Saturday, January 01, 2011

1-1-11 - New Year's Day

It's always fun to have the older kids home.  I wasn't very surprised to be the only one up at 6 a.m. I finished writing the second week of homework prompts for James.  Zander woke up - writing waits. 


We started the day with breakfast. Stacia managed to work this out well. 
The kids had great fun changing our calendar to a new month and a new year! 
Today is the 8th day of Christmas  - and the day we had decided to have a family gift exchange. We started by talking about God gifting us with family and sharing what about family caused us to be thankful. 




 I asked Mike to take a photo, as I thought I'd be absent in many photos of the day. LOL 
Twenty lbs lighter, 35 to go....Lookin Great by 48? Feelin Great by 48?
Josiah and Jamin bought Zander and Nolan very cool RC helicopters. They are SWEET. 
No Comment....

 
 Can you tell there are earbuds in the strings of the hood? She was sort of saying, "Oh, that will be interesting." I told her you just stick the ends of the strings into your ears. I told her you put your ipod in your pocket...but Arielle doesn't have an ipod.  ::snort:: Wasn't that a great way to totally surprise her. 

Coin Rack to display military coins
 Jared and Arielle got me this stain glass.
We cleaned up. We played games and played with toys. 

Josiah enjoyed teaching the boys how to fly their copters.  

We gave the kids a Wii....they were SURPRISED. It was very affordable for us as that was IT - and for 5 kids, day after Thanksgiving sale....it worked well. We were surprised when we couldn't find their other gift ANYWHERE. We had given each child a Wii game. WHERE could they be????? It was a bummer - but Josiah and Jamin had given them a game, so they are enjoying. We realized the Wii isn't going to work great with the projector - thinking of work arounds. 

I worked on go-withs to accompany the slow roasting turkey. I'm trying to use up as much as possible from our chest freezer while the big guys are here. They eat - and I love it. 

They're ending the day playing Mario games. I'm going to edit as much of I can of my writing. I'd like to make copies tomorrow at chapel. I'm working on getting our James Study together. 

Choosing Joy!
©2010 D.R.G.
~Coram Deo~
Living all of life before the face of God...

11 comments:

Renee said...

I think Wii is a perfect gift for the family; it's lots of fun..... love the Superman underwear

Linda said...

Great surprise! I have always been anti video game system, but broke down for the wii last year. And we love it! My boys could use a coin holder thingy, but I'd like something encased for dusting purposes! :) Great surprise for Arielle! Are the girls coming?

Anonymous said...

HI: AND all is well that ended well. What a wonderful and fun filled day you had. FUN and precious no doubt. Neat to see the face of Arielle... I remember when you bought that. You should have been here the day after Christmas.. what bargains. I have been home busy the entire week. I'll look for bargains the rest of the year and then again........ we'll see. :):):):) Can you believe I don't enjoy shopping as much as I use to? Bet Dad is glad. :):):):) you all continue to have the fun you deserve. love/prayers - Mom T.

DeEtta @ Courageous Joy said...

LInda - I hope I end up thinking it is perfect. We were still "on the line" but saw lots of possibilities....so really...time to take the plunge. LOL The thing now is figuring out how to set it up as we don't have a TV but have a projector/screen and the wii box needs to be in front by the screen....we're looking for some sort of long extension to an AV cord....or maybe we'll buy a TV too...see how one compromise can spell total ruin? ::snort:: Just KIDDING here.

DeEtta @ Courageous Joy said...

Renee - I think it will be a lot of fun - when we find the games. LOL I don't know how long they'll play Mario before they want something new. Thank goodness that Josiah and Jamin got them a game. LOL

Anonymous said...

Tell Jamin that the underwear picture will be great fodder for basketball practice...
Coach Armstrong

Lois said...

Sounds like everyone is having a great time together. I'm happy for you all.

DeEtta @ Courageous Joy said...

LOL - Coach - I'll do that.

Lois - we are happy for us too. LOL

Debbie said...

Love this post. Everyone looks so happy and having a great time being together.

We love our Wii and it has been a great family gift.

You look great!

Cynthia said...

I hadn't noticed the mention of weight loss.. must have skimmed too quickly before. GOOD JOB! I'm hoping to have the rest of mine off by summer :) if I can manage to stay on this path of strict healthy eating and exercise! It all started with my knee problem. Did I ever tell you about that? No matter.. it's all seems to be good now :)

DeEtta @ Courageous Joy said...

No, Cindy, you've not mentioned your knee. Tell me more. Great job on your weight loss.