More sock puppets today ...

Saturday, November 30:  How is it possible that this is the LAST day of November? Where on earth did the month go?!?!?  Wherever it went, it got there TOO FAST.

I picked Kaity-Girl up today and we hung out at my house. I had made a few sock puppets with Brendan (they are quite pathetic, but the very best I could accomplish with my limited sewing abilities). I wondered if Kaity might like to make one as well. She did! Kaity's is pictured above. Her name is LULU. Kaity thought one pink eye, one green eye, and a very orange nose would be perfect. THEN she decided we must add some green ribbon hair. OK! 

 Paco the Pig joined in our puppet fun for the afternoon too ...

 Kaity was quite pleased with her creation. I hope it survives a few hours at her house ...

 The puppet below is Crazy Googenheimer ... he will stay with me at the Beach House, and entertain all who visit.

 Kaity was pooped out after all of that creating. We did watch a little bit of "The Secret Life of Pets" today, but not the entire movie. Afterall, it was almost time to drive over to McDonald's and play a few games of foosball!

We gathered our stuff together and took the 5-minute drive over to McD's ... you are not going to believe what we discovered when we got there ... NO MORE FOOSBALL! Their game room was completely emptied and we were told that renovations were due to begin in April (!!), so because of many reasons, they emptied out the game room to make it into another dining area. Sigh. We are terribly sad about this! We LOVED playing foosball there! 

Well, that does it ... now I have no choice but to go on-line and do the very laborious hunting of a desk-top foosball game that isn't super tiny or fragile, but actually plays like the real game! Yuck. I remember looking a few weeks back and not finding anything that came close ... but I will not give up!

Sixteen is a BIG DEAL

Friday, November 29:  It's Chris's birthday today. He is SIXTEEN. Wow. In just two years, he will be old enough to vote. Very soon, he will be driving and doing other very adult stuff. Chris doesn't hang out with me any more and I totally understand. He is very involved with friends and also he is in a lot of different sports at Comstock. AND, he has a girlfriend. All of that leaves little extra time, besides the fact that I am ... OLD ... I have no television or video games, and only really have a bunch of toys/games that younger children enjoy.

I do miss seeing Christopher on a regular basis. It's really the only way to have any kind of a relationship ... so I am missing out with NOT keeping in touch. We do see each other, briefly, now and then and it's not like we don't like each other--we just have a distance now that we didn't have before.

Having said that, I will tell you that I love my oldest grandson, and pray often for him. He is approaching a super important time in his life where many decisions he makes will be life decisions. I keep praying that Christopher will surrender all of his life to Jesus as his Lord and Savior--the #1 decision any person can make, young or old. 

The days got a little ahead of me and I neglected to ask Chris what he wanted for his birthday. So two days ago, I reached out via messaging and told Chris that #16 comes with a double budget amount, and asked him to go to Amazon and pick out some things, which he did! I'm so glad! His gifts did not arrive on time for his birthday, but he seemed to accept that without a problem. Whew. I also went over to Baker Book House today and picked out a really good study Bible for him. Since I ordered his name engraved on it, it has been sent away and won't be available for another week. Sigh. I'm excited to give it to him, though. He is a good reader. How can I hope that Christopher will know God if he doesn't have a nice Bible to read and study, right? Right. The deed is done. I'm just praying Chris will read and understand ... and obey ... and live a life worthy of the One who died for him.

Thanksgiving Day

Thanksgiving Day:  Dylan and Kelly hosted the family for dinner today. Whew, because I lost power over at the Beach House at about 10:30 this morning. Thankfully, I had just finished sauteeing the onions and celery for the stuffing, and everything else was already cooked and ready to go. But poor Matey had to spend several hours alone with a rather dark house, NO music to listen to, and I was a bit concerned about the temperature in here. It all turned out OK, though, because the power went back on after about five hours and I returned to a warm and cozy house after my day away.

It was good to see Shane, who was already over when I arrived; and then Jesse, along with Emma and Kaity, showed up a little later in the afternoon. 

 Brendan and Kaity had a good time playing together.

 Little QP was her sweet self all day ...

 She LOVES having her picture taken and gives me her very best scrunchy face each time!

 Oh my word, Erin!

 Aidan Paul was pretty intent to play outside, cold or otherwise, so the four littles and I bundled up and went outside for awhile to give Kelly some needed space in the kitchen.

 Aidan loves his dinosaur winter coat--he's quite proud of it. He looks like the very cutest tiny dinosaur in it too.

 Brendan ran to the side yard to show Kaity his very favorite climbing tree ... it's HUGE.

 They both crawled inside this evergreen and began the climb ... up, up, up! Brendan told me that the higher up you climb, the thinner the branches get ... so he very wisely didn't climb much higher than in this picture. I love this picture of you, Brendan! JOY.

 We decided to walk on down to the creek to see if it had risen to dangerous levels ...

 !! It definitely was too high to walk UNDER the bridge. So instead, we walked OVER the bridge and threw leaves down, watched them spin and take the plunge, and be swept away down-stream.

 Kaity took very good care of Aidan while we were outside. She is a natural care-giver. Good job, Emma, teaching Kaity useful skills!

 I snapped a quick picture of Jesse as they were leaving ... he looks very tired ... but it's the only one I snapped of him all day, so I'm posting it anyway. I love you, Jesse. Thanks so much for coming over and hanging out with your family today!

So much to give thanks for today: health, life and breath, a roof over our heads, excessive food to eat, warm clothing, friendships and family, our amazing God who loves us unconditionally ... His love endures forever. What a difference that makes in every second of life.

The stuff we did today!

Wednesday, November 27:  Brendan did not have ANY school today, so I picked him up early over at his house and we drove downtown to visit the planetarium and see "INHABIT EARTH."  I love visiting the museum with Brendan. He enjoys every little thing that is there!

 We were early for the show at the planetarium, so we explored a little bit upstairs nearby the entrance to the show--we wanted to go inside as soon as the doors were open in order to get the best seats possible.

 Isn't this a great globe of the earth? I love how huge it is and how detailed. Brendan and I talked all about the continents, the oceans, the mountains ... and look! There is Michigan! I'm glad we live in a state that is easy to spot!

 "Habitat Earth" was very well done, narrated interestingly, and just beautiful to watch. There was a brief video prior to the main movie and that showed Saturn and the cool things we've learned about that planet because of the probe we sent out into space in 1998. I learned that Saturn has at least 82 moons! Back when I was a kid, I think we had discovered only about 12!

 There were some cool hands-on exhibits that we wandered through ...

 And then we went to see the LEGO model of downtown Grand Rapids. What a great model!

 A trip to the public museum is never complete without a ride on the carousel!

 We were finally "home" to my house at about 4:00. Brendan chummed around with Matey while I fixed a little dinner for us.

 I'm so glad Matey has gotten used to the children. They have so much fun with him.

 Brendan and I also attempted to make sock puppets this afternoon. It was a little more difficult than I had bargained for ... see "Bluey Googenheim" next to the marker container?

 Brendan and I were talking about DNA, so Brendan went over and demonstrated he could draw a strain of DNA. Impressive, dear child. He also knew that in real life, it looks like a "twirly ribbon".

 I love you, Brendan. I love being your grandma.

LEGO model of downtown Grand Rapids

Wednesday, November 27:  Brendan and I were at the public museum this afternoon and we got to see the LEGO model of downtown Grand Rapids (circa 1922) ... except I don't think the Wealthy Street bridge was painted BLUE at that time ... well, anyway ...

 It's an incredibly well-done model, just beautiful. Brendan and I walked around and around it. We had a little sheet of paper that had listed some objects we were suppposed to find. I should have photographed them, because we DID find them all (after a prolonged and serious search--Brendan was not leaving until he found the person who was making their bed!).

 There were a couple of working trollies that were going around on the tracks, which made the entire model come alive.

 This is the Pearl Street bridge (below) ... do you see the 1922 marking on it? Hmm. So that's when the bridge was built, but the entire model is not necessarily modeled from that year--ah!

 One of the objects on our "find list" was a person on a staircase. Do you see him falling off head-first in the picture below? We were also supposed to find a guy dressed up like a hot-dog (!!), a few people kissing (!!), a white dog, and I forget what else.

 Oh! The seagull (on the roof below) ...

Anyway, it was super cool to walk around this model for awhile. It was interesting to see how determined and how patient Brendan was in checking off the list of objects to find. He does not give up easily!