Holidays 2007

We had great times together over Christmas and New Year's.
Some of the highlights (in no particular order):
Gathering at Kristen and Cory's
Watching the grandkids open presents
Caroling and service
Good food and games
Traditional Christmas Eve taco dinner
All being together for Christmas morning
Breakfast casserole by Adrian
Opening presents at our house
Flying Ian's helicopter
Christmas dinner
Walking and biking together
More games and fun
Going to church together
Hearing Logan's talk in Sacrament meeting
Going to the movies and watching one at home
Our outing in the rain
Trampoline activities
Making gingerbread houses
Doing painted sugar cookies
Kristen and Cory's homemade salsa and other good food
Chicken casserole and sweet potato casserole
Family Home Evening
Families Are Forever Blankets
Playing at the park
Writing in our journals
Making predictions
Writing on the New Year's Eve tablecloth
All the cameras flashing
Visiting, laughing, sharing...making lots of memories!

We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

Sitting around the table at Kristen and Cory's house, writing in each other's New Year's Eve Journals.

Our New Year's Eve tablecloth holds lots of memories.

Adam, Logan, Kristen, and Ethan. We enjoyed visiting and playing games together.

We had fun with our first annual trampoline extravaganza!

We shared some good meals around the dining room table.

8bol cheeses it for the camera.

Merry Grace always has a bright smile to share.

The brothers sharing some good times together.

Our rainy day excursion to ride and play! Do we know how to have fun or what?! :)

Adam and Elise on the bike trail. Even the little ones did a great job keeping up and having fun!

It was fun to gather for a movie night and share some laughter and good times.

We made painted sugar cookies. Ian was so cute when he discovered he could eat the "paint" which was really icing!

We all love to play games when we get together. We appreciate our chief game organizer, Ethan, for all his good ideas and enthusiasm!

Who knew there were so many things you could do on a trampoline! :)

Holiday Fun

We made gingerbread houses.

We played at the park. I love Merry Grace in this little red jacket. It was a hand-me-down over 25 years ago and worn by Kristen, Ethan, Adam, and Logan, and now also by Elise, Ian, and Merry Grace...that's some good coat!

The sib's at Kristen and Cory's house.

We had fun on our trips to the greenway walking/biking trail.

Tour de Family

It has been so long since I've written! I kept thinking I'd make a post or put up some pictures, but just didn't seem to get around to it, so here I am at the beginning of December! There are so many things happening that I don't even know where to start! Of course we have lots of big events coming up with Adam entering the MTC in a week and Ethan and Kristen and Cory and family coming in for the holidays, but today I wanted to just make a quick post about last night's bike ride! I've been walking regularly since August, mostly at the church during seminary. A few times we've been to the walking trail as a family. This has been a lot of fun, walking and talking together and getting some fresh air, sunshine, and exercise. Adam and Logan have taken their bikes a few times, and I started thinking about the possibility of getting out my old 10-speed which has been in storage at the shop for about 20 years. Adam got it out for me and I was surprised it was in as good a shape as it was. Adrian and Adam did the mechanical adjustments and I cleaned it up. I guess I expected to jump on feel like I did as a teenager, which wasn't the case, but it did come back to me a little. Anyway, last night Adam went with me biking at the trail and it was so much fun! (Logan was going to go, but his bike was having issues.) Adam was so patient with me as I was going at a less-than-lightening speed. We biked the whole trail and I was thrilled! It was a memory I'll keep for a long time...the evening I got to go biking with my almost-missionary son. It was such a nice time to bike along and talk as we rode. It was a simple evening, but one that meant a lot to me. The time I spend with my family is always precious and I'm so thankful for it.

Ward Party and Music

This is Elise at a ward social, a fiesta.

Logan and Adam playing guitar in our living room. They started taking lessons in the summer and it's really fun to hear them play. Logan also started taking drum lessons, so we have lots of music around our house these days!

Ian's Birthday and A Day in the Park

Ian at Build a Bear for his 4th Birthday.

Kristen and Cory - what a cute couple - getting ready for a train ride.

Merry Grace and Grammy ride together.

Adam and Ian on the Carousel.

My Upload Bandwidth?

Last night I was working with some of my pictures, posting a few to my blog, when the boys called up from downstairs..."Hey Mom, are you doing something on the internet?" They were trying to play Halo 3 and my picture uploads were interfering with their ability to use their xbox live to its full potential. I was finished with what I was doing, so life went on happily for them in their xbox world. I was working on several things around the house and on the computer, finishing up some things before bed, when I decided to upload a few pictures to my online picasa album. I really didn't think anything about it until I heard the boys in an xbox live game downstairs... It went something like this: "I can't pick up the flag! Hey guys, I'm here but I can't pick it up! ..." At this point it occurred to me that I was probably the problem, but I was keeping my fingers crossed that maybe it would be okay and I could finish my pictures, then came a voice from downstairs, "Mom, are you doing something again? You're using all our upload bandwidth! How long are you going to be doing that?" Me: "Maybe about 5 minutes?" (Which was probably optimistic - I had a lot of pictures!) "Is that going to be too long?" Well, it was... so being the nice person I am, I figured I could upload my pictures later and not use all their "upload bandwidth" while they were in the middle of saving the world on Halo 3! Later, Adam was kind enough to explain how things work with the whole upload bandwidth stuff and I did think it was interesting and it made sense....but I'll let him explain it to you.

Family Stuff

Merry Grace and Papa at Kristen and Cory's house. Isn't she sweet?! And Papa is cute, too!

Adam and Logan enjoy playing outside on the trampoline and the water hose adds and extra dimension of excitement.

This is Jr. - what a great dog! He is really smart. One of the cutest things he does is bring you a "present" when you come home. It could be a stick or a rock or just whatever he can find. He is always so proud and he makes this moaning kind of sound and wants you to brag on him.

I got very nice hand-painted pots from Kristen's family one year for Mother's Day. I have two of them by the front porch that the grandkids painted. I have enjoyed them so much and it makes me think of them when I water my flowers.

At home and at Kristen and Cory's

Adam looks like a missionary. Papers are in, so we're just waiting for the call.
Don't you like Logan's hair?

This was taken in Kristen's back yard at their new house. I thought it was an interesting camera angle.

This is Logan doing a jump off Ian's skateboard with Elise close behind on the tractor.

So you've never had cable - EVER?

"So you've never had cable - EVER?" That's what the cable guy said when he came to install cable at our house. I guess he didn't think there was anyone left like us! I'll bet he would really have been surprised had he been told that we hadn't had TV in our house in...probably about 15 years! We've rented some movies or shows, or seen some online recently, but we haven't even gotten ANY channels in years, and it's been a long time ago that we even got a couple of channels and they weren't all that clear. We've been at this house 19 years, and it was before we moved here that we even got the 3 local channels pretty well . So, I guess we've been in the TV dark ages around here! I guess it's just never been THAT important. During the school year we didn't normally have the TV on during the weekdays for most of the kids' growing up years, so this whole TV thing is going to be different. We'll see how it goes in this new adventure!

My Talented Husband

"Is there anything that man can't do!" ...a popular phrase coined by one of our neighbors many years ago who was suitably impressed with Adrian's many skills and abilities! I was thinking about that again yesterday as Adrian replaced our pressure tank... (I think that's what it is called). I'm not exactly sure what the thing is for, although I know it has something to do with our water supply, because it was cut off yesterday while he was working. So, while I don't even know what it's for, my smart husband knows how to install one! He is so handy to fix everything around the house and knows about so many other things that have to do with everything from car repair, to building and making things, to fixing broken things, to...well, you name it and he can probably do it! And to top it all off, he's smart with so many other things like financial things, doing our taxes, and he can help with complicated homework (Algebra and Calculus...ahhhh!) right off the top of his head - it's impressive! To be honest, he's a handy resource for quite a lot of things! I could go on...I'm sure thankful for my talented husband!

Time for Soccer!

Logan got a good kick on this one. We love to go to the games and support Logan and the team. Soccer is a great sport to participate in and fun to watch, too!

Soccer Season Returns!

 

What we've been up to lately....

From Adam and 8bol enjoying a book, to the branch activity at Homeplace, to mission preparations and celebrations, to time on the trampoline and in the yard, to the guys camping trip, ....it's all been fun!

Where in the world will Adam go?

Adam should have his mission call in a few weeks...so any guesses as to where in the world Adam will go?

What a surprise!

I came home Friday afternoon to 5 big black garbage bags of video tapes from our entertainment center area that Adam and Logan had cleaned out! My first reaction was something like, "What have you thrown away?" I imagined all my family tapes and precious memories carelessly tossed aside and I was a little panicked at the thought. But they assured me they had carefully examined their selections of what to keep and what to throw away. Still, I had to look. So I emptied out each bag and sorted through, only to find that they were mostly right. There were a lot of old video tapes of long forgotten tv shows; and so, not many were kept from the reject pile...only a handful of movies and tapes I thought might be worth saving and several to pass along to some other folks who might want them. The "favorite" label on one of the old tapes was one that had been marked over many times where it had been recorded and re-recorded multiple times and finally just said "movie". There were a bunch of unlabeled tapes which I dutifully looked through. I mean, how could I throw them away not knowing what was on them?! Most were more of the same and several I wondered what I was even thinking to have recorded and saved it in the first place. But I did find a couple of treasures... Adam in the famous box routine, Adrian doing Tooty Fruitie, and Cory's mission pictures, which sparked a debate as to whether Cory, the master cleaner and thrower-outer, would want that tape. My vote was yes, but Adam and Logan said no. So, now the family room is cleaner and more organized thanks to the boys' initiative and I had a nice trip down memory lane!

Times and Seasons

The weather is hot, hot, hot, but I know fall is on the way. I can tell by the back to school stuff on the shelves in the stores and the routines we're trying to get back into.

Summer has been absolutely wonderful! I have loved everything from all the sweet visits of our family to the cleaning and organizing projects around the house! What a great time of year! I love summer... and the snow days of winter (I guess I'm a kid at heart), but there are good things about each season. And with fall, I suppose it will be good to get back into the routine of school days and soccer and look forward to the pretty colors of fall and the visits and fun things we'll be doing. Just a little hard to say goodbye to this summer.

In the news... I guess we're all doing fine around the Jarrell household, except for the coughs - boy will I ever be glad to quit coughing! Uncle Roger and Aunt Nancy were here for a visit recently and we enjoyed getting to see them. We all ate Sunday dinner at Mama's after church, which was nice. I'm getting settled in at work, but it's challenging to get everything done for home and family, housework, etc. with being gone several hours each day for work. I do love being home. Adrian stays busy with work and things around the house, most recently working on getting power and water to our outside building and the chickens; and he has just been called as YM president, which is a big calling with all the youth activities and scouting, but it will be nice for him to be in the program with Logan.

Family Update... Kristen and Cory and family are getting settled into their new house. They're doing well and the grandchildren are cute as ever! Ethan's doing great at his job at Logoworks and is getting ready for classes to begin soon. He has been running a lot lately, about 12-14 miles most days, but needs to slow down a little (the mom talking) as he's been really sick with a fever and sore throat. Adam should have his mission call in a couple of weeks and we're excited for him. Logan has started practicing soccer and starts back to school and early morning seminary on Aug. 27. It's been a full summer... Adam and Logan have enjoyed spending time together this summer and have been helpful with all my summer projects! Right now they're getting ready to go to guitar lessons which they take together. Logan is also taking drum lessons. It's sure been fun to hear them playing around the house.

Well, that's the recap...