PS...

If you're looking for something pleasant to buy with all that Christmas money you just received, :) I'd like to suggest the harp music CD that another Hannah friend of mine recently made! Learn more about it here: http://gloryandgrace-hannah.blogspot.com/.

I received my copy of "Still, still, still" in the mail yesterday and we have been enjoying it immensely ever since!!! :)

Name that thing...

My blogging friend, Hannah has recently been posting mystery pictures and then, whoever wishes to can guess what the picture is of. I thought of something to take a picture of just now and am posting it here for you to guess, if you like!

Got any ideas???

We all had a busy day doing regular cooking and cleaning, and then did some more cleaning (our messy closet got a major overhaul!) and some special cooking/baking (Andrew made ice cream and I made cookies.) Oh yes, Mom and I also had a fun time putting the pictures in the photo album that we'll be giving to Grandpa!

As my dad stayed home from trucking because of the weather, when our work was done, we all sat down and played the game, "Rage." As tomorrow is my mom's birthday, I thought it would be nice if she'd win, but Papa won instead. :)

It's still snowing..... We were planning on going to SD tomorrow, but if it's a blizzard, we'll be celebrating here in our cozy home!

Well, it's family prayer time once again, so I'll bid you farewell~

The first blizzard of this Winter~

It has been snowing most of the day here in ND! While out at chores this evening, we plodded through about 2 inches more snow than we had to go through this morning. The snow is still coming down fast and the wind is picking up, which means one thing--it's a blizzard! The weathermen are predicting a blizzard for a few days, so we'll probably be staying pretty close to home for a while. :)

Lots of different things got done today around here... Dad hauled another load of grain to Enderlin and got loaded up again. Mother went to Bismarck and brought home some supplies. The boys and I picked out pictures on the computer to have printed in town (which Mother then brought home) for a photo album we're putting together for Grandpa Harvey. We also folded the letters (put them in envelopes; addressed the envelopes; and mailed them) that Mom wrote up for him, announcing to friends the fact that Grandma isn't with us anymore, as Grandpa had received several cards from people recently who didn't know that she had passed away.

Speaking of Grandpa Harvey, he didn't have to have surgery today after all. PTL! He's back at home now and will have to see a gall-bladder specialist after the holidays are over with to see if he needs the surgery done or not. Thank you so much for praying for him! As the nice, older gentleman on Rejoice radio always says, "God hears and answers prayer!"

Sweet arrivals~

The first new arrival to our farm this day came in the form of a new calf... I had gone in the house already after morning chores when Andrew came in from feeding cows and announced that another of my cows had calved! Jacob & I bundled up again and went out to get the new baby into a warmer location--someplace warmer than it's current bed--a snowbank!

The second arrivals at our farm came in the form of our blogging friend, Kimberly and 3 of her children, my friend Whitney (who's married now), Daniel & Leah. They had come for BodyTalk sessions with Mother, but we had a great time visiting too!!! It had been a long time since Whitney and I had had a chance to just sit down and talk and we got a few minutes to do that today, so that was really nice! Our friends had never been here before, so we children bundled up and gave Whitney, Daniel & Leah a tour of the place and swung on the snowy swings for a while.

Here's a picture of a game of UNO--a game that Leah's a pro at... See how hard she's thinking? :)

Later, Andrew dug out our UNO Blitzo game and he, Whitney, Leah and I played a few games while our mothers visited and Jacob & Daniel played other things...

I think they were having a great time!...

Daniel really enjoyed my brothers' remote controlled trucks. He told me they set up a jump for the trucks outside, and he was happy he got to drive for a while!

The afternoon passed quickly and soon it was time for our friends to go....

Thanks for coming, Kimberly and all!!! I hope you enjoyed your time as much as we did ours. :)

After they left, we had a little time yet before supper, so we separated the 17 gallons of milk we'd saved up and got 5 quarts of cream. We're planning to make some ice cream in the near future!

For supper, I made blueberry pancakes with the blueberries that our friends had given to us. Delicious!!!

Before I go, I have a prayer request for my grandpa Harvey again. He had to go to the Eureka hospital yesterday, as he was having pain again. The doctors have decided that, if he's strong enough tomorrow, they're going to ship him to Aberdeen for a surgery to remove his gall-bladder. This will be the 3rd time he's been in the hospital this year... Poor Grandpa!

It's Winter in North Dakota!

It's winter in North Dakota--
And the gentle breezes blow
Seventy miles an hour
At twenty-five below.

Oh, how I love North Dakota--
When the snow's up to your knees...
You take one breath of winter
But then your nose begins to freeze!

Yes, the weather here is wonderful,
So I guess I'll hang around.
I could never leave North Dakota anyway
'Cause I'm frozen to the ground!
~anonymous

Well, maybe it isn't quite that bad yet, but sometimes it does feel pretty cold outside!

I just wanted to wish you all a happy Winter and to share a quote with you... :)

"Snowflakes are one of nature's most fragile things, but just look what they can do when they stick together!"

A cute picture from a forward~

A sinking feeling (and babysitting~)

This morning, after our chores were through, my whole family headed up to ice skate. When we were in Bismarck last Wednesday, God helped my brothers and I to find some really great deals on hockey skates, so we had each purchased a pair and really wanted to use them. As the area of our cleared off ice was only about a third the size it should be for a real hockey rink, the guys had the idea to take the tractor up and clear the ice off--if the ice was thick enough. Andrew did some research on-line this morning to see how thick the ice would have to be in order to hold up a heavy tractor, and then he took a drill bit and drilled down through the ice in a couple spots and found it to be thick enough to hold the tractor up. SOOOOOOO..... Dad cleared a lot of ice off in a short amount of time and planned to make the rink a 100x200 ft. rectangle.
However, before he was entirely done, he had a slight change of plans!

Right along the edge of the ice, the reeds had obviously kept the ice from freezing as solidly as everywhere else... Talk about a sinking feeling--for us to see Dad try to get out of the mud and water and also for Dad--as the tractor sank down! The guys had confidence that they'd be able to pull it out later with our other 9030--which they did and everything is OK on the tractor that went in the water, so it's just our ice surface that's not the greatest in that spot... Talk about an adventure. :)

A little before 11:00, I headed home to change quick and then drove over to our neighbors to babysit their children while they did some shopping and spent some time together.

These are the same children that I watched on Thursday, but this time I took my camera along and got some pictures, so I thought I'd share them with you....

Meet Amelia (called MeMe): It was hard to get a good picture of her because she was always on the move! :)

Here's James (or Jimmie)...

And curious Michael--who's getting some teeth in currently...

The twins at the window:

Amelia hard at work coloring a picture:

And the twins once again--with their Cheerios! You can tell that James was more hungry than Michael...

We played together; colored together; read books together; sang together; danced together; watched Winnie-The-Pooh together; ate together; they slept together; and we had an enjoyable time until their parents came home a little after 7:00.

.....The best part of it all is--I get paid to have that kind of fun! (True, dirty diaper dealings aren't the most fun things in the world, but they're a fact of life!!!)

That was my busy day. I'm sure many other things happened around the place here, so perhaps my family will fill you in on that in the next few days....