Sisters

Sisters

Thursday, April 18, 2013

Albert's Update 17 April 2013

(There is another post coming with an explanation plus video on the "Old man" Stick.)

Dr Beach giving Albert the "Old Man" Stick

A Busy Semester

It has been a long time. The pressures of this semester have meant that my blog contributions have had to be placed on hold for a wee while.

I am well, but the workload has been daunting this semester. I still have a number of significant papers to complete before the end of the Semester, and so I would appreciate your continued prayers. They help!
 
In the meantime here is some of my work for you to have a look at/ listen to.

I have given my first chapel message. You can download that here:


Here is a Sermon that I preached for Preaching Class.
 

And finally, a Paper I have just submitted:
 
 
Enjoy!

Blessings,

Albert

Tuesday, April 9, 2013

Sledding

The next day we decided to go sledding during school time. Albert took afternoon off from studying (he had no classes) and came with us to go sledding on a 'sledding' hill. Believe it or not, there are not many hills around and these 'sledding' hills are made specifically in parks for this very purpose!
It was a cold day (as you can see from the gray sky) but the girls had a blast. I also went down a few times and really enjoyed it. We borrowed sleds from a neighbor up the road. We also took some of the girls of one of the seminary families with us. My camera ran out of batteries and so I haven't got too many photo's sorry :( hopefully better next year. I also took the girls again a day later but a lot of the snow had melted already, it made for some VERY muddy (fast) sledding! (Very thankful for my HUGE washing machine and dryer!)

Going up the hill
Looking down the hill, it is a fair way down,
it's hard to see
Albert testing the hill out!
The visiting girls having a go, my girls watching
Here are my girls going
Back up the hill
On your tummy is the best!
Grace
Kate and ? sorry my photography skills are amateur!

Monday, April 8, 2013

Snow Storm

Here are some pictures of our first 'snow storm'! While I'm sure the rest of Chicago was dreading this 'storm' we were looking forward to it! It is soo magical to watch the snow fall and accumulate. I (sorry I mean we) had a 'snow'ball! "No girls you can't shovel the driveway, GIVE me the shovel!" haha I pulled rank, you got to sometimes as a Mum surely! Don't worry the girls got plenty of play time with the shovel too! (We borrowed the lovely next door neighbors shovel as well!). The snow just kept falling, and falling and falling. The school next door finished early but mostly life goes on, it's amazing really. The amount of trucks plowing and salting the roads is quite amazing also. 

Isn't it gorgeous? 
Accumulating snow
Where is the footpath again? (Grace)

Grace, Zara and Michaela building a snowfort
snow fort
"Mama" Snow Angel"

Shoveling the paths
7 Inches and going

Next morning, notice the clear roads
Final measurement about 8 inches, AWESOME!

Saturday, April 6, 2013

Winter Fun

When they are not doing schoolwork, reading or playing outside they play in the basement. The girls were spoiled with lots of Friends Lego for their birthdays and so they set up a town with all their stuff. Here are some pictures. 

Grace and Michaela
The Vet
We also looked after our good friends (Aaron and Audra's) boys for an afternoon while they celebrated their anniversary. The girls and boys had a ball! Playing in the snow, making snow angels and swinging!

Grace, Kate, Zara (pink) with Michaela
and Josiah in the 'house'
Grace showing Cademon how to make snow angels!
Michaela and the boys

Friday, April 5, 2013

Kate's Big Snow Balls

I'm learning a lot about snow. I hadn't thought about the fact that there is at least three different types of snow, (there might be more haven't experienced it yet!) wet and 'dry' and snow flurries. 'Dry' snow doesn't really make good snowballs/snowmens/snow fights! Wet snow however is great, it rolls great into HUGE snow balls and makes great snowfighting material! Flurries are very light snow flakes (these got me excited at first but after having experienced real snow, a bit of a disappointment). In the photo's here is wet snow, hence the snowman(s) and snowballs! It was pretty cold that day and so most of us didn't last very long apart from Kate, she persevered and spend a good part of the afternoon out there making HUGE snowballs. She was struggling to get the snowballs into our front yard and so I went out and helped her, no wonder she was having trouble, the snowballs were very heavy even I had trouble moving them. We accomplished the 'job'with a bit of good old fashioned team work! Go Kate! 

Snowman - in the neighbors yard
All of the family including our lovely neighbor
Snowman!
Snowman number 2
Kate with snowball number 3
Having a rest, it's hard work
and now there is four
Me helping Kate

Our snowball (they were too heavy to lift
otherwise I would have  made more snowmans)
Now there are five!
Kate!

Thursday, April 4, 2013

Random February

Here are some random photo's, enjoy!

Group photo of our homeschooling co-op
different pose
Guess who is often the last one to be asleep?
(Zara having a late night cuddle)
Father and daughter games at GEMS
Kate and Me

This one day after we had some snow. The day was very warm and the girls thought it would be a good idea to play with the water. I gave them specific instructions not to get their shoes/socks etc wet. Grace come up with a genius solution, well at least she thought so. Nothing got wet! Very clever Grace!