Good Bye 2009

Happy New Year!!

Love,

Dad & Mom

Christmas Pictures

We made graham cracker houses with a couple of other families in our neighborhood. Here are th finished products. Braxton and I made the shelf for a scouting project. Kanyon wanted something too so we made a box. The boys got to paint their own projects.

Christmas Eve with Brant and Leslie. Do you think our grandkids will use these same costumes in 20+ years.

Grandma and Grandpa, thanks for the puppet kit. It kept the kids busy for a couple of hours this morning. Here are the finished products (L-R): Braxotn's wolf, Kanyon's guy, Raya's Cinderella, and Adria's Jasmine. Now we just need help writing a script.

Christmas at Our House

Making Graham Cracker houses
Listening to the City Councilman reading "T'was the Night Before Christmas". You can see Seth's back and Koper and Westin in front of him. They do this every Christmas.

Locomotive at Potlatch City Park

Another shot of the locomotive

Martha's Luminaries

Dressed for dinner on Christmas Eve (notice the neck tie). Does that bring back memories for anyone?

A couple of the nativity scene actors (notice Great Grandpa's cane)

It was kind of busy last week so I didn't get a chance to blog. Now that Christmas is over and life is returning to normal I'll add a few pictures. I took a couple of days off before Christmas and we got caught up on stuff. We had a nice Christmas. Thanks to everyone for the phone calls, gifts, thoughts, and visits. Matt and Kimbre came down the week before Christmas and then Seth, Lacey, and family came over the night before and stayed over night. Christmas morning we all had fun opening presents, eating, laying around, eating, playing, and eating. We only had a skiff of snow and it is about gone now. The weather turned cold but not like it was a few weeks ago.

We went down to Lewiston to pick up Aunt Tami on Wednesday. She stayed a few days with Grandpa and then went home today.

Brandon and Michelle, and Matt and Amanda came over for a short visit. We enjoyed talking to them.

We had all our work and church parities early in the month so things weren't quite so hectic at the last minute.

Today our ward was in charge of the 4-ward combined meetings. There were about 6 couples there from our ward. Several of them spoke and taught lessons, prayed and passed the sacrament. Mom played for Sacrament Meeting, Sunday School, and Relief Society. You do what you have to do.

I finished tithing settlement today and then tonight we went down to our home ward and did our tithing settlement with Bishop Walker. They had lost two months of our contributions. I suggested they might have been mis-entered into Grandpa's account. Sure enough, there they were. We had a nice visit with some of the old ward members. We'll be going back some day.

Tomorrow I head back to work and Mom has the whole week off. She has been helping Lacey and tending the boys so Lacey can rest and relax. She is threatening to deliver early and they are trying to keep things calm.

Seth is leaving tomorrow to go to Boise for the Humanitarian Bowl. Idaho is playing Bowling Green. Seth has worked hard with the team and it is nice that he gets to be involved. They play on Wednesday. Go Vandals!!!!!

Have a Happy New Year!!

Dad and Mom

Merry Christmas G & G

Eating at the nice table Family concert

Coming down Christmas morning.

Rett and Maura joined us about an hour later.

Christmas Clothes

Office Cabinets

Dryer vent

The Skinny on my Fat Belly

We haven't posted much lately because we've been insanely busy, but I thought I would update you all on the skinny of my fat belly and other Jones happenings.
Seth is done with school for the semester!!! The last couple of weeks have been crazy with him finishing projects, papers, speeches and finals. To top it off, I have also been crazy busy with vinyl orders. In the middle of everything, my vinyl machine which was supposed to last 4.5 - 5 years decided to poop out on me. Apparently, I was using it too much. I bit the bullet and purchased a much higher quality machine that should stand up to the daily use I've been giving it. This was a pretty big purchase that I felt would take a couple of months to pay off. But somehow, I was slammed with orders and by the end of the month, I am hoping to pay it off. I only mention this because I know it has something to do with paying tithing. Somehow, the Lord just blesses ya.
And on that note, we turn to my fat belly. I am measuring about four weeks ahead of schedule, which is not necessarily a good thing. One to two weeks is fine, but four suggests that something may not be right with the baby or I could just be big. So, I've had an ultrasound and the baby looks fine, but I also get to do non-stress tests once a week. I went in for my first one today, and I was having contractions four minutes apart. Not the kind that hurt, but contractions none the less. So, they gave me a shot of something that helps my uterus relax and I will take medication to continue that. I am not on official bed rest just yet, I am just supposed to sit on the couch and let people do things for me. Mom and Dad took care of me and the kids today while Seth worked and watched the BYU game at Richards. I'll go back for another test on Saturday and we'll take it from there.
All of this wouldn't be so interesting if it weren't for a little impression I had when Koper was born. When they gave him to me right after he was born, I had a distinct feeling that I should prepare for baby #3. All along, I've been trying to figure it out and thought that it could mean twins, or when we found out that it's a boy, that I need to just get used to the fact that we'll produce boys. Then, I had/have the gallbladder issue. Now, it's getting a little more interesting. So, we'll see what time will tell. Uncle Chuck is taking excellent care of me and Seth and I both agree this is why we went to him in the first place. I think it's great that he has all the medical knowledge plus the fact that I can tell him about my impression about baby #3 and that he understands that as well.
So, there's the skinny on my fat belly.
We're all excited for Christmas and it has been fun watching Weston and Koper catch on to the spirit of things.
Hope all is well with you and yours!!!

Kevin and Lisa's Christmas Letter

We sent this out to everyone (I hope) via email, but I thought I would post it here as well. If it displays well, I will post it on other blogs.

Sorry

We had visitors (Seth, Lacey and family & Matt and Kimbre). I'll blog tomorrow evening after work.

Dad

Feliz Natal

Wednesday was Katie's preschool Christmas program. It is always fun to watch a bunch of 4 year olds try to sit still and sing for their parents. Katie did a good job and had fun singing the songs. In her picture, she is wearing her hat with her Christmas light bulb on it.

We had a good time visiting with the herd Friday night. It is always fun to see the cousins. Thanks to Erik and Jaime for hosting the madness and to Lisa for the great rolls (and Kevin for his doughnuts!)

Last night Les's family came down for dinner and we looked at lights. We visited a place by Chatfield Reservoir, where all the trees are covered in lights. It reminded me of Temple Square before they downsized. After that we made our trip to the house on Elati Street with the model trains and loads of Christmas decorations.

Today was our ward's Christmas choir program. Les sang in the choir and had a solo at the end. She did a great job as always. I gave Les an early Christmas present and sat with the kids during the program. (Not too bad considering I was conducting Sacrament Meeting.)

Merry Christmas to all!

Brant

Happy Christmas Week

Here we sit on a wintery evening in Palmyra. So far I've watched some Ben Hur and some Battlestar Galactica, read part of a self-help book for women, and been kicked in the head by Kelly (I have the scratch above my eye to prove it).

We don't have a lot of plans for the next week. We'll probably finish some Christmas shopping, take a look around the countryside and sit around reading books.

Anyone else have big plans for the Christmas season?

*A note from Kelly: I would just like to add that I kicked trav in the eye while both of us were standing. And I'm not very tall.

A Zirker Christmas

We had our "Colorado Chapter" Zirker Christmas Party on Friday. Krista and Craig even came down for the fun. It's always great to see them. There were plenty of people to eat all the food that was prepared...except I made way too many rolls so we could have used a few more mouths, apparently. Oh well now I know for next time!

Does this look like a lot of kids or what?
After dinner was cleaned up, the kids enjoyed a little foam craft. Our's are hanging on the fridge. The kids love them.

Then we ended with a book exchange. Kevin read Twas the Night Before Christmas and every time he said "the" you traded your present to the left. I know Raya was giggling through the whole thing. Some of the younger kids didn't understand why their present kept getting taken away. And there were some trades done after to make everyone happy. All in all we had a great time and glad we live close enough to get together often.

Just for fun...

Since Sunday was a bust for blogging, thanks to Tithing Settlement, I thought I would throw this picture on for fun. Here is our yule log that we made from our Christmas tree remnants.

Brant

I'm pretty sure that Kori is flashing some sort of gang sign.

Home Alone

I'm sitting here alone tonight. Mom, Seth, Lacey and boys are at the stake center listening to the presentation of Handel's Messiah. Being the great music lover that I am, I opted to stay home. After the music presentation they are going to the other stake center to see the display of Cresches (sp). There are over 400 0f them. I have seen them several times during the week as I was in and out of the building.

It snowed yesterday so we have about 3". We survived a week of sub-zero temperatures and now it has "warmed up" into the 20's and low 30's and is more normal.

We bought our Christmas tree yesterday. For years we bought it at the St. Mary's Catholic Church tree lot but yesterday we went up to Moscow Builders and found nicer, taller trees for less money. We put it up yesterday and it is beautiful. We hope to get it decorated in the next couple of days.

I drove down to Pendleton to do the final walk through on the new floor on Thursday. Steve Berglund rode down with me. We had a nice visit and enjoyed the ride. The floor turned out beautiful.

That's if for this week.

We love you all.

sad news

The only thing new here is that my dear friend Monica's mom died yesterday (Monica was my roommate). Her mom had been fighting off everywhere cancer (it started in her colon and spread all over her body) and it was kind of expected that she might not make it, but they were obviously hopeful. The funeral is Wednesday. Very sad.

Pictures

Here are some pictures of Maura for your viewing pleasure.

An Addition to the Zirker Family...don't get too excited, it's not a baby

Say Hello to our new dog!

Matt and I adopted her from a family who was moving to a new house and couldn't keep her anymore. Her name is Kiowa but we just call her Kia. She is a AKC-registered chocolate lab and will be 6 years old in February.

She is very obedient and knows all of the basic commands. When she's outside all she wants to do is explore and play play play! She could play fetch for hours if it didn't wear us out first. When she's inside she's extremely mellow. She just follows us around and lays in the front of the couch when we watch tv.

She's an all around very happy and fun dog! We couldn't be more excited!

A few more...

This was the best shot we had of the cars.

From our seats we could smell the ice!

Brant