Married December 18, 1999.

These were so cute, I couldn’t choose just one or two…and it’s my website, so I don’t have to!

That was an Archer look if I ever saw one!  I have a picture somewhere of myself at about that age with that exact expression!  I will have to hunt it down.

Saturday we went to Esther’s wedding…Esther is the girl who painted Amelia’s bedroom furniture, as well as a lot of other things around here.  She was part of our original youth group.  I first met her at Camp when she was 10 or 11 and I was her counselor.  Ben has known her even longer than that.  It was so nice to be a part of her wedding day.

Amelia spent the night with her friend Faith and was exhausted when we picked her up!  Faith’s mom said they “had a whirlwind of playing.”

Sunday was our Sunday school Christmas program, and Amelia was Mary.

It was a non-speaking part–they were more just posing while some older kids sang.

Apparently we aren’t set up for video clips, but maybe we’ll work on that so you can see her rocking the baby while repeatedly adjusting her headpiece…she’s a little multi-tasker already!

Her class sang “What Can I Give Him?”

This is what she had on under the Mary costume!

She’s at the age where we get a lot more fake smiles than real ones, and we can’t convince her they aren’t genuine.  She tries so hard!

She’s had her camera for over two years now, and still uses it quite a bit.

Amelia received a trunk of dress-up clothes, shoes and accessories a few years ago from a friend who had outgrown the items…she dresses up several times a week and is frequently reminded to take things off before a meal!
On this occasion, she chose her Dorothy outfit (she doesn’t even know who Dorothy is) and a crown…

It is so hard to capture an actual smile of hers on camera…she was laughing in that one and even thought it’s blurry I love that it’s a genuine look of hers and not the usual fake smile!

We always get a Douglas fir, but this year I saw a Noble fir (which I don’t even think I’d heard of before) and fell in love with it.

Amelia thought it would be fun to try on the tree skirt!

It looks better in person…I’m sure there’s a trick to getting a lighted Christmas tree to look good in a picture, but I don’t know it!  So stop by and see it for yourself!

That one (above) was my favorite, but it was too blurry…

These were taken when we went to the Nutcracker, which Amelia LOVED!!

If you’ve received a Christmas card from us, then you know that none of those was the winner!

That’s right, we went back!

Well, we got home from our awesome Columbus Day get-away, and Ben promptly got a new job!

He worked for almost a year for IBI, the one where he was working from home and supposed to go to NYC one week a month.  As it turned out, he only went to NY maybe 5 times, the last time being the first week of April…so we were blessed to have him home full-time since then.

However, the company was very shortly going to be putting him on projects where he would most likely be traveling full time…as in, get on a plane at 6 AM Monday, and return home at 10 PM Friday (for weekends, you can either mow your lawn or see your family…).  Neither of us thought that would be a good situation for our family, so he had been looking for something else.

He accepted a job at Excellus (through a contract company) and through an interesting series of events, ending up having almost two weeks off between jobs (that’s also two weeks off from a paycheck, but it was so worth it!!).  So…we contacted the people who own the cabin and asked if we could come back.

It was available the dates we wanted and so, less than a week after leaving, we found ourselves right back there for another three nights!  It was great.  It was also about 30 degrees colder than it was the week before, so we didn’t play in the creek all day this time!  We did, however, return to Stony Brook.

Miniature Waterfall:

Stony Brook has the most incredible playground I’ve ever seen!  Maybe I just don’t get out much, but I was impressed.

So, Ben has been at his new job for two weeks now, and he’s sort of settled in, if having to work in a conference room is settled.  Do you bring your reference books and family pictures and spread them out on the conference table, or what?

In any case, we are blessed with his new job, and I think he likes getting out of the house after being here for 14 months.  I thought it would be a big adjustment for Amelia and I, but so far we’re fine.

Right before we went to the cabin the first time, we went to the funeral for Ben’s grandfather (his mom’s dad).  He was 77 and had been in poor health for some time.  It was great to catch up with some of Ben’s cousins and it was an absolutely gorgeous drive down there.

Speaking of funerals, this summer I attended the funeral for Vickie Sluga, who, among many other fine qualities, may have been the most frequent commenter on this web site!  It’s been very quiet around here without her!  Vickie was from my hometown…I grew up with her son Lee (with whom I frequently exchanged heated, debate-filled notes during church and argued good naturedly with during youth group, on the bus to Christian school together, and so forth).  Vickie loved to anonymously give gifts, of which I was often the recipient (at least I think all those gifts were from her!!).  We often emailed back and forth and she had a genuine interest in my life.  Many at the funeral commented how often she emailed them and how empty their inboxes now seem.  I know what they mean.  She had a long battle with cancer and left us at the age of 56.  She will be missed by many!

We needed a break.  We took one.

I’ve gotten a lot of inquiries over the last several months…where are the posts?  Why are there no new pictures up?  Is something wrong?  What’s going on?

It’s a long story.  I  kept thinking I’d make time to write all about it, but that’s not going to happen…so here’s a very short version…

I was our Camp’s registrar this past year.  For the most part I liked the work; I just wish it didn’t take so much time.

60-70 hours a week for a volunteer position is too much.  It would be too much even if it were a paid position.  My wise and loving husband decided that I will not be Camp’s registrar this coming year.  (It was not that many hours year-round, but crept up to 30/week in June and 60-70/week after that)

I have begun training my replacements and am relieved to be passing the torch…and a whole lot of equipment!  We love Camp and will continue to be involved in other capacities…but this was just too much for us.  I committed to being a stay-at-home wife and mother, but even though I was mostly working from home, that number of hours didn’t leave much time for my husband and daughter, not to mention cooking or cleaning.  We ate a lot of Chinese food.  (considering I was barely performing basic household duties, you can see how posting new articles and pictures got dropped altogether!)

We spent all of our weekends at Camp this summer.  We had very little time as a family.  We needed a break.  We found a cabin in the woods and rented it for three nights over Columbus Day weekend.

It was only 3 miles from Stony Brook State Park, hence the waterfalls.

Looking back down the road that we came in on (to the cabin):

Camp was just one of the major things going on this spring and summer.  The rest I’m not even going to get into.  Crises of all kinds.  Time eaters, all of them.  Now, as Ben puts it, we’re circling the wagons.  Our little family is holing in for the winter.

Our wash house (separate from the cabin and 40 yards away–although it seemed a lot further in the dark!):

Washing dishes outside the wash house (no water in cabin):

We did, however, have a stove, fridge, toaster oven, and heat!

The weather was around 70 degrees (warm for October) and there was a creek and a pond.  We spent one whole day playing in the creek (all of us, yes).  There was a porch swing, a grill, and inside we enjoyed a very comfy couch and tv for movies.  We saw all kinds of animals, including a snake, but we won’t get into that!

It was a great 4 days!  We left hoping to return.  We were told our car wouldn’t make it down to the cabin in mud season, so we planned on returning the next fall.

…to be continued…

On Amelia’s 5th birthday, she had two parties.  The first was for friends, followed by one for family.

She received this beautiful doll from Uncle Jeremy, Aunt Tara and her cousins…it looks just like her!

She was increasingly listless and kept saying she was so tired, so part-way through the family party I decided to take her temperature…her ears were bright red and her temp was 101!  That’s when we remembered she hadn’t eaten any lunch…this picture we actually took while waiting for her friends to arrive–we thought she was being dramatic, but apparently she was already not feeling well.

Both parties went very well anyhow!  Hopefully she’ll make a quick recovery.  In the meantime, she’s very much enjoying playing with all of her new things.  Last night I asked her which of her presents she liked the most.  She thought about it and said “The 20 money and the 5 money.”  This is referring to the $25 cash she received from her great-grandparents–how smart is she?!?!

We returned to Camp for Family Camp Weekend over Labor Day!

Finding newts is always a favorite part of Camp!

Faith & Amelia play in the creek:

My good college friend, Breeze and her family came for a visit from Maryland!

Breakfast:

A Trip to the Zoo:

We Match!

We have three baby chipmunks in our back yard!!

Vegetables:

I never posted pictures from Family Camp in July!!

Oh, and we have feisty squirrels, too!

Here’s Amelia with our friends’ (Becki & Seth’s) 3 kids:

The kids chasing Seth:

This August we were again part of Summer Round-Up at Camp!

Ben is the assistant director, and our friend Dave is the director…here he is with his wife Amy:

Ben’s mom Sharon was a counselor this year!

(I have to give the Round-Up photographer credit for many of these pictures)

Here are some nice ones of Ben “directing”:

Amelia and her friend Faith happily spent the week as Bunny Campers:

We spent time in the pool:

Grandpa and Grandma came out to visit on Grandma’s birthday:

And of course time at the corral:

Heather, Sarah and I in our matching camp shirts: