Thanksgiving and Other Pics

Well, we are back from our Thanksgiving trip to Chicago.  The trip went well and we had a lot of fun. There was plenty of food and plenty of shopping, never a dull moment for sure. Thanks to Seth and Jen for the hospitality and pulling off a great Thanksgiving. We may have to have you guys host Thanksgiving more often : )

The girls absolutely loved the trip.  They had a great time playing, cooking, and helping decorate for Christmas.  Jen had a mailbox in her living room that contained a new gift for Olivia and Sylvia every morning.  The girls really enjoyed opening up the mailbox right away to see what they got.

I've uploaded our pictures from November and from Thanksgiving.  Click the links below to check them out.

November pictures

Thanksgiving pictures

Happy Thanksgiving!

We are headed to Chicago for Thanksgiving this year.  We will be spending the holiday at Abbey's brother Seth and his fiance Jenney's new house.  Abbey's mom is meeting us in Ames tomorrow and we are off! (Two trips to Chicago in two months for me!  Aren't I special!) We are looking forward to seeing everyone.  We hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving and has safe travels to wherever you are headed.  You are all in our thoughts and prayers this holiday!

Something to ponder over the holiday:  If you and I are playing a game with a Hershey bar (it has 12 pieces remember?) that goes like this: Player 1 breaks the bar along one of the lines and sets it down, then Player 2 picks up one of the pieces and does the same.  Play continues until there are no more pieces to break apart.  The player that makes the last break wins.  What is the strategy to win this game?  Is there a strategy? What if the bar had 32 pieces? 9 pieces? email me the solution and I'll send you a prize!

A Tribute to the Beard

As the days grow colder and as "No Shave November" draws to a close I am coming to appreciate the growth of my "holiday beard." In honor of the beard and all of the manliness that it brings I thought it would be appropriate to salute some awesome bearded men, so here goes!

Sean Connery

Abe Lincoln

King Leonidas (Gerard Butler)

George Clooney

Chuck Norris

"Al!"

Maximus (Russell Crowe)

Me!

I'm hungry for a steak now....

A Word of Renewal

While sitting home sick today I was surfing the web and found the following verse on Jeremy Camp's website:

"Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up."
-Galatians 6:9

It kind of took me by surprise because I have become weary in parts of my life and have felt like giving up or not trying so hard. I prayed for strength and renewal and this message has given me my answer.

Through the Eyes of a Child

A while back Olivia got a Fisher-Price digital camera for kids and has always loved taking pictures with it.  The camera holds about 50 pictures so when she fills it up I usually go through and delete some of them so she can keep taking more pictures.  But the other day I decided to download the pictures from her camera onto our computer.  When I looked at some of the pictures I had to wonder what she was thinking about when she took them.  What struck her as something worthy of snapping a picture of it? Here are just a few of the pictures she took.  Just imagine the curiosity that was going through her mind when she took them.

Here's a picture of a light on the ceiling.

The trashcan in the kitchen.

Her feet in pajamas.

A teddy bear and frog on her bed.

Sylvia.

A close-up of her gift from Gramma Lola's trip to Africa.

A light switch

The back of my head.

Candy IQ

Congratulations to the majority of you that answered the random question.  A Hershey bar is divided into 12 sections!! (You didn't peak did you??) 

Pretty Princess

One of the girls' favorite activities is to dress up as princesses and prance around the house. Another one of their favorite activities is to dance to music. Today I caught a little video of them doing both! Also, I included some pics of the girls in their princess gear. Just imagine Sylvia saying "pitty pincess" (pretty princess)!





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Calming Sounds

Recently I downloaded a couple of those "nature sounds" albums from iTunes and I listen to them when I'm working on my computer. Wow, I love it! I have a mix of ocean sounds, forest sounds, and rain sounds. I would sometimes listen to music but it would get somewhat distracting when I had to do a lot of reading or I would watch a video clip or something, but not with the nature sounds. I'm definitely addicted now! Do any of you do this? If not, I would suggest it.

PS: Lola, I need to copy your Alaska sounds CD!

Hello, I'm a PC...again

Well....After lengthy hours of research, anxiety, and debate I have determined that now is not the time for me to be a Mac. I have discovered that in order for me to do all of the things that I regularly do on my PC I would have to do one of the following:

-Purchase Microsoft Office for Mac (another $150 on top of what I have already spent, plus Office for Mac is NOT the same as Office for PC)
-Run Boot Camp and install Windows XP on the Mac (then what's the point of owning a Mac?)

I think it is worth noting that I thought the MacBook was AWESOME! I loved the design, the new trackpad, the display, and the performance. Everything I read about them is true. The operating system was not that complex, I could have figured it out. Though I thought the file organization was not as efficient or intuitive as on a PC. However, the bottom line is that it was not as functional for ME as my PC was right out of the box. It would have cost me much more to do the same stuff. That being said, I think the casual computer user that mostly does basic stuff would really love a Mac. They are cool and fun and work great, but I think my brain is wired for PC for now. So I will embrace my virus attacks, unexplainable system errors, lock ups, and crashes. No hard feelings Mac, it's not you......it's me.

Life with my Mac: Mac Attack

As I was working on my new Mac yesterday I was trying to figure out how to do everything on it and started developing what I will refer to as a "Mac Attack." Here's my definition:

Mac Attack: An overwhelming feeling of helplessness caused by running an operating system completely different from what you have run since you ever touched a computer. See also: Windows Withdrawal.

I hope this is a natural feeling for those that are using Macs for the first time. If you have experienced this please let me know that I'm not the only one!!

For example, I was running Pages (=Microsoft Word) and discovered that there is no equation editor! I use this feature on a daily basis and it made me quite nervous to discover it is lacking in Pages.

Also, I was trying out Numbers (=Microsoft Excel) and it seemed kinda weird to me. For someone who makes spreadsheets for breakfast this was a little disconcerting.

I guess I have the "boot camp" solution. I can install and run Windows XP on my Mac. Do any of you Mac users know more about this? I will also be picking up a copy of "Macs for Dummies" from the bookstore pretty soon.

I guess that is all for this installment of Life with my Mac. Wish me luck!

Halloween Party

Last night we went to Elkhart to Denny and Krystal's annual costume party. We went as Goldie Locks and the Three Bears. Here are some pictures of us in our costumes.

Hello, I'm a Mac

Well, it's official...I have taken the leap to the other side!! I purchased my first Mac yesterday. I visited my local Apple Store and walked out with the new MacBook. So far, so good.....I am still getting used to the new OS but it's been fun. I have my phone-a-friend, Karen, helping me with the transition so it's all good (or maybe I should say video conference-a-friend!!). Karen and I had our first iChat video conference with our Macs and it was a blast!! How cool! I will keep you posted about what life with a Mac is like in case you are a frustrated PC user who's contemplating the move!!! We still have our PC up and running for some applications and for Abbey (she's still a PC....but not for long...muahahaha!)