Random things about me

25 Random Things about Leah

1. If I didn't watch sports on TV, I wouldn't need one. If I'm at home alone, the TV is usually off. The quietness sounds nice at this stage of the game. Of course Hawkeye sports are my favorite.

2. I married my highschool sweetheart and am still in love. : ) I wish he was home more though... he works 60-70 hours a week. I appreciate that he is a hard-worker and a non-complainer.

3. I hated living in Goshen, IN for about the first 10 years or so of our marriage. I finally started praying to be content in all circumstances, and asked my family to stop asking us to move home, and it's better. I would still rather live in Iowa near my family, any day of the week. (My brother-in-law, Jeff, still regulary asks me when we are moving back!!). Did you know that it's still possible to feel homesick at age 40???

4. I have 5 nieces and 1 nephew but none live near us. I have 2 nieces waiting on me in heaven. I can't wait to hold them.

5. I hate making supper.

6. I don't mind doing laundry and I love my washing machine...a Whirlpool Carbrio. : )

7. I have the spiritual gifts of Mercy and Leadership. I use Mercy while working at the hospital as a nurse practitioner with chronic and cancer pain patients.

8. I'm the VP of Major Softball at Concord Little League.

9. I'm the chairperson of our congregation, Silverwood Mennonite Church.

10. I'm not at home very much, but our neighbors would tell you we drive in the driveway often, and usually leave right away again. It's the season of life... their day is coming. : ) (BTW, I have really nice neighbors).

11. Attending Bible Study Fellowship (BSF) was one of the BEST things that I ever did for myself years ago. Someday I want to join again.

12. My kids, Madison and Quinn, bring me the most joy in life. Watching them do things they love makes me happy. Hearing them laugh warms my heart. I try to soak them in and burn all of the moments into my memory. They are growing too fast.

13. I grew up in the country, on a sheep farm in Iowa.

14. I wish I could play the piano well enough to play at church.

15. I used to play volleyball in highschool and was ranked in the state for ace serves. Wow... that was forever ago. My kids don't even believe me...LOL

16. I like almost all foods, except fish, green peppers and Dr. Pepper.

17. My colleagues tell me I'm the calmest person in any crisis and they want me around when they are crashing. : )

18. I pray often and a lot, off and on all day long, and love the constant companion of Jesus in my life. I pray about everything... the present, the future, spouses for my kids, jobs, the stranger in line at the grocery store in front of me... people who would never suspect that I pray for them probably. I thank God every single day for the health and safety of our family. Who knows I may have prayed for you today! Do you need me to pray for you? I would count it a privilege to talk to the God of the universe for you and with you.

19. I'm not good at landscaping, flower gardening and basically have no clue what to do outside in the yard. I wish someone would come and save me and my flower beds.

20. I've decided I dislike tent camping very, very much but go for my kids and pretend to like it. I'm at the RV stage of life. Wonder where I could find one of those... cheap?! LOL

21. I'm afraid of snakes. My colleagues would see me NOT remain calm in a snake-circumstance.

22. I worked super hard for my master's degree in nursing when my kids were little. They were in 1st grade and 3rd grade when I graduated from Ball State. They both can remember going to my graduation. It was one of the happiest days of my life. Seriously. Much better than the undergrad.

23. You can tell me your deepest secret and I won't even be tempted to repeat it. I'm a very good confidant!

24. I used to play the flute in elementary and jr high. I can read music very well and carry a tune too! : )

25. I wish I had a bigger house so that we could entertain more. Some day I would love to host a ladies Bible study in my home.

OK... there are 25 totally random things, really you probably don't want to know all these things about me! Now it's your turn!

Bald is Beautiful!

Quinn has a new "do" in support of Lauren. She is a sweet little first grader and the younger sister of Quinn's friend, Trevor. Lauren is a survivor of kidney cancer and is currently going through chemo and recently completed radiation. Quinn and Trevor are in the same class and have played on many, many sports teams together. Trevor shaved his head this last weekend in support of Lauren because the chemo is causing the natural side effects of hair loss. Quinn and Nate shaved their heads to support Lauren, and Trevor too. He found that even his short hair was a good head-warmer... and it's a little chilly now without his hair!

Snow Camp Review

Quinn said that Snow Camp was "OK"... which after clarification means

• the food was good
• it was fun staying in the dorm-like room with Nate
• the sledding was fun
• yes, his snow clothes were hung up and dried out OK
• the top bunk was a "little too bouncy"

I really think he had a good time, it's just a little hard for him to be gone from home like that (2 nights in a row). He got a really neat t-shirt and I know he brought home some good memories too.

Snow Camp

This picture was taken earlier this week but tells the story of what I hope Quinn will be doing a lot over the next two days. Tonight Shari and I took Nate and Quinn to Snow Camp in Shipshewana. It's for 3rd-6th graders and with Nate's church, The Church of the Brethren. It is so COLD outside! School was cancelled today because of the -20 degree weather, even colder with the wind chill. Tomorrow it should be in the 20's so I'm glad it's going to be "warm enough" to go sledding. He was somewhat nervous about going, not much to be gone overnight for two nights in a row. I hope he does OK... and that I do OK too! : ) I tend not to sleep very well when my birds aren't all in the nest. They are staying in a "dorm" like building and he and Nate were quite happy to have their room for two, complete with their names on their door. I will be praying for them all weekend... and am already looking forward to Sunday afternoon. : )

Never to cold to play outside...

...for Madison and Cocoa that is.

Sledding at Ox Bow Park

Quinn and Nate convinced me to take them to Ox Bow Park today after school. It was SO ca-ca-ca-cold! I don't even know what the wind chill was this afternoon but it felt like it was in the negatives. They were out for 45 minutes. Quinn thought his chin had frozen solid when he was done. They had a great time but each had their share of spills and Quinn certainly had at least two face-plants (see center and top right). Where was Madison you ask? She went to the store with Heather and missed it!

Christmas Fondue

We celebrated Christmas with Beppe & Pakka on Saturday night. We always enjoy our yearly fondue... so good! We talked to Michelle, Archie and Jade on the web cam and the kids opened their gifts from them while they watched. We have about 10 inches of snow so the kids went sledding in their backyard first. It was a little difficult because the snow is so deep and it needs to be packed down more. They had fun though. It was a nice evening on a cold snowy night.

Room Makeover

Madison and I started the process of her room make-over back in the summer. It was quite the lengthy process but mostly because we didn't have large chunks of day time hours to work on it. The first step was to take off all of the wallpaper. Madison did most of this herself, however she recruited Abby to help her during the summer days when I was working. (Thank you Abby!) After the paper came off, the walls needed to be prepared; patched, sanded smooth, washed down... This project was pretty quiet through the first semester of school, although we found the bedding and picked out and bought the paint. She also started going through her things and boxing up the little girls things, and gave things away. We moved out a big bookshelf and Quinn added that to his room.

This past week we spent several more days back in her room. We taped all the walls one day, primed the walls the next and painted the final coat the following. We discovered that purple was a hard color to paint over. Thank goodness for the priming coat! After the painting was done, the fun part of decorating started. We bought new curtains, 2 lamps and set her room up. Altogether we think we put in about 25 hours of work into her new room. She loves it. No longer little girl looking... out with the bunnies and bows.

What do you think?

Happy New Year 2009!

Happy New Year! Today we went to John & Colleen's house to watch the Iowa Hawkeyes play S. Carolina in the Outback Bowl with them and also Tim, Tonya, Preston and Peyton. It was a fun game, lots of things to cheer about and I thanked our sweet hostess when we left for arranging for the hawks to win today as well. 31-10! The kids downloaded Mario Karts on their DS's and played each other between some of the football action. Peyton came home with us to hang out with Madison for the rest of the evening. We meant to get back to her room project tonight but it didn't happen. We watched lots of football today, a great way to start off 2009 (right Cheryl?)!

New Year's Eve 2008

Tonight we went out for supper at Chili's and then went to see Bedtime Stories. This is a really cute movie! Very good! Madison brought Holyn and Quinn brought Nate. Holyn stayed overnight. We played some games and waiting for the ball to drop. The hugs in the pictures were the mid-night hugs. It was a fun but small party to welcome the new year.

In other news...It has been a very busy week so far. I took this week off from work. We are trying to accomplish some major projects. Madison and I spent over 8 hours painting in her bedroom. Out with the bunnies and bows, in with the teen look of polka dots. We still haven't gotten her room completely back together yet. I'll post some pictures when we get her moved back in. It is looking really good. I'll be glad to have her stuff out of our bedroom/hallway, and back into her's. I think I might need to go back to work so I can rest next week. Ha! ; ) No, actually I have truely enjoyed all of my time with my family and am trying to savor the last few days.

Home Again...

We got home last evening at 4:45 and were welcomed by 2 inches of ice on our driveway. Obviously they had lots of snow and ice here last week. We flew out of Orlando at 9:10am and landed in Indy at 11:30 or so. It was super foggy in Indy which made for a "creative" descent and landing. We had to make 2 attempts at the runway and it was so turbulent that one passenger lost their breakfast... too close of quarters for sure! Better than my poor mom and dad though... over 400 flights in/out of Chicago were cancelled yesterday due to an ice storm, including their connecting flight. Their journey included a bus drive to a neighboring airport (Cedar Rapids) and then finally arrived home about 16 hours after they left the condo in the morning. They had to drive to Moline, IL today to get their car and luggage. They could have nearly drove back from Florida in all that travel time. It took Amy & Jeff 20 hours on the way down.

Madison and I were in bed by 9pm last night. I slept 10 hours and she slept 13 1/2. We were obviously a little low in the sleep department. I'll have some more pictures for you but somehow my camera cord ended up in Jeff & Amy's van (after Jeff stole it from our condo) so I have to wait for them to mail it. We spent Christmas at the resort, putt-putt golfing and swimming. We grilled steak for supper. It didn't seem very Christmas-like in the 80* weather though. Amy said it didn't feel all "ooohshy-guuushy" without the cold, snow and abundant Christmas decorations. We took a big family picture by the Christmas tree in the lobby though and I'll post those pictures the future.

Hope you had a Merry Christmas!
Leah

PS... I've gradually added pictures from our trip, including the first day. Scroll all the way down if you haven't seen them yet.

Merry Christmas from Orlando, Florida!

Merry Christmas from Bonnet Creek in Orlando, Florida!


Christmas morning brought a few "stocking gifts" from Santa. Our gifts to our kids was our trip to Florida this year. It felt really weird not to have any gifts under our tree. A different Christmas for sure... but warm and FUN!


Us Midwesterners aren't used to swimming, putt-putt golfing and playing cards outside on Christmas day! We heard the overhead speakers playing Christmas music all week, but some how the snowy songs just didn't "go" this year. We didn't miss the HUGE ice storm that Indiana received this week though. We picked a good week to be gone.


We grilled steaks for our supper this evening. Plenty of food this week! Amy brought 2 huge containers of Christmas goodies that she made in Iowa. This was our last evening together. We hated to see our week's vacation end. We are taking home lots of good memories for souvenirs though!

Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure

Today we went to Universal Studios for most of the day. This is not a Disney Park but was very, very nice. We really liked it a lot. In fact, this was probably our favorite of the week. Their attractions included "shows" such as the movie, Jaws, Twister, The Mummy, Shrek, Jimmy Neutron, and the Simpsons. Although the kids hadn't seen half of the movies, they still enjoyed their rides or 4D shows. The park was really quiet in the morning, but busy by afternoon.


The highlight of the day was watching Jeff (Amy's husband) participate in Fear Factor. He got to be one of six people to compete in their 30minute show. He knows how to ham things up and did a good job making the audience laugh. He told the cameras that his reason for knowing he was going to win Fear Factor was because "I've seen the other contestants and I look better in my Spandex than all of them." Their first task was to hang from a bar, 50feet off the ground with a huge fan blowing in their face. He wasn't one of the last ones to remain so he had to take the "walk of shame" after this stunt. We enjoyed his fame while it lasted. Some of the other stunts on the rest of the show got kind of gross... the eating part was disgusting.

Around 3:30 or so we walked over to Universal Island's of Adventure which is their amusement park section. It was awesome! We were amazed at Quinn's love of the Hulk roller coaster which pretty much went in loop after loop and lots of barrel rolls. We are pretty sure this was the wildest roller coaster ride he has been on... and he loved it! At this point we had been in amusement parks for over 45 hours this week and I was done with the rides. I spent the rest of the evening with Amy, Jeff, Mikayla and Haley in Seuss Land while Tony took the older kids on the other wild rides of the park. : ) The Seuss Land was adorable! We watched a live production of "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" which was so cute. I think we were in Seuss Land for 3-4 hours.

We finally found our Christmas Eve supper at the NBA restaurant around 8:30. It wasn't very "Christmas-y" but was sure good.

Downtown Disney

Happy Birthday Mikayla!

Mikayla turned 8 while in Disney World on December 22 (yesterday)! She spent the day at the Magic Kingdom. Can you imagine a better place to spend your birthday as a kid? Her birthday present was getting her ears pierced the next day. After we drove in a big loop to find "The Loop" and a Claires store, she had 11 people watch her get her ears pierced that morning. It was a lot of fun. She didn't even blink an eye during the piercing. Quinn wondered where the boys section was at Claires... not to be found. ; ) Doesn't she look cute with her new jewels?

Animal Kingdom

Animal Kingdom

Our family of 4 went to Animal Kingdom on Monday, the 22nd. The rest of the group went to Magic Kingdom which we decided to skip this year. We had a great day but it was a cool 60 degrees and by the time we left, 12 hours later, it was in the 40's. Brrrr! We enjoyed the Everest Expedition rollercoaster the most and rode it 4 times. We also enjoyed the safari and the Christmas parade. Their Christmas tree is decorated with animals. So cute! We missed the last bus back to the resort and it ended up taking us 2 1/2 hours to get back! A long story... but a memorable one for sure!

Epcot (stands for Every Person Comes Out Tired...?)

Highlights from the day:

"FAST passes" work to get through lines without standing in lines forever!

Tony ran into Dan from work!

I laughed so hard I cried... at my overly safety conscious husband (long story).

Epcot at night.... gorgeous!

My feet hurt SO bad after 12 hours in the park today!