Saturday, January 31, 2009

Ulmer Visit!

We were delighted to have Dad's brother and his family spend a few days with us in early January. They spent many hours hunting and although they saw deer, and took a few shots, they didn't end up bagging a deer.

Armed and ready to go out!!

On Saturday morning they spent around 6 hours sitting and walking in dense fog and patches of rain. They were all glad to come back to the house for some hot chocolate to warm them up for the next trek out!!

What exciting games we played.........

Mad-Gab!!
(And Noah's awesome blueberry pie.......mmmmmmm!!)

The teams were boys against girls!!

Frantically guessing.........

--Smiles--
Aunt Judy and Addison.
One evening we headed to the local gym to play basketball and volleyball.

Uncle Bernard gets a block!

Noah and Tabitha were the champions of the 2 on 2 teams.

The whole group!!

Thanks for coming; we love ya'll!!

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

Trivia Tuesday!!

The answer to last week's trivia is.......................
--Noah--

Congratulations to those who guessed correctly!!


When Noah was 3 years old, he was bitten by a large german shepherd. She caught a lot of his face, just narrowly missing his right eye. His cheek, lips and eyebrow all required stitches-- around 50 total. When he was 11 or 12, he was bitten on both knees by our neighbors dog and had 12 stitches. And last year he has surgery on his elbow, resulting in 8 more. So his approximate total is somewhere around 70 stitches.

Andrew, Moses and Micah are also good guesses-- Moses has had stitches on his knee and eyebrow, Micah cut his finger on a machine and had stitches and Andrew has had around 50 stitches from various different scrapes.

And now to this week's trivia..........

Some time ago, there was a little girl playing with her friend, who we'll call John. John's Mom was watching all the children while our Mom was away at a prenatal. The children were having a wonderful time reading books and playing games while John's Mom made lunch. Now John had a little pair of handcuffs. Those were quite fun for the two little pals, and they would chain each-other up, then liberate themselves with a simple turn of the key. They then chained the little girl and the little boy together-- his ankle and her wrist (or possibly the other way around.......that detail is a bit fuzzy). They climbed and traipsed over everything in sight, until they suddenly found themselves in quite a fix; they were stuck up on top of a very high shelf, 5 or 6 feet off the ground. And they couldn't get down without one or both of them falling. To make matters worse, the key was no where to be found!! Frantically they tried to maneuver their way down, but to no avail. They triple checked their pockets while their siblings searched the room, but still no key!! Finally they called John's Mom to come in, but after trying, she couldn't get them down without one of them falling. (It was becoming rather urgent for them to get down and freed, because both of them needed to use the restroom.) In desperation, John's Father was called home from work to rescue the two culprits. Once the two were safely down from the shelf, the most urgent needs were attended to, but how do you seperate the two?? The key was still no where to be found!! As they contemplated their options, the little girl stuck her hand in the back pocket of her jeans. "Oh......." A stunned hush fell over the room as she pulled a small black key out of her pocket. Ooops!!

So........which Ulmer girl do you think found herself in such a scrape???? :)

New Year's Eve 2008.

The last day of 2008 was full with friends and fellowship!! We were thrilled to have our friends, the Sarensens visiting for a couple days.
Mr. Sarensen reading to our younger ones.

The Rehm family joined us for the day on New Year's Eve, so our three families spent several hours at the gym playing volleyball!! It was a wonderful afternoon of visiting and playing!
The three Mothers.

The Dad's visiting....

--Volleyball--
(Excuse me for the lack of volleyball pictures, but playing volleyball held more alure than taking pictures on that particular day!)

--Shooting Hoops--

--Games--

Bryant & Elizabeth.

Little brother & Big brother.
After several hours of activity, we went to see our friends musical program at a local church. Our family has attended their concert at this church every year for several years, so it's almost like a New Year's Eve tradition!!




As we visited afterwards, Phoebe enjoyed playing with Charissa!

The remainder of the night we spent with a group of friends from our local home-school group, visiting, playing sports and the countdown to usher in the New Year!!


The Lord blessed our family so richly in 2008. May we be His vessels of love and truth to all those around us in 2009!!

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Introducing...............

Trivia Tuesday!!


This is a brand new addition to our family blog. Once a week (Tuesday) I will post some random trivia regarding our family. The trivia will be varied in it's form-- from funny stories of something one of us children did, and you get to guess who did it, to a random question like; "How many times have the Ulmers moved?"

For Example;

"Who updates the Ulmer blog?"
That one is pretty easy, but some of the trivia questions may be a bit tricky-- but hopefully they will all be fun to think about, you will all wind up knowing us just a little bit better!
---A couple quick facts to keep in mind while you are guessing.---
The trivia will extend to include all members of our immediate family, including nephews and our brothers-in-law!!
Because the trivia will include them, all Ulmers, Shepards and Ansons are disqualified from guessing!!
The answer to the trivia question will be posted every Tuesday, along with the new trivia for that week. You will have a whole week to guess--- and if you change your mind, you can leave a second guess.
All guesses are welcome!! They can be left as comments, or emailed to us!
So with all that said-- let's jump right in with our first trivia question!!
---This Week's Trivia---
"Which Ulmer Child has had the most stitches?"
So put on your thinking caps and join the fun--- leave your best guess!!

Thursday, January 15, 2009

Ulmer Family Christmas 2008!

Our Christmas celebrations this year were geared primarily around just how much time we could spend together as a family-- all 20 of us!! Looking back, it's amazing to see how in just five years we've added 7 people to our family through birth and marriage!! The Lord is so good to us. And this year we had a precious time together, marveling at the blessing each member in our family is!!

Silas and Mommy.

Christmas morning began with our traditional breakfast-- a scrumptious egg dish-- the recipe has been used exclusively for our Christmas breakfast ever since Lydia created it at age 7!!

Mushroom Delight.

Our family gift-exchange followed breakfast and the reading of Luke Chapter 2. And it wouldn't be time for presents without a continual volley of wadded-up wrapping paper balls!!

Gift-giving time!

Silas was Dad's special assistant in opening his presents.

"Look Daddy, you got new jeans!!"

Exuberance? Excitement?

Got the Giggles!

"Oh yeah!!"

"Whoa Pheobe-- can I see them??"

Charity trying out her new yo-yo.

"Thank-you!!"

Silas got some cowboy guns.

Dad waiting in suspense!

Bringing in the big gift.

"WOW!!"

Mom surprised Dad with a chest that matches the rest of their current bed-room set!!
Around noon, we headed into Grandma's for dinner and our gift-exchange with her!! We are so blessed to live close to Grandma, and get to see her often, especially during the Christmas season!
Grandma made a delicious Christmas feast!!

Brothers.

"MMMMM....Hot-Chocolates!!"

"Silas this is the best present!"

Grandma's Christmas Tree.

Smiling Siblings.

"Look!!"

"This is a Hold-Up!!'

"Wow!!"

The Three Stooges.

Silas was super-excited!!

Strumming away.
Thank-you Grandma for the great gifts!!
Before we left for home, we took a few quick shots of our family.
The girls.

Dad and the boys.
This picture is arranged very close to one we had taken Christmas 2006-- if you look at that picture, it's amazing to see how much everyone has grown in 2 years!!
Our family!!
The Day after Christmas we had the USA (Ulmer-Shepard-Anson) gift-exchange. The boys are getting old enough to appreciate the gifts as well as the thrill of just tearing open a present!! :)
Goodies!!

Yummy Cheese Fondue.

Mom made homemade biscotti---too good!!

Paul loved ripping the paper off!

(Quick note- Scott received a couple CDs from Dad and Mom. Mom wanted to creatively wrap them so he'd be clueless as to what was under the wrapping paper......so she put them inside of a phone-book and wrapped the phone book!!! Needless to say, Scott was totally stumped!!)

Justice, Uncle Seth and Aunt Esther playing together.

Fun Photo Gifts.

Marcus was content just to hold his opened presents!

Memory-Making-Mama.

Esther made quilts for both the married girls and their families.

Raspberry Chews!!!!!!!

Just for fun, we girls gave each-other make-overs--- fun sister time!!

Happy Family.

Uncle Seth and Philip.

Marcus and Justice.

Hmmmmm.what could this be?

Uncle Sethy and Justice.

The boys singing and signing "Away in the Manger".

Investigating the awesome car mat Nana made for Justice!

Pillowcasas......curtains........napkins.......what should I do with this???

Dad taking a quick power-snooze in-between presents!

One totally cute little Shepard Boy!!

"Thank-you Papa!!"

Justice and Daddy playing around.
Grandma joined us later in the afternoon for treats, and to for the mini-birthday celebration we held for the two oldest Grand-boys.
Gigi and Philip.
Paul and Justice celebrate their 3rd birthdays only 6 days apart-- Paul on Dec. 30th and Justice on Jan. 5th!!! We try to have a joint birthday party for them when they are up for Christmas.
The Birthday Buddies.

Trying to figure out how to hold up 3 fingers!!

Paul loves the birthday hats!

Justice opening his birthday present.


The Ansons had to leave at 6pm, so before they left we took pictures of us all together!
First picture--- Paul 'helping' Philip smile!! :0

Little bit of Love.

Just plain cute......

Papa, Nana and the grandboys.
(Hopefully someday we'll get some girls!!) :)

Great-Grandma (Affectionately called "Gigi") with the four grand-boys.
Our Entire Family- 12 Ulmers, 3 Shepards, 5 Ansons and Dad's Mom!!
(My apologies on the long delay in posting these Christmas pictures........there's nothing like Christmas in January!!) :)