These Evenings at Home!!

During the winter our family enjoys many evening inside-- but we never lack for entertainment with Dad around!! :) He never ceases to make us laugh!! Follow the link for a short video of our hilarious Dad!!

http://youtube.com/watch?v=G-STj_LqFcs

Sometime Noah decides to make us laugh too!! :)

God's Protection.

On Thursday morning Noah went off the road on his way to work. We'd gotten about 5 inches of snow through the night, but it had been blowing so our main gravel road was almost completely clear. Noah was about 3 miles east of our house when he popped over a hill and found that the entire down-side of the hill was covered with snow. He didn't see it until he was on it, and he felt like he was going just a little to fast so braked to slow down. His car lost traction and slid right off the road, traveling at about 45mph. His car for several yards, plowing over several small cedar trees, narrowly missing a fence and then sliding to a halt against the edge of the ditch. Noah was wearing his seat-belt and was not thrown around. He was not harmed in any way- Praise the Lord!!

(If you look closely you can see his tracks, the fence, and his car in the thicket.)

The view of his car from the road.

Both of our older boys have been in accidents and could potentially have been seriously injured, but both times, they walked away un-harmed (see Seth's wreck , June 2006).

We are so grateful to the Lord for His hand of protection over us every day. He has kept us safe in so many situations. He is faithful!!

Ulmer Times.

Silas trying on Tommy's slippers!!

Playing Spoons- the beginning of the game-

Everyone fighting to get a spoon!!

Eating breakfast and visiting!!

Tommy is a master at card tricks!! Here Charity is practicing one he taught her!

Last week-end we were delighted to have Dad's brother and most of his family (we missed you, Shawn and Ashley!!) come for a visit!! They arrived Friday afternoon just in time to get out in the field and do some deer hunting, as Uncle Bernard and Tommy both had tags to fill. Tommy got his first shot off that night, but they never found the deer.

Saturday we spent a good part of the day hunting and as the light faded away that evening, we were successful! Uncle Bernard and Lydia were both able to bag a deer! Tommy got another shot, but although they searched for quite awhile, they never did find his deer. The hunters brought their trophies back home before we headed to a local gym to spend several hours playing volleyball.

After a rather late night we were sad to see them go when they headed back to the airport Sunday morning.

What better way to start a new Year then to spend time with people you love!!!

The hunters from L-R Lisa, Tommy, Seth, Micah, Uncle Bernard, Joshua, Lydia and Moses!

Thanks for coming, We Love you Guys!!!

Family Time.

One of the things we treasured most this Christmas was the time we got to spend together as a family!! What a joy to be together- Papa & Nana, all twelve children, both brother-in-laws, the three grandboys!! Great-Grandma got to be with us several times too!

Rebecca and Seth.

The three boys loved sledding with Uncle Moses!!

Rebecca and Justice.

The three grandboys with Great-Grandma!!

Uncle Sethy and Justice!

The Shepards!

Aunt Elizabeth and Marcus!!

The seven sisters!!

What can you say?? We like to make people laugh!

Whenever Silas, Justice and Paul are all together, we make sure to get aa picture of them together. It certainly was a funny scence- 4 cameras flashing crazily, 8 people trying to get the boys to smile simultaneously and the three boys who giggled, crawled away and took their shoes off.

All ready for a picture- except Paul- quite the little comedian!! :)

Paul, Uncle Silas and Justice!! What special little guys!!

Rebecca (chuckles)!!

"You mean those raspberry chews are for me!!!!!"

"I love my Aunt Esther."

Daddy and Elizabeth

Our adorable nephew Marcus gives me a grin!!!

Mr. and Mrs. Anson-- awww!!!!

Sisters!!

Precious Smiles.

Noah and Esther!

Charity and Phoebe.

Uncle Seth and Marcus!!

Esther and Charity!

Uncle Micah and Justice!

Moses, Seth and Esther!!

Look- they're all sucking their thumbs!!! (It was Papa's idea!)

Papa and Nana with their three Grandsons!!

Family-- what a precious gift from God!!

An Update on Silas.

It's been some time since we asked for prayer for Silas, and time for an update!

Our blessing boy has doing so much better!! For the week following our post, he continued to having more bruising, but now he has had no bruising or swelling for the past 10 days.

We are so grateful for all of you who have held Silas and our whole family in your prayers. We know that they made a difference!! We are so thankful to the Lord for taking care of Silas, preventing any major complications, and for Silas' swift healing.

In the video Silas says;

"I can Walk, Jesus gave me new skin, Thank-you for praying for me. Bye-Bye."

Hunting Adventures!

November 28th brought with it deer-hunting season, which means that several members of our family suddenly had a strange fascination with rising very early in the morning and going out to sit in the freezing cold in search of Mr. Monster Buck.

During the season we saw many deer and there were several shots fired- Lydia shot at a large buck (and presumably missed since we never found anything), Moses shot at a doe, but missed, I never actually saw any deer while I was carrying a gun (we had 4 guns for the five of us), so I never got to shoot.

Esther and Moses on opening day, empty-handed but excited!!

With five hunters between us and the Ansons, we had a serious case of buck fever floating through the house. We didn't think it was contagious but apparently it was; before the first day of the season was over, Esther had contracted the fever too. She decided not to buy a tag, but she went out faithfully everyday with Moses. This was Moses' first year getting to carry a gun and he was SO excited!! He saw plenty of deer but didn't get a shot until the end of the season.

The guys heading out to the field.

Most of the season was unreasonable warm and sunny, usually hunting season brings with it below freezing temperatures, snow and wind. This season it stayed warm until the last 4 days. Scott bagged his deer on the last warm day and tried not to laugh as the rest of us battled the freezing cold, ice and wind the next three days.

Seth is the most selective hunter of us all. Having bagged two 8-point bucks during his career as a hunter, he now reserves his bullets for only the largest bucks, which unfortunately, he has yet to locate. During the beginning of the season he passed up on several nice bucks and a swarm of large does. Finally as the days ticked off until that last day, he began to shoot; we won't talk about the three that got away, or the eight empty shells in his pocket, which all strayed from their target.
On the last day of the season Seth, Esther and Moses once more walked through the fields hoping to bag a deer. They were heading home when suddenly; they saw it. Actually Esther saw it, and as she dropped to the ground she whispered "It's a buck, a HUGE buck!!!" Seth, visions of those antlers floating through his head, raised his gun. Scroll down for a picture of the monster........

Okay, so Esther was partly right-- it was a deer, so she gets brownie points for actually seeing it, but as you can see from the picture, it was not by any means a big deer, and there were certainly no antlers on her. Seth deliberated for only a second before pulling the trigger. Since it was the last day and he will be able to hunt only the last day 1/2 of the next season, he wanted to fill at least one of his tags.

Hopefully this coming season will be a little more profitable then this last one-- we've still got 4 tags to fill!!

Icy Adventures!

On Monday night (Dec. 10th) Kansas was hit with a ice-storm. Somewhere between 2 and three inches of rain fell during the last few hours of the day and by midnight, the steadily dropping temperature had frozen everything into a thick sheet of glass. During the early hours on Tuesday morning, we lost all electrical power to the house. Exciting, huh?? With no work on Tuesday for Dad or Seth we spent the day at home, mainly in the kitchen or living room. Our huge stove is run on propane, so by keeping a pot or water cooking all day, we were able to heat part of the downstairs and stay warm even without the furnace. With plenty of hot water, we weren't fairing too badly. When darkness came at 5:30, we couldn't find much to do without electricity but we all sat in the living room while Dad read aloud. By 7:30, half of us were headed to bed, but Dad stayed up to play cards with the younger ones by candlelight.

There was a thick layer of ice over everything!!

Moses and Micah loved seeing how many icicles they could knock off our fences!!

Our power lines; covered with ice but still up!

::Tuesday Snapshots::

Playing risk- why does Esther always win, because seriously, there isn't one game of risk played in this house that Esther doesn't win. It's so sad!!

Silas was prepared for anything and everything with Dad's flashlight and his own little pistol!

With no lights, candles became a highly valued item in this house!!

::Wednesday Snapshots::

Wednesday morning we packed up and headed to Grandma's!! It was a little difficult to make it down our tree-lined road with our tall bus, but thankfully it wasn't damaged. Grandma never lost power during the storm and we are so grateful for her willingness to open up her house to us all!

Wednesday morning was a good time to get started on some special Holiday baking. Grandma pulled out her recipes and we got right to work making Christmas cookies!!

Chocolate covered peanut-butter-balls are a family favorite!! Grandma always makes several batches---- mmmmmm!!

Tabitha has the time-consuming (but mighty tasty!!) job of shaping, then dipping the peanut-butter-balls!!

Silas and Grandma working on puzzles.

Lunch-time--- organized chaos! :)

The ice hurt the trees severely in most places. Wednesday as we girls busied ourselves in the house, the boys spent the day working on the outside cutting down the broken branches and hauling them away.
On Thursday we girls got to have a piece of the action too and we all pitched in together to clean up several yards.

One of Grandma's trees was damaged quite a bit. The boys kept busy for a whole morning on just that one tree!

Seth ran the chainsaw most of the day!

Charity and Tabitha received the logs that had just been sawed and stacked them on the curb to be loaded into the trailer.

Micah hauling the limbs- they were quite heavy with all the ice on them!!

Dad loading the trailer.

Esther and Charity.

Moses unloading the trailer.

Thursday evening Scott arrived at our house with a newly acquired generator. He and Lydia generously offered to let us use it, and Scott hooked it up to power the house. Thank-you, Scott!! So Thursday night we moved back out to the farm where the Ansons moved in with us for the time being, until they got power back at their house.

With the Ansons staying with us on Friday and Saturday, we got to spend extra time cuddling Marcus and cuddl--- no, chasing Paul!! :)

Now it's Tuesday evening, and it's been 7 days since we lost power. On Friday Seth and his boss made a trip down to TX to purchase a large number of generators. They arrived back in Kansas Saturday night and Seth hooked up a generator at the Ansons so they could move back home. Since then both houses ran on generators until they got their power back yesterday morning. We are still running on the generator, which is large enough to supply the majority of our house, except for the water softener, wash machine and dryer, our two chest freezers and the distiller which purifies our drinking water. We've been buying drinking water in Seneca and Grandma is doing our laundry (THANK-YOU, Grandma!!), and the Lord has provided weather cold enough to keep the items in the freezer still frozen, so we're all set; but we are taking donations of brownies and chocolate chip cookies......:) The electric company said that we should have power today or tomorrow so hopefully tomorrow we can quit running the generator!

It's been a exciting week and certainly a change from our normal lives! It's amazing how loosing the power changed so many things. One doesn't realize what they have until they don't have it! We're all have a greatly heightened thankfulness for electricity!!

Praises;

-We've been out on the roads all week from place to place the the Lord has given us all safety and so far nobody has gone in the ditch. We're are grateful for the Lord's guiding hand of protection!

-Grandma has been so helpful-- letting us stay with her, making lunches for us while we were working on the trees around town, lending us her truck so we could come home and do horse and chicken chores, doing our laundry, the list goes on! We're so grateful to the Lord for our Grandma!!

-Scott and Lydia have been so generous letting us use their generator. Without it we'd be living here at home in darkness. We're so thankful for their kindness!!