Jasmine Enjoying Her Gift

Bryan's mom sent us several packages the other day and she put in a few gifts for our kitty. So thoughtful! Jasmine loves this gift. I don't know what you call it but she loves it. She likes to get in it and then when one of us walks by she jumps out and attacks us.


Here she is waiting to pounce!


She has gotten spooked and is going all crazy. You can tell by the way she has her ears.


She is not so sure about this one and neither are we! The kids love it though. You push some button and it starts singing. Bryan's mom loves to get us noisy things.

Great Gift

Bryan showing his great gift from some friends of ours. He is enjoying it ALOT!! Thanks Paynes!

Decorating the Christmas Tree

Here we are decorating the Christmas tree. The kids really enjoyed it this year. Ethan was a big help wanting to put up all of the ornaments. He got really tired waiting on Bryan to put on the lights.


Mikaila putting on her "name" ball ornament. This was given to her on her first Christmas (I think) by her great grandparents.


Ethan and Bryan putting on another ornament.


Mikaila and Bryan putting our angel on the top. She really was waiting for this the whole time.

Thanksgiving 2006

This Thanksgiving we got to spend with several of our friends and colleagues here in Poland. We traveled up to Northeast Poland and spent several days sharing, laughing, encouraging and just having a great time with 3 other families who are with the IMB. The kids really had a blast playing and getting to speak English with other kids and we enjoyed sharing and learning from each other. We had the most ginormous turkey! It was 37 pounds! We were all amazed at the sight and prayed that it would fit in the oven.

We missed getting to spend the holiday with our families in the states, but we had a good time with our overseas missionary family. We pray you all had a great "Turkey Day".

Here is the turkey. The biggest one I have ever seen! It took two guys to get it out of the oven.


All the food! We had stuffing, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes and the turkey of course.


The two huge pies! One pumpkin and the other pecan. Where was the chocolate? Nie ma - there wasn't one! So sad. It was fine though - I had my fill of buckeyes. Thanks Lid!


Mikaila and Rebecca are just really picking at their food. At least that is what Mikaila did.


Here are Ethan and Maciek enjoying the meal at the kids table.


Here are 3 of the guys (including Bryan) leading us in a time of worship. We were able to share the things that we are thankful for as well.


Here are some of the kids playing on the gamecube. All of them had turns the whole weekend long.


It wouldn't be Thanksgiving without watching football! Some friends brought a tape someone had sent them of a football game from the states. The guys finally got the kids off the gamecube so they could watch a little bit of it. I think they fell asleep, which is also typical!

Geocaching!

We had a fairly free Saturday a little while ago and decided to go search for a geocache. We thought that we might not have many more days of decent weather that we could do it. We all had a really great time. The kids were tired after the full day of hunting, hiking and exploring.

Ethan is leading the way! He was making sure that we were going the way it told us to go.


Mikaila is on the hunt. She sees it and is going after it.


Mikaila showing off her find! She found this one. It was great.


Stacey with the kids after the big find.

Zamek Lipowiec

After our hunt for the geocache we decided to go up to the castle and look around. It was really neat. At some point it was a prision for clergymen and later ruined by fire.

I don't know if you can really tell but, here are the tons of steps that we had to climb up to get to the castle. It is way up there! It was a great view and we all had a blast exploring the ruins of the castle.


This is Bryan explaining to the kids what parents used to do to their kids when they misbehaved and that they should be thankful that we only have them sit in time-out or some other "light" punishment.


This is the outside of the castle ruins.


View from the top of the tower.


This is another great view from the very top of the tower. It is a bit hazy. Bryan was the brave one and went up all the way to get the great picture.

First Snow! November 2nd

We have had our first and only snow so far here. It is cold but so far we have had only a little bit of snow - once. Quite disappointing. Here is a picture I took along the road as we were leaving our friends house up in northeast Poland.



Here are the kids bundled up for the winter weather! We are on our way to school.