Another Powerless Evening

 We didn't make the drive into Eagle River for church today. We visited CoRielle's church. Sure enough - we lost power again - but we are so prepped for it now! Sunday night games and ice cream in the glow of the flashlights. 

Changing Plans

Our plan had been to visit vendors, watch a parade and enjoy Colony Christmas. HOWEVER, it has been cold and windy, and we didn't feel like being outside. We changed our plans.  

Everyone moved to our home where we created a little gingerbread village (remember that missing village set up), made and decorated cookies, had hot chocolate and visited inside instead. 

Danny & Allie

Jojo (Josiah)

Annie

Playing games with the boys - not this day but the
photo is on this day? 

Noah and Jared came by and joined the fun! 

Noah

Jared questions Noah's decorating decisions

The day turned out to be great fun even though we didn't do what we had planned on doing. 

FRIDAY VISITS

 Michael previously had a cardiac procedure. Today he had a wound check. We were SHOCKED to find out he had been doing the whole "no lifting over 5 lbs., no pushing or pulling thing," WRONG. This was a bit discouraging as he had been hoping to be back to full lifting etc. today. He had begun lifting with his left arm instead of his right....but they want NONE for a bit longer. 

ALLIE IS STILL HOME ... and several stopped by to visit...several more will drop by tomorrow. I caught these people on film.

Playing Headbandz in Stacia's space

Noah plays bean bag toss

Annie and Bre put together this puzzle

Gideon and I put this together

We cannot find my Christmas village. I purchased a train to go around it...so we are in the process of building some sort of town. It started with a trailer, a water tower and some trees.  Michael and I thought we would paint a village, but our local Art Cafe did not have the pieces. I did pick up a couple of buildings on clearance later on in the season. 

Annie

Gideon 

Noah and Trudy

Nolan

Stacia had to work today but was able to enjoy some of the fun. Bre and kids, CoRielle, Noah and Jared and Jamin all dropped by. We had something for dinner and then played games and visited. 

Allie is Home!

 The day was full. Michael had two appointments (Orthopedic and Chiropractic), and I had to take Dad for an eye appointment as well. Life group was tonight...but the highlight, by far, of the day has been picking Allie up at the airport! 

We planned, re-planned, and finally the day was here! Allie is home from college. Of course, it wouldn't be Alaskan travel if one didn't fly in around midnight. ::Snort:: 

We arrived early and checked the arrival board about a million times before her flight finally landed. Next time we plan to make fun signs! 

Ah, life is sweet! 

One more shot - and then I just put the camera aside and enjoyed the moment! 

How we've missed Allie! We all knew when she was ready to fly the nest or coop as it may be. It has been so FUN to watch her flight. She is thriving in Virginia. YES, there are things she dislikes about Liberty. All in all, she LOVES what she is doing, and is very good at it, too. It's fun to watch her developing new skills and finding her community of creatives. She did swimmingly well in all her courses last semester: Cinema Legal Environment, Story Analysis, Producing and Direction and Production: Editing. Her college grade point average is 3.87. 

We are thrilled she has a nice long vacation before she begins her next semester. She will be taking Cinema Aesthetics, Narrative Writing, Intro to Motion Pictures: Directing, and she will be part of creating a feature length film. Two of her classes will revolve around the creation of the feature film; Feature: pre-production and Feature: production. 

Here are some random photos of Allie living her best life which I haven't shared because I've not been blogging. ::snort::