Bear with me

It's been so long since I have been able to post pictures that I feel I must do a post updating you all on the visuals of our lives these past few months.

We have started getting some snow, and with the first real smathering of it Phil was inspired to build a sled. Although we have yet to find any hills...We were so anxious to see how it worked that he pulled me and Ryan along the road a ways, which brought back great memories of being a kid on the way to a HILL!


It is amazing to me, though, how well our state handles snow. The equipment and manpower they have lined up each time it snows allows to the streets to be dry and ready to drive within hours of a big storm. We saw this tractor with a blower while driving through Marshalltown- the dump truck it is blowing the snow into was one of about twelve they had lined up to catch snow. This, of course, is not how they handle all snow, just the bridges.





The next pictures truly deserve their own post, especially for the significance of what happened here. We inherited this house with the carpet to the left. Red carped that was at least 30 years old. The amazing thing was it could STILL stain your clothes or feet if it got wet. Because we have so much work we want to do in the bathroom, we have just left it. It has been the one room we have said "Don't look in there, we haven't gotten that far yet!"





We love our visitors out here. We love them because we can see and spend time with them, but we also love them because they give motivation to do drastic, out of the box things. The night before our November visitors (Michael and Tif) came for an extended weekend, we decided that the red carpet simply had to go. It was a long night. And at this stage, we were nervous that we might have done more damage in getting rid of the carpet instead of leaving it...

But that was only until we finished putting down the new flooring (cheap laminate that will come up when we have time to get to the bathroom). Yes, one long night for the benefit of clean, pretty floors and unstained socks. Definitely worth it. Slowly but surely we attack each part of the house...keep visiting!













Of course, Michael and Tifani did not come to see our new flooring but to spend some quality time with us. Ryan found a new and exciting (yet quite dangerous) game (pictured at left). Dangerous? Yes, when it involves spinning and walking...














I wrote about our Christmas party a few posts back, and while I explained what happened, the visuals here really clue you in to the gravity of our ornament exchange. Yes...this was actually brought as an ornament. And then put on OUR tree.








The culprit of the whole "put the ornaments on Phil and Tracy's tree" surely couldn't have been our innocent pastor...











Ryan really loved Christmas this year. Before the big day came, he had learned that the unwrapped packages in the front room held wonderful prizes, like candy and toys. There were many times he snuck into he front room and turned up with another unwrapped present.








But when Christmas was finally here, he really had a great time tearing into the boxes. It was neat to watch, since last year he mostly enjoyed the taste of the paper.











He received this huge box of blocks and enjoyed figuring out how to put them together. With dad's help, of course.

Watching those two reminded me of the time my sister and I received Tinker Toys as a present. My dad had a blast!















As a Christmas present from her parents, Phil made this sink cabinet for a young girl at church. We collaborated on the design but really, any credit for a job well done must go to him. (Can you believe he rounded those corners with a chain saw?)

He is still spending time doing projects for RVP 1875, but adds in others as he can.








This one was fun because it was so out of character for him- usually his work is for a much older audience.















And finally, some pictures of our cat that came, took our hearts, left, came back, and left again. He has been gone for a few weeks now- probably just visiting the neighbors like last time. (Maybe we need some better cat food?)









Good thing no one around here liked him...that would have made it tough not to have him around.











And finally, a picture of mischief. Ryan was playing so nicely in the kitchen one morning. When Dad finally went in to check on him, he found Ryan with an unwrapped stick of butter. The butter had been smushed around the kitchen floor and then placed inside this tractor, which was dutifully carrying it along with Ryan's coaxing.