Sick, Really Sick

Jono is in the hospital recovering from a ruptured appendix. He had surgery this afternoon. What a new and exciting way to celebrate Christmas. Hope yours was better than ours. We are thankful that he is doing better and that we know the true reason for the season. We pray that he will be home soon.

Stephen's cousin

Stephen found it quite interesting to have a cousin around. He could "feed" him or take away his soother. Sorry Phil & Leanne, I don't know how to spell it the way you say it! Stephen would try to be helpful. But mainly I think he just wanted to sit in Chayton's chair and rock!

SICK

All three of us are sick. We went to the walk-in clinic on Saturday to confirm our suspicions: strep throat. We are all on medication now. Stephen seems to be the least affected. He stills runs around and plays. Jono and I are another story. I have this headache that doesn't want to go away. Jono has a painful stomach. At least our throats aren't killing us anymore. We hope you are all healthy!

Gingerbread house

These are some of the workers, Stephen, Ashton, Aiden and Uncle Kris. Beppe and Janice made the trees. When we went to Hannah's and bought the pieces, we put our name in the draw for a "real" gingerbread house. Ironically, I won it! I didn't think it would survive the plane ride home so I guess Uncle Kris has 2 to eat!

Dorm 8 Reunion

We spent an evening in Welland with the Dorm 8 girls. Stephen spent a lot of time on this slide. I did take a picture of all 7 kids but it turned out to be a picture of the floor instead! Its hard to believe that from us 8 girls there are 2 girls and 5 boys all under 2 1/2!!! There definitely was something in the water over there! Karen and Holly, we missed you! Hannah, thanks for hosting us! It was great to see all of you again, it had been too long.

A few of the grandparents and Stephen

Playing with Opa, well maybe more like making a big mess with Opa watching!
Helping Beppe at Dominoes.
Here is Beppe Great holding cousin Chayton and Mommy holding Stephen. He wouldn't sit there by himself!!
Stephen and Oma. Yeah, he isn't crying. That was the first toy he found at Opa and Oma's and he loved it!
Helping Pake make a gingerbread house. M&Ms stick real well if you lick them first!! Mommy won a gingerbread house but didn't take it home with us. I guess Uncle Kris gets to eat it after all!!

A before picture

Here is a before picture of Janice's hair taken with a grumpy Stephen. This was a common face on Stephen in Ontario. He had a hard time adjusting to all the changes.

Janice with no hair, well a lot less hair!

Here is Janice with her braid. It will be made into a wig for a girl with cancer. It'll grow back Jono!

No Longer Alone - They Came Back!!!

I'd just like to say that Janice and Stephen are back! They came home late Monday night, at least I know it was Stephen and some other woman who looked like Janice but was missing a lot of hair!!!

Temporary bachelor...

Well, Janice left me. Fortunately she's coming back, but for this week I have to cook my own meals and wash my own dishes, all while I'm in the last couple weeks of school! Not only that, but I can't play with Stephen after supper and I have to tuck myself in to bed every night. And the house is sooo quiet, too quiet.
On the positive side, there actually seems to be more time without Stephen wanting to drag me around and show me things (Although I do miss that). And I can set my own schedule, like staying up until three to get my paper done. And Janice did prepare some meals for me to heat up.
I do miss them. Janice is the best wife ever, and Stephen is one of the funniest people I've ever met. But, I know they're having fun visiting grandparents and uncles and aunts and friends.
Come back soon!
Oh yeah, and I have made a few changes to the "look" of our blog. I hope you like it.

They are mailed!

We are happy to report that our first official Wycliffe newsletter is in the mail. Look for it late this week. Wow! Am I glad its finished! Now for Christmas cards!!
For a short update, Jono is in the busy part of the semester: working on assignments and papers. Janice is thinking about Ontario and what to pack and who to see. Stephen is climbing up everything he can and loves to play!

Family Picture

Here is our latest family picture! Thanks to Uncle Jake for taking it and Auntie Donna for entertaining Stephen! Many of you will see this soon in the mail.

Learning how to play soccer

I went to Daddy's indoor soccer game. It was fun to play with the balls and yell and clap!

Halloween, but not really

Mrs. Judy let mommy use this dog costume for Halloween. Mom and Dad put me in it and it was hard to see. We didn't go Trick-or-Treating because mommy and daddy didn't hand out candy. They turned all the lights off so people wouldn't ring the doorbell while I was sleeping. But I must admit that I looked pretty cute as a dog. Ruff!!

The coolest thing at Uncle Dave's ... a hammock!

A big, cool kid's park

There was a park by Uncle Dave's house that we went to play at. It was the biggest and coolest park that Mom and Dad had ever seen. I got to play for a long time and drive a car!! There was a lot of sand and I didn't like getting it on my hands which made falling and standing a bit of a challenge.

This is my Uncle Dave

Uncle Dave and me. I wasn't too fond of him for the first day or two at his place. By the time we left I would let him hold me.
This is Daddy with his little brother.
This is Uncle Dave with Auntie Evelyn. She's really great!

How mom and dad survived for 30 hours of driving

Mom and dad would stop driving if I got antsy and would make me run around to get rid of energy. Then the would feed me and change my diaper so I would be happy for as long as possible. If I was sleeping, they would drive as long as possible because they knew that I would wake up again. We actually made really good time on the way home even though we would stop to run around!

The car ride was really long...the camera would make me stop crying

The Trip to Edmonton to visit Uncle Dave

New Look!

You may notice, if you are a regular to the Banter, that the look has changed. Well, with the help of some very intelligent people I managed to post links to the websites of some friends and family. You'll see this on the sidebar under "Friends and Family". The last template that we were using didn't have a spot for links and I couldn't figure out how to make the title for Friends and Family look the same as the Recent Posts and Archives, so instead of having a nasty looking red 'x' we decided to change the template. I hope you like it. I enjoyed putting links in so much that I also added a few to places like Ray Mayhew Online, which is a site with a veritable treasure trove of information Christian resources.
In other news, Stephen has just cut four, yes four, more new teeth. He now has 12 teeth! Four on the bottom in the front, four on the top in the front and four practically molars. Exciting times. He is also down to only one nap a day! Mommy loves that.
For those of you who we don't email regularly, we have been accepted into Wycliffe Canada, and are now starting to develop our support team. If you would like information about how to become part of our team, let us know. We'd love to send you our newsletter.
Our camera cord should be here any day, so pictures will hopefully be updated more often. I guess that's all the news we have. We'd love to hear from you, so leave a comment, or send us an email.

Dad, what is that? Where am I?

Some cute pics

Can I help you make that one, Mom?
A not-so-happy Stephen.
Getting ready for bed.
Riding a bike on the deck.

Going for a walk!

Its a bit of a challenge when mom and dad put me in these big shoes and then they want me to push the stroller. I don't know why they laugh at me.

Thanksgiving

Mom made quite the feast for Thanksgiving. We had some of our Korean friends from CanIL over to celebrate (and eat) with us. Notice the "Adult table". The kids had their own table just like at home!!!

What is life without going to the park?

Sunday reading with mom!
I love the slide at the park!!!

Another assortment

Uhmm, how does this work? What is behind me? We have a new roof. I loved to watch the guys work but it was hard to nap with all the hammering.