Merry Christmas!

Hoping your Christmas was as incredibly fabulous as ours was!
May the Lord bless your family as 2010 comes to a close and 2011 draws near!

Whose Birthday Is It?

...........It's Trenor's!

Happy first birthday, buddy!!

Happy 6th Birthday, Caroline!

Our sweet Caroline Joy celebrated her birthday with us yesterday. Her mother, Sara, baked a pretty special crown cake for the little princess!

We love you, Caroline! Happy Birthday!!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Carving the turkey


Filling plates


Cuddling the new sweetie


Bundling up to go home

We have much to give thanks for this year and pray that you are rejoicing in God's goodness today as well. A very happy Thanksgiving to you all from the Erber family!

It's a Girl!!

Welcome little darling!!

Charlotte Anne DeLadurantey was welcomed this afternoon by her parents, and a few VERY excited siblings - whose primary comment was on how little she was, and how many kisses they were going to be giving her... Mama and baby are both doing well, and we're so excited to have another niece/granddaughter in the family - and a special extra someone to give thanks for this Thanksgiving!!

Visiting the Northwest

Mom and I (Jessica) just got back home after spending about 11 days in the northwest - Washington and Idaho. We spoke at a couple of Mother/Daughter teas in Washington, and spent the "in-between days" visiting with our dear friends, the Bradricks. But then we tagged on a few days to visit with Jonathan in Idaho! It was great to be able to see him, get to know some of his friends, and see what his days are like. On Sunday afternoon, he took us up to the top of Moscow Mountain, which was absolutely beautiful! We are so grateful to have had the opportunity to spend time out there! Oh, if it only were closer!!

September

Ahhhh, September! A full month, in its own way. Some travel, lots of projects, and saying "goodbye-for-now" to Summer! The one trip that we took was to the Providential History Festival in Omaha, Nebraska. The Festival was held at the Strategic Air and Space Museum. So in addition to the festival itself, we also got to browse a thorough assortment of military airplanes. Very interesting place if you are ever looking for somewhere to spend a day! :-)


The Festival itself was well organized, and very enjoyable! There was a lot of variety in the presentations, plenty to look at, and - of course - always people to talk to! We look forward to going back again next year, and hopefully entering a presentation or two, as well!


I mentioned that we said "goodbye" to Summer this past month, and we are very definitely into autumn around here! But, the boys did get in one last epic water fight before the pool got all closed up for the season!



The End of Summer also brings the final days for garage saling!! Jeanine, Sara, Abbey and I (Jessica) went out for a day of such shopping, and packed the vehicle as full as we could with fun finds! We were literally balancing things on our laps by the time we left the last garage sale. It was very fun, and the best thing is that we really didn't spend that much money! Yay!


Projects. That's another thing September was full of! Fall cleaning, furniture refinishing, painting, remodeling...






September is also a birthday month around here! Camille requested a "Castle Cake" for her birthday, so when all the cousins got together to celebrate she got a "Castle Cake" and everyone loved it!!



Technically, the next picture was taken on October 1, so it doesn't really belong in a "September" post, but I'm playing catch-up so here it is! :)

A number of us got to attend a concert featuring Alasdair Fraser (fiddle) and Natalie Haas (cello) perfoming Scottish-style fiddling! The two of them work/blend together SO well! We really enjoyed the concert!


That's all for now!

Happy Birthday to our buddy - Josiah!

Today was Josiah's Birthday Observed.

And here he is doing one of his very favorite things - traveling!



We love you, buddy!

Summertime...

Just some pictures of what we've been up to over the summer... It's hard to believe that August is almost over!

Visiting Grandma in Florida - waaaay back in June.



It's been a delightfully warm summer this year (last summer was SO cold!), and so the pool has been in much use this season!


I (Jessica) got to spend nearly two weeks of July out in Washington state for a friend's wedding. It was an absolutely wonderful time - both exhausting and refreshing, but completely delightful to spend time with friends who are like family as we prepared for, enjoyed, and rested after the wedding!! More wedding photos can be found here.

During June and July various ones of us also traveled to Ohio, Texas, Kansas, Idaho, Arizona... and I think that was it. A bit here and there, but not untypical for summer! Most of the travel was related to conferences and Resounding Voice.

For most of July our camera was AWOL - but it returned in time for "The Big Game" last Saturday!

Our church's team won and Jeremy, Josh and Joseph were all candidates for the team MVP award (which ultimately fell to Jeremy's lot - for the second year in a row!).

The game was great, but we also had a bunch of fun visiting with friends from church... and old friends that go "way back" who came into town for the weekend!

Not only was there softball to watch but the cutest collection of kiddos were present, as well!



For those interested in more pictures from the Big Softball Game you can visit Wendy's Blog and the Yen's Blog - yes, they have Cute Kiddo photos, too, but they also managed to document the game itself more than we did!


We have also been busy this summer getting our house ready for Grandpa and Grandma Erber to move in with us. We're getting close to moving time! It will be a big change for us and for them to have them here, but we look forward to what God has for us in this new season of life!

And He's Off!

This morning Jonathan left for Idaho.

Jonathan and Joseph replaced the brakes on his car last night. It was very hot outside, swarms of mosquitoes were biting, but they got it done.


Some greasy guys getting the the car ready to go :-)


This morning we had to say our sad goodbyes. Some of us won't see him again until after Christmas.



Please pray for Jonathan, he's got a long, lonely drive ahead.



Drive safe! We'll miss you!

Hi there!

We'll be updating soon! Hope you all are doing well!

Summertime!

So, the last activity on this site was a post in early June titled "Early May". As we are well past May at this point, I suppose we should move forward!


June was a little bit busy, but - of course - that is usually a good thing! Our camera is AWOL this morning, so until we locate it I don't have more pictures to share (not that we ever take very many anyway), but aside from everyday summer stuff, house projects, and family get-togethers, last month was made extra special by a family vacation!


We haven't taken a real vacation in years (our trips all require lots of working!). However, in early June we took 10 days away as a family to drive down to Florida and visit with Grandma! It was a wonderful and relaxing trip. We took it easy on the way down, even stopping a few times for sight-seeing and museums (something our family does NOT do). We were going to stop at Lookout Mountain, but as it was raining so hard that we could hardly see the car in front of us on the highway, we figured there was no point in driving up a mountain famous for its view... We did stop there on our way home (briefly) and got to watch a thunderstorm roll in at sunset from the top of the mountain. Pretty neat.


While in Florida we had a wonderful time visiting with Grandma, seeing the manatees at a state wildlife park, going to the beach (gulf side), spending time in the pool, getting LOTS of sunshine, visiting with friends, seeing the Atlantic coast of the state, eating, playing tennis, bocce, and fixing a few things around the house. Thank you, Grandma, for a wonderful time!


After arriving back home, we had a few days to get our feet under us, celebrate Father's Day, catch up with the local extended family (married siblings, etc.), before all of us kids hit the road again - once more in work mode! Josh and Resounding Voice took us to Ohio for a conference.


Looking at the calendar for July, various ones will be on the road quite a bit - with destinations in Texas, Arizona, Idaho, and Washington - and we will also have some out of town friends stopping in. So, we'll check in here when we can!


May the Lord bless your summer!

Early May

The events of the merry month of May began with Josiah and I performing the first movement of "Brahms' Sonata No. 1 in E Minor for cello and piano" at Josiah's cello recital. It was the same piece that Josiah had played in a competition back in February, but we had not really played it since February. So we worked to brush it back up a bit for the recital and then pulled it off rather decently (according to eyewitness accounts). The picture above was taken just after we concluded the performance, which would naturally be the reason we are smiling. **Please note that Josiah is the last of my siblings who is still shorter than I am. I'm thinking that will not be the case much longer.**

Josiah with his teacher, Richard Evans.


~~~

For Mother's Day, Josh & Abbey had us all over for a cookout. Sadly, what had been a warm, pleasant day turned rather nasty with hail, rain, and cold winds. But that didn't slow us down too much! The grill still smoked the meat nicely in the midst of the storm, and it cleared enough to allow marshmallow roasting after dinner. And is it ever too cold for Sara's delicious homemade ice cream???

Grace has taken to this odd habit of stealing her brother's baseball hat and wearing it backwards. It's really kind of cute on her! :-)

Aside from those events early May was busy with house projects and Presbytery preparations. I was also gone for most of the first two weeks - not out of town, but all the way across town - house sitting/baby sitting for some friends who were, not just out of town, but out of the country! They left their three youngest at home with me, and overall we had a very enjoyable time together - except for the night when the house security alarm went off three times...

I arrived back home from that "job" on a Friday afternoon. Saturday we traveled a few hours away for a friend's wedding. Sunday was church. Monday was house prep. Tuesday guests arrived for Presbytery. A couple of days after Presbytery wrapped up, I had a piano recital for my students (at which I took no pictures).

And that was May!