Happy New Year!

 Wow! That was a long break from the blog!

Life got busy there for a while. Hopefully it will slow down a bit. We've had some challenges with Micah's van breaking down in Fargo (90 miles away) when she and a friend were shopping.  They rented a car to get back home. (Micah's sister, Missy, who lives in Fargo helped them out, thank goodness!) But then Adam and Micah had to take two vehicles and a trailer back to Fargo the next day to return the rental car and trailer the van back to our neck of the woods. They got snowed in in Fargo for a night due to an ice storm, but finally made it back. The van was quickly repaired by an acquaintance who is a mechanic. Thank you, Lord! 

After this was taken care of Audrey had an issue with a growth on the roof of her mouth. It was scary to look at and kept bleeding. Many phone calls and doctor visits later she and Adam drove down to St. Paul (4 hours away) to an oral surgeon to have it removed. They don't seem to think it's anything serious, but it's been sent in for analysis. They spent the night in St. Paul last night because it was snowing pretty hard. They are on the way home this morning. Glad they took Adam's 4WD pickup! 

We had quite a bit of snow here, too, last night. Micah kept the woodstove going yesterday, and Adam's dad came this morning to stoke it on his way to work. We're so thankful for family! His dad's electricity went off last night. We're only a mile down the road, and were thankful it didn't effect us, but I think it must be back on by now.

We had a great Christmas. Lots of excited kids and way too many presents! :) I had breakfast with the family next door and watched everyone open gifts. It was a fun day!

I found some "senior easy-on-the-knees" ballet exercise videos on a YouTube channel called jessicasmithtv. A change of pace from walking videos, though she has some of those as well. I hope to use a variety of videos to keep things interesting.

I've cleared the art supplies off of the dining room table and have begun putting a puzzle together. I haven't done a puzzle in decades! This one is from a thrift store, so I'm hoping the pieces are all there. It's a painting of some folks acting out Romeo and Juliet on a stage. It looks like a pretty old puzzle. 

 

I just started reading The God Who Is There by Francis Schaeffer. My mom was a Francis Schaeffer fan and I like him, too. I read L'Abri, which was written by Edith Schaeffer, many years ago and I used a video series called How Should We Then Live? with my kids when we were home schooling many years ago. I'm still in the introduction and I'm hoping it won't be too difficult to follow. :)

I'm going to try some bread baking. Haven't done that in years! I found a really simple crusty white bread recipe made using a Dutch oven, which I don't have. But creativity is encouraged and I think I can make do with two cast iron pans. I'll try to take photos if I do it and we'll see what results!

And here are a few of the cards I've made lately. Probably forgetting some of them. Oh well. 

A Trash to Treasure swap. The host sent us some paper scraps and we had to create some ATCoins.

These were from a swap entitled "Let It Snow". Did you already guess that? :)

And with that I will sign off for now. It's amazing how much mental effort goes into a brief post like this. I'm tired! Ha ha. 

Wishing and praying for a happy new year for everyone! May God bless and lead you all through whatever the new year holds.

Shalom family and friends!