Welcome 2020! We ended 2019 with some wonderful memories. We were so excited that our friends who had tickets to come for Christmas were able to still come. There has been a pause in the protests and riots the last several weeks. We loved having Henry Millers (family from our church and good friends) and Monica Stutzman (Bryan’s cousin) here for a week. Henry’s had visited us the beginning of 2016 but didn’t bring their children that time. This time they came with their 4 children and we were thinking that its the 2nd time people have visited us and brought children along. We love all visitors even though it was fun to see our children showing their friends what life is like for them. We also had a very yummy Christmas dinner thanks to the ham that Monica brought for us. We went to the beach once and to the river twice while they were here.
It wasn’t uncommon for the inside of the truck to have extra room because all the children loved riding on the back! Ended up being nice when they were wet and sandy
This was our fun group of people! I am having a problem getting pictures to upload so even though I have lots more these 2 have to do. (photo credits belong to Monica)
Another exciting thing happened while they were visiting. My wringer washer blew up! It smoked gray smoke and smelled really hot. Bryan and Henry looked at it but said it wasn’t repairable so we were able to do 2 loads in it while it was smoking before it gave up completely. We had to do some laundry by hand but with 3 ladies we were able to put laundry in the kiddie pool and get some clean that way! It also worked out well because when Bryan took them back to the airport on Saturday he brought me home an automatic! This week has felt amazing with having lots of laundry to do and not feeling stressed about it at all! We had extra laundry piling up because of not having a machine and I had extra sheets and towels from our visitors. But it wasn’t a problem getting it all caught up the first 2 days of this week. Part of me hopes Bryan can repair the wringer because there might be times it would be nice to use it. I’m thinking of when we wash our super sandy beach clothes mainly. Not sure if that would be hard on an automatic or not.
When Bryan got home from Port on Saturday we decided to have a small Christmas with our children and give them their gifts. They were so excited.
I had spend 3 days sewing in our bedroom earlier in the month and so the girls knew I was making them something for Christmas. I had found this feather fabric when Bryan and I were in the Dominican Republic in September and thought it would make cute Indian dresses for the girls. I figured Peyton especially would be excited since we had read a book series about Indians and she’s been fascinated ever since. We got Weston bullets for his Nerf gun but he was gone before we could get a picture.
Today we took of from school and have had a very holiday feeling type of day! It’s been perfect. I had told the children we would make some candy today but yesterday afternoon it was dreary and rainy. (very unusual for December! We got 7/10ths yesterday afternoon) So even though we had done school and laundry that morning I felt caught up enough to make candy yesterday afternoon since it felt like a good day for it. We made caramel, buckeyes and rock candy (some people call it glass) And I know the buckeyes are not pretty enough for a picture but when little ones are helping you just let them have fun!
I am having a bit better luck uploading pictures from my phone then I did when trying to upload Monica’s pictures from their time here. So I’ll admit my galaxy doesn’t have a camera like an iPhone 😉 😉
I am gonna sign off. This ended up taking alot longer then I expected because our internet wasn’t working well. Hope you all have a wonderful start to the beginning of this year! Love -Ashley
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