Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Christmas!

With Christmas just a few days away, I thought I should share some December pictures/events with you-I know the blog has been neglected for over a month, but we have excuses!
Shall I name them all??? Smile!

We had a nice Thanksgiving, celebrating with our grandparents-We made our usual 2 gallons of "Peppernuts" on Thankgving.
We've almost eaten through our gallon! Mmmm.....

Precision is the key!


Susanna helped with the rolling, and taste-testing!


Memaw and Susanna


The cutters-Papa, Miles, and Eric


Caroline and Memaw


Pumpkin Walnut Cheesecake-Our Thanksgiving dessert!


In our school history class, we've just learned about Jewish Holidays. So with 3 other families, we had a special Sedar (say-dar) Meal similar to a Passover Celebration.
It was a wonderful time of new foods and fellowship, liturgy and Bible reading.



Horseradish Root


Matzah Ball Soup!


The "Haggadah" (order) booklet which we followed




We've had lots of snow already, and by the
looks of it today, more is coming!
But, we stay warm as we stay by the fire!
Miles made a fire in this round log!









Christmas Preparations!

Putting up the tree!


The Lights outside looked gorgeous with the snow!




Christmas Cookies!






Getting our special Christmas snow-men out on the ledge, they are all so cute!


A Blessed Merry CHRISTmas you and your family from The Beckman Family!!!

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Conglomeration

When coming up with a name for this blog post, I was thinking about what I was posting about.......A conglomeration of various pictures accumulated over the past month or so.
Hey-conglomeration is a good word! I wonder if there are any synonyms that I could use
to describe the post-
Here are a few I liked off of thesaurus.com-Agglomeration (a close cousin to conglomeration)
collection, combination, combo, "everything but the kitchen sink" (my favorite!!!!) hodge-podge, mass and mish-mash. Aren't those fun! (Try and use one of those words today!)

Elizabeth: "Mom, why do we have so much stuff(good descriptive word!) in the front seat of the car-It is always so full, nobody can sit up there-We must have everything except the kitchen sink up there!!! (I say this ALL the time!)

So, to our hodge-podge, mish-mash of pictures. These are a combination I've taken from a variety of activites.

To start out with, a collection of our Hyllningsfest weekend.
We've been planning this occasion for a year, and what a wonderful time we had.
Our dear friends, the Ulmer and Kroeker Families came up to spend the weekend starting out by surprising Mr. Kroeker for his birthday. Dad also had his Men's choir concert that night!

It was amazing! Although the weather was the best, we had fun watching some Swedish festivities downtown, going to the parade, having a hymn sing, playing the chimes, going to church in the "bus", walking, football, food, staying up late (or early-5:00 am!), everything was a total blast!
Thanks so much for coming Ulmers and Kroekers! Can't wait to have ya'll again!

SURPRISE!


Smoky Valley Men's Choir
(Dad is on the left towards the bottom)


The whole group at the parade-All 32 of us!


The Mom's!


It was SUPER cold out!


The four older boys-Those grass stains are from some
serious games of football!


Miles, Eric, Micah, Kyle, Moses, and Kaleb


Lots of play time!


Lots of yummy food!


Hymn Sing



"Oh, the wonder of it all, The wonder of it all, Just to think that God loves me"
-How true this is! God's steadfast love for us is shown all the time-Throughout the whole weekend, the love of the Lord was our common bond.Everything else was secondary-Food, Fun, Friends, Family, etc.


Swedish Susanna!


The Beckman children in Swedish Costumes


Bountiful Sweet Potato Harvest!







We had some lovely fall days!
But, I think winter is coming as we've got the fireplace going,
and we even had snow yesterday!


We celebrated Memaw's Birthday with an Italian Dinner-Mmmm!


The cake-Italian Creme!



In October, I had the opportunity to spend some time with
the Anson family-Scott (Mr. Anson) was gone for a week, and I was
able to help Lydia (Mrs. Anson) out with the 4 boys!
They are all lots of fun with LOTS of energy!
I was weary when I got home, but I had a great time!

It was beautiful outside, so we went to the park!


Marcus



Rolling down the hill!


Paul loves to climb!





Phillip


Having a snack!


Phillip, Marcus, Baby William, Paul and Me.



Caroline made it to State Piano Auditions, so Dad, Caroline and I went up to
KU in Lawerence where she participated in that.


Dad and Caroline


Caroline


Outside Allen Field House, there is a statue of Forrest "Phog" Allen (thus, Allen Field House)
Dad posed the same way as the statue and looked hilariously suave!!!



Susanna loves to read her little Bible while we are doing our Bible reading-Mom's glasses had broken awhile ago, but Susanna likes to play with them-She was so cute sitting there!!










The Kroeker children came for the weekend, when Mr. and Mrs. Kroeker
were in Kansas City. As always, a super fun time, but never enough time to do everything!

Moving some firewood












The girls dressed-up! But the boys played "Risk" (the WHOLE weekend!)





Caroline also had her Symphony Concert last Sunday-They did a great job!





Behind Caroline are two of our friends-They all car-pool together every Saturday morning.


Well, are you about to collapse, drop, faint, give out, or wilt from all this?
I hope not! Hopefully you are feeling astonished, asounded, out of this world, peachy,
extravagant, fabulous, fantastic, phenomenal, terrific, etc.

Really and truly, I hope you enjoyed all the pictures, and are encouraged today!


Remember to: "Make a joyful noise to the Lord, all the earth! Serve the Lord with gladness! Come into his presence with singing!" ~Psalm 100:1-2