Karate

Some of the healthy white belts before testing a few weeks ago. 

What happened BEFORE the white belts tested for their stripes…

Matt: “Karate is getting REALLY expensive!”

…yeah, if we have to keep replacing parts of our house that get kicked or punched off…

The newest white belts with black stripes! 

So Proud of this crew. They worked so hard!

Deesey Beff (Lucy Beth)

 

 

Thanksgiving 2021

Thanksgiving was truly a day we gave thanks. We were FINALLY healthy and Matt had just come home to us. The children were so happy and things were just plain peaceful.

 It was perfect. 

I had the marvelous idea of asking all the children to bring one dish to the thanksgiving meal. I told them it didn’t matter what they brought, just something they felt confident making and would like to eat. I got the list of ingredients needed from each child and did a quick pickup at Kroger (Lucy’s favorite pastime). 

I wish I had thought through my ingenious plan. 

We had five desserts and no vegetables. 

Dessert!

Manicures with Eddie

Danny chose to bring the Turkey to dinner…with a little help from Daddy.

Playing Santa

Thanksgiving Dinner

Watching Charlie Brown Thanksgiving

 

From the States to South Korea

Matt packed up and left for a business trip in Seoul about midway through November. It was the longest trip he's ever taken, and the longest we've ever been apart at one time. It was heavy, letting him go.

His vacation business trip started off looking pretty darn nice to me. 

While he was off gallivanting working hard in Seoul, we were still finishing up the last of the antibiotics and breathing treatments, catching up on MUCH NEEDED sleep, and preparing for Thanksgiving.

I wasn't alone while Matt was gone. Erika and Nick and Mary and Art sent care packages, cards and love from afar.

Grandma Lois came to help me during the day. We had fallen immensely behind on school, and I needed some serious quiet time with the older kids to prepare for their exams.

She read to the littles and loved on them for the entire day. Hugs and kisses and books and playdoh and playtime. It was a huge blessing.

We watched the calendar like hawks. The days passed by so slowly and Matt's plane looked like it would never land back in Detroit.

But he finally arrived.

Bearing gifts.

The jetlag took a bit to work through, but the kids didn't mind helping Matt get back to himself.

Everyone was so joyful to have Matt home. It felt like Thanksgiving had come early for us all.