Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope everyone had a happy, joyful, safe Thanksgiving day! :-) Ours was just a pretty much normal day. We'd planned on going to a friend's in the evening, but they got sick so we didn't go. I was pretty disappointed. Not because of the food, but because it gets very lonely and long for me these days. I don't have the strength to go out much at all, and I'm missing church and fellowshipping with church friends. We were also invited to Jere's folks for lunch, but the invitation came as we were fixing a VERY late breakfast and it just didn't work. Instead, we did school (horrors I know, but we got behind over the time of my surgery so we're working hard to catch up) and the little ones got nice naps. Jere took Jaron hunting in the afternoon, and then Jere's parents came for a little visit in the evening. So it was a nice, quiet day.

I was very thankful to find my strength returning some! I actually made pancakes for breakfast as a special treat, and still had strength enough to sit up to the table and eat with the rest of the family. And then I spent some time working at getting my violin in working order again. Our new piano is just out of tune enough that I can't quite get the violin tuned right to play it, but at least now the pegs don't get so stuck that I'm afraid of breaking a string every time I try! One of these days I'll try dragging out the keyboard and see if I can't get it right then. It's been years since I played my violin... By the way, anyone know of a luthier in the area here? It needs a bit of a touch up to a few areas that are starting to crack, and I don't want to stress it out too much and ruin it. And one of these days we need to get a piano tuner up here to get the piano sounding right. And, since Jere JUST found my camera, I should be able to post pictures of it pretty soon!

Things are feeling more and more like home around here now. Not that it's really looking any homier inside yet, but we're starting to make memories in it. It helps that we're still living on the same property so that already feels like home. Jere got the lights in the basement hooked up today--hooray! Now we don't have to use the big, too bright work lights anymore! He also got some outside lights working, so that will be nice too once it gets dark out again. Now that the wiring is about done in the basement, he's going to finish the insulating on the exposed basement wall so that should help things not be quite so cold in our "bedroom". Even the little bits of progress are exciting!

I think about the best news yet is that it looks like we've sold our mobile home! Someone came to look at it today, and offered us a decent price for us. Now they need to go to the bank to finish applying for the money to buy it, or something like that. So, we're cautiously optimistic that it's sold, and hoping and praying they come back with money in hand and trucker in tow. :-) We have a LOT of memories wrapped up in that little house--two of our children were born in it, and we brought the other home to it from the hospital. I walked out of the house pregnant with Treasure, and have never been back into it since he was lost. We've laughed and cried and argued and played games and enjoyed raising our family in it. So, it will be a little sad to say goodbye once it takes the journey out of our yard...

And we look forward to life in our new house! Even though we're not even heating the upstairs yet, we have so much more living space. The children love being able to run about, playing hide and seek or tag. I think it eased their transition into it because they were thoroughly familiar with it before we actually moved in. We've had a few interesting times since they are all sharing the one bedroom, and naps have been cut short because of one thing or another. Oh well. I'm just hoping not too many more months go by before we can get the upstairs livable and all have real bedrooms again! But come to think of it, that means I have a lot to look forward to, doesn't it? Real bedrooms, a working bathtub, doors on my kitchen cabinets, a utility tub in the back entry... oooh, I can hardly wait!

Birthday party!

Well, finally I'm getting around to posting pictures of Leanna's birthday party the other night. We had a very nice evening, thanks to all of our guests chipping in to bring the meal!

The birthday girl with her birthday "cake".

We had a butterfly theme, in case you can't tell! ;-)

All ready to sing Happy Birthday!

Blowing out those candles...

"Yeah, I did it!"

Opening gifts--a new dolly from the aunties.

And the general hubbub afterwards of trying to put the new kitchen together. :-)

Pouring concrete!

The Lord graciously held back the abundant rain we've been having lately long enough to finish the digging and get the footers poured yesterday. It's raining again first thing this morning, and we are SO glad we were able to finish yesterday in enough time for the cement to set up before it gets wet again! Here are some pictures of all the goings-on here. Enjoy!

Jere and my dad adding to the dirt pile. (Finishing the digging.)

Starting get the footers formed.

Jaron and Uncle Judah digging out the loose dirt in the bottom of the frost wall pit.

The cement truck arrived!!!

The first cement coming off the truck.

Jere working the cement in the frost wall pit. Isn't he handsome?!

Working the concrete.

The little ones entertaining themselves.

Jaron working hard. He worked like a man!

Jere showing Eliott how to do it.

Eliott working hard with his own little shovel.

Lots of activities!

 We've had a lot going on the last few days! My sister Michele came for a visit Wednesday, and leaves today. We've enjoyed having her here, and she's wearing herself out, as well as the children! She brought some fun gifts along, and they've spent their day yesterday blowing bubbles and throwing Frisbee.

Also, yesterday Jere started really tearing into getting ready for the house to show up. Here he's taking the roof off the deck in the back. (Yes, those are loader forks he's standing so casually on, not a bucket!)

Also yesterday there were a demonstration at the La Farge school about EMS, with the MedLink helicopter coming in for show and tell. Jere volunteered to help, and so we all went along to watch!

Here's the chopper flying in.

The ground crew watching it land.

My  handsome man!

Our kiddos getting a chance to peek.

My wonderful family!

 

Someone else snuck a shot of the 5 of us...

Here they're getting an explanation of how the patient gets loaded in the back.

After we saw the chopper, we took the opportunity to walk over to the Organic Valley headquarters to survey the damage done during their big fire on Jaron's birthday. Wow.

On the walk back from looking at the damage, we stopped at the swings for awhile. Leanna's hands-down favorite activity!

And here, Jere is taking the first pass, removing the topsoil from the site where the house is going. It's been raining a lot, and the ground is VERY soggy, but he got most of the sod removed last night.

In this shot you can see a little better where the house is going, and the denuded back deck with no roof and only 1/3 of the decking left.

 

I hope to keep taking pictures as things progress, but we'll see how it goes! Please pray that things will dry up, and stay dry for the next week, despite a 40% chance of rain for the foreseeable forecast.  Once the basement is dug, Jere has some concrete work to do and some block to lay before the house gets moved on, and it needs to be moved out by June 1. Thanks!

Jaron's birthday!

Here are some pictures from Jaron's birthday party! He thought turning six was the greatest things that ever happened! We grilled hot dogs and ate outside. What fun! I think the rest is self-explanatory...

A new family picture!

We needed a family photo for our church's directory, so last night Jon and Lisa came for supper. After supper was the photo shoot! We struggled getting the setting right, and the lighting decent, and all the little subjects looking at the same time with something akin to at least a pleasant expression on their faces! Here's the result:

The one we ended up using.

One of the ones that we didn't use!! :-)

Party time!

I feel like I have an awful lot to catch up on! This week was crazy busy, but an awful lot of fun! Jere's sister Grace flew home from Mexico for a couple of week to tend to the orchard, and we couldn't let the occasion go by without something happening. So the rest of the Hege siblings (minus Susie, still in Mexico, and Anita, in Haiti--MISSED you girls!!!!) got together on Tuesday. 8 children 5 and under in a relatively small space was a riot. Grandma Hege, most of these pictures are put on here especially for you!!!! ;-)

 

My boys making the chair go 'round.

Timothy's littlest girlie, Sandra.

Timothy's oldest girl, Jasmine, playing with Uncle Jere. We all had a good laugh over that one!

Our Leanna Jean getting sleepy.

Timothy's middle girl, Brianna.

Sandra again. What a cutie pie!

Enjoying each other.

The newlyweds.

Eliott and Jasmine whirling in the chair.

Then yesterday, Valentine's day, we had a handful of young couples from church over for a Valentine's party. The children (with the exception of one very privileged baby!) were all elsewhere. We had SO much fun. I hadn't laughed that much in a long time!

The cake.

The table.

A place setting.

Most of the people. (Sorry to Micah who didn't get included. I couldn't back up far enough!)

One activity was to feed each other a cookie without touching it with your hands. This was the very tame start. It only got worse--those pictures I think will remain private!!! :-)

We had such a good evening. It was fun to just relax with friends in a romantic setting, though I think I had more fun preparing than anyone else did enjoying it! Maybe we'll have to do this again next year!