Finally My Celebrity Status Is Secure

Here's a link to an article about me in my hometown newspaper.

Well actually it isn't about me per say, but it does mention me.

I'm not specifically mentioned by name, but if you read far enough you will get to the part about the son in residency. That's me! Famous indeed.



Ok, Ok, this is an article about my Dad and his battle with Lymphoma (he's currently winning). He's very embarrassed about the whole deal so I'm doing my part to get the word out to further increase that embarrassment a little bit.... and because I love him.

Happy Birthday Kristian

Kristian turned 2 on Friday. I think he must have known it was his birthday as he was per-ma-grin all day. He woke up with a huge smile and ran around excited for most of the morning. Spencer and Jessi kept telling him that he was the boss since it was his birthday. He seemed to relish in this and had a great time being "in charge" of their play time throughout the day.

When we started making his cake he went from per-ma-grin to totally hyper. He kept running around the kitchen trying to push me out of the way so he could see what was going on. For a 2 year old he is surprisingly strong and I eventually had to get Jacob to take him downstairs as I couldn't get the cake iced with him pushing me every 2 minutes. This put a momentary damper on the per-ma-grin but he got over it when he was shown the finish product.

For dinner we had Kristian's assumed favorite, Pancake Dinner. We assume this is his favorite as he can put them away like nothing else. He enjoyed his pancakes, sausage, biscuits, and fry ups. (So its not the healthiest birthday dinner) As soon as dinner was cleared he was ready for cake. He grinned from ear to ear while we sang happy birthday to him and then couldn't quite figure out while we all kept telling him to blow on it. With a little help from his siblings we got the candles blown out and then enjoyed his football shaped birthday cake and ice cream.

After cake and ice cream it was time for presents. Kristian understood this year that there was a toy inside the paper and couldn't tear it off fast enough. I love when they get old enough to understand the concept of presents. He was very happy with his gifts and played for them for the rest of the evening. At bed time he climbed in his bed with his new football and was particularly happy when Mom and Dad decided it was okay for him to sleep with it, as it was his birthday. And you better believe he was asleep before he even had a chance to play with it. Nothing like a great birthday to wear you out.

Kristian is such a joy in our lives. He is a ball of energy each and every day and can go for hours. He is generally a pretty easy going kid and doesn't get upset to often. He likes to pack away the food and I often wonder if he is ever full. He is learning to talk more and surprises us each day with the new words he has picked up. He is really starting to love playing and watching sports with Daddy. They cheer on their teams and practice play on time-outs. It is a blast to watch. We are so grateful to have his precious little spirit in our family. We love you, Nader Man!

Christmas is Coming!!

We spent last Sunday and Monday getting our house ready for Christmas. It took two days this year as we had two trees to put up. Ah yes, I am following in my Mother's footsteps. (Although I have promised Jacob that I will never make him do three trees) Jacob found a great tree at a garage sale last summer for $3.00. He bought it thinking to replace our smaller tree. I was so excited when he brought it home to realize that I could now have two trees.

It was the perfect year to start the two tree tradition as we now have two rooms for Christmas trees. We put the "new to us" tree in the living room and decorated it with the matching ornaments, ribbon, and white lights. How we got all of these matching decorations is a quirky story.

When I was pregnant with Spencer the company that I worked for announced that it would be closing its doors. My boss and I were responsible to go through all of the assets and account for each as we sold them. When we got to the end of the list we realized we still had a few things in the storage shed that hadn't been accounted for. This included the Christmas Decorations for the tree they put in the lobby each year. As it was never listed as an asset it wasn't required to go in the "sale" pile of assets that had been sold to another company. And wham, suddenly I inherited a beautiful set of ornaments to decorate my own Christmas tree. And all I had to do was lose my job :) I also got a cool office tree (one of those fake ones) but it never made the move.

So this "new to us tree" and "new to us decorations" now makes up my "formal" Christmas tree. I love it. I can't tell you how happy I am not to have Homer Simpson hanging on my beautiful Christmas tree. I can't wait for the after Christmas sells. I would like to get a few more of the really nice ornaments for my formal tree, just for some variety, but I can't bring myself to pay for them at the before Christmas prices when I know they will be going 50% - 75% off after and it really looks great now so it is definitely something that can wait.

So where is Homer now? We set up our old tree in the family room and even bought (shocker I know) some colored lights and a few more glass balls for it. (the ornaments where a little thin now that they are divided between two trees, I love that Dollar Tree.) The tree turned out great and it is so fun to see all of the handmade ornaments that the kids have made. Although I think next year we won't be putting candy canes on it as I keep finding them stuffed in my couch cushions, broken in half with one bite out of them. Thanks Kristian.

All in all, it turned out to be more fun to set up our Christmas stuff then it has been in the past. Spencer was much more of a help this year and all of the kids really seemed to get into the process more. The kids get so excited each morning to take another mini ornament out of the advent calendar and they plug in the Christmas lights any time they are in the room. It is just fun to see them so caught up in the Christmas Spirit.

The First Annual Eastern Corry Thanksgiving

So as I am typing this for my Journal as well so you will get an in depth play by play of what went on mostly in the kitchen. Feel free to skim or skip.

It was a great Thanksgiving Holiday for us. Jacob was slammed at the Hospital all day Wednesday but when 8:00 rolled around everything just slowed down. He headed to the call room and was able to sleep most of the night. This was a huge blessing as he arrived home at 7:00ish on Thursday morning and was able to enjoy the entire Thanksgiving Day without needing a nap first.

Meagan and I stayed pretty busy most of the day in the kitchen. I feel pretty good about our first go of making an entire Thanksgiving Meal on our own. We prepared the pies on Wednesday so that was out of the way. We had a great breakfast of Pumpkin Pancakes (courtesy of Doug and Meagan) Eggs, and Bacon. The pancakes were a great hit, especially with Kristian. He ate three and had pumpkin toots the rest of the day. Yup that is right, pumpkin toots. This means when Kristian tooted, it smelled like pumpkin. Hilarious.

After breakfast we started making the rolls. The guys took the kids outside to play with the remote control cars. The kids had a blast chasing after the cars and I think Jacob and Doug had just about as much fun, keeping them away from the chasing kids. While the kids were outside and out from under foot Meagan and I moved on to prepping the turkey, that was a fun experience. It is amazing how you can watch your mom do this whole preparation every year but suddenly when you are in charge you realize you never payed very close attention. Ah well, Thanks again mom for keeping your cell phone close to you all day and answering question after question.

During nap time Meagan and I finished prepping all of the Thanksgiving sides and Jacob and Doug went to see The Dark Knight. They triple checked to make sure this was okay and we let them know they were allowed to go as long as when they got back they did whatever we asked of them, including dishes. (Which they did, Thanks guys!!) Upon their return from the movie, began the "down to the wire" time. Meagan and I had every burner on the stove going and Jacob and Doug has us laughing with their creative carving techniques and their constant howls of "oh man, that's hot". With very little stress, much less than I was anticipating, we were sitting up to the table ready for a prayer at 5:15. We had planned for 5:00 so I figure this is pretty good.

The turkey turned out great, very moist and we even managed to have gravy from the drippings that wasn't lumpy. (this was the part that caused the most worries) All the sides (Rolls, Stuffing, 2 types of Potatoes, and 3 Veggies) were wonderful, with a slight exception to the roast potatoes which were a little underdone. Meagan's family's tradition of Pretzel Salad was a big hit and a great addition to the meal. By the time we pushed away from the table everyone was sufficiently full and we waited a little bit for pie.

After clean up, which went super fast, we sat back up for pie and I was very happy with how our homemade crust's turned out. This was only my second time making pie crust so I was a bit nervous of how the end result would be. The pies continued to be pulled out throughout the rest of the evening. We put the kids to bed at 8:00, I fell asleep on the floor at 8:30 and Jacob and I went up to bed at 9:00. Doug and Meagan said they followed to bed pretty soon after that. We are party animals!!

So that is the play by play of the First Annual Eastern Corry Thanksgiving. We are hoping to have Mark and Krista join us next year, and whom ever else we can coax to visit. It was a wonderful visit with Doug and Meagan and we are so grateful they were able to come. There was lots of laughs, chats, and good old family fun. We have so much to be grateful for and I am overwhelmed at how much the Lord has blessed me and my family.

The Big Game

As Jacob wrote, we went over to a friends to watch the big game. Here is our little family picture just before leaving to go to watch the game.

Jacob was on call the next day and wasn't able to attend church with us. I decided that we would celebrate for him by wearing our favorite team's colors. Here is a picture of the kids. Most everyone asked if we were taking Christmas pictures after church and I let them know we were celebrating the big win. However, after looking at the pictures, we might end up with a Christmas one that looks very similar, with mom and dad added of course.