everyone this year!

 Our first day of our 8th year of homeschooling! It's always fun to start with fresh books and fresh supplies and a new schedule for the day.

And a first for us this year was a broken bone. Leah broke her arm on the playground at our church's Labor Day picnic. Just in time for her 11th birthday! She had surgery to set it and wore a cast for about 6 weeks, which went by really quickly and easily for everyone.

September

Brett & I went on our annual Pastor's Retreat, this year only an hour away in Vermont. It's always a great getaway and we get spoiled away from the kids.

Jacob started going to 3-year-old preschool at the local public school. He was shy about it at first but really warmed up and loved going to see his friends 2 days a week. Later in the month, we celebrated his 4th birthday with a little family Paw Patrol party.

October

One of the most memorable parts of our year was our trip to Washington, DC. We met Grandma & Grandpa there, and we got to see tons of awesome things! Of course the Museum of the Bible was one of our favorite, but I really couldn't pick a favorite photo from the week!

Halloween was wet but we enjoyed trick-or-treating with our friends and Trunk or Treat at church as Cruella deVille, Iron Man, Supergirl, and Spiderman.

Abi celebrated her 7th birthday with a mermaid cake and 2 friends over for a sleepover.

November

In November we celebrate Brett's birthday with whatever yummy cake I can come up with. We took our annual family photo in the fall leaves, shortly before we saw the first snow of the season (the first year Jacob tolerates going out in it). Later we celebrated Thanksgiving around our table as a family and the next day we found our family Christmas tree.

 December

And of course the end of the year brings the Christmas season and all it's charm! Look how much they grew from the beginning to the end of the year!

Christmas Day

So this year Leah, Andrew, and Abi all knew the truth about Santa Claus. Leah found out a couple years ago, and this year we one day just decided to talk to Andrew and Abi about it. (Jacob was there but he is still too young to really know what we were talking about.) Andrew said he had already figured it out anyway, and Abi really didn't have much of a reaction. They were almost kind of excited that they knew something that a lot of their friends didn't know and they had a chance to be "sneaky" and keep a secret. And we were relieved that we could make the focus of Christmas more on Jesus' birth. 

Of course, we still gave them each one big gift from Santa, and we still put out cookies for him and played along but it was so much easier putting the gifts out not having to worry about using the right wrapping paper or handwriting to disguise Santa. There was still so much magic on Christmas morning when the kids woke up to this. This year we let them all sleep downstairs together, so they could get up and play in the morning and have access to the bathroom without seeing any surprises. They all seemed to fall asleep rather quickly and we didn't really get up and get started until around 8:20am. 

Of course, the opening is always mass chaos. They usually tear right through, occasionally stopping to see everyone else's gift or to let Brett or I open one, but usually they go, go, go.

Abi's request of Santa was an 18" American Girl doll. She got a smaller one last year and has really proven that she can take care of it and plays with it often. So we decided it was a worthy gift. She has really enjoyed dressing it and carrying it around and playing with it.

Andrew usually asks for XBox Games, and this year he got Halo. It is a bit of a mature game, but he genuinely wanted something that he could play as a 2-player game with his Dad. He has several other games that are designed for older kids, but he doesn't seem to be bothered by them, so long as his time is monitored on the games. He does love his XBox!

Jacob didn't really ask for anything specific from Santa, so he got a Paw Patrol pup with its car that he didn't already have. He almost has a whole collection of Paw Patrol pups with cars! And to feed the obsession, Aunt Karen sent him a giant, life-sized Paw Patrol tower with working parts that really had a wow factor for opening on Christmas morning! 

Jacob also added to his collection of bear counters and peg puzzles (which he calls "tall bears" because he usually plays with them together with the bear counters and they are matching colors).

Andrew got a How to Drain Your Dragon book he'd been admiring-- sort of an encyclopedia for dragons, another hobby of his. And he got some army men and army vehicles, which he can often be found lining around his room in the early mornings before school.

For some reason Jacob had also requested a Woody doll. I don't even know that he's really seen the Toy Story movie, but we managed to find an inexpensive Woody doll and Buzz to go along with him, and he acted as if that was exactly what he wanted!

We had a hard time finding Leah's request from Santa. She had chosen two different Barbie dolls that she wanted. Neither of them were less than $60 on Amazon, which is way too much for a doll. Perhaps we waited too long. Regardless, I found one of them used on Ebay and bought it, telling her the caveat that we would buy her a new one when the price went down later. I could tell she was a bit disappointed, but she is mature enough to understand how it works and she said she got plenty of other good stuff. Aunt Karen even sent some flashy new clothes!

Among Abi's other gifts were plenty of LOL dolls (her current favorite obsession-- they come with tons of tiny accessories) and clothes for her baby dolls.

Leah also requested this Lucky Fortune Collector Case. I didn't really get the attraction to it. It looks like a giant fortune cookie with some hidden jewelry inside, but she really was surprised she got it.

I always love the quiet playing of toys and the relaxed pace of Christmas Day after the gifts are all opened. It's interesting to see the things they choose to play with first and how they choose to use them. They do sometimes get a bit overwhelmed and want to just do things they're used to doing but that's understandable. May they never lose the wonder of Christmas morning!