On December 26th, we had a "catch-up" day here at home. Jim and Natasha had to go to work, but the rest of us worked hard on getting the house back in order and preparing for the next round of activity. That night, we watched 'Amazing Grace'. If you haven't seen it, you simply must!

December 27th we went over to some dear friends' house for dinner. We had a lovely evening with John and Nina and six of their seven children. There was constant conversation and lots of laughter happening all night.

December 28th we went to Gerben and Sandra's (more dear friends) house for dinner and had a wonderful evening of fellowship. Mom and Dad came along too. All of our kids had a great time with their kids and Mom had a nice time visiting with Sandra's mom, Jennie.

December 29th we celebrated Abigail's 13th birthday!

Hard to believe that our second to the youngest is now a teenager! Where are the years going?

Pumpky enjoyed the party immensely as you can see in this picture.

Sunday, December 30th, we went to my sister's church and then on up to their place to celebrate Christmas with my side of the family. We had fun opening gifts,

and trying to get a good picture of us four kids with Dad and Mom. We finally gave up and said this one was just going to have to do.

Here's a good picture of cousins, Cassie and Tamara.

And another of Isaac and Rachel. What a nice guy to give her a hand massage!

December 31st, Jim and the boys worked hard all day to replace two great big garage windows that didn't open with this one little one that opens and has a screen. I'm very happy with it! They also tar-papered part of the garage.

January 1st, they worked hard all day again. This time they ran telephone line from the phone box to different jacks in our house. Natasha and Cassie went shopping all day. I worked hard inside preparing a big turkey dinner for our family, Dad and Mom, and some friends who were visiting from California, John and Helen. Since I hate chopping onions, Seth stepped up to the plate and chopped them for me. As usual, he donned the goggles, thus preventing even one tear from forming!

And now, we are all getting back into our normal routines of school, work, etc. It was a good Christmas and New Year all the way around!