Happy New Year

 We spent New Years Eve with the Rineys.  We hung out, ate chili, played cards, drank wine and Champagne, and was in bed by midnight.  

Goodbye 2021 and welcome 2022!!!

CHEERS!

The Christmas Hangover

 Phew!!!  The next morning the dogs were TIRED!!!  They slept ALL day.....well, after they begged and begged Mike for just one little bite of his leftover biscuits and gravy.  I think they were left disappointed....

Milly was here too, but I guess she didn't want any biscuits and gravy???......

Christmas

 Merry Christmas!  It was a happy day!  Maddie woke up first (of course).  She and Mike headed downstairs to get the coffee going.  I came down and started getting breakfast ready.  Grandma and Grandpa Farm come up from the basement and then Grandma Jeanne, Mark, and GiGi arrived.  We were all in attendance and ready to roll.  We thought Maddie would have to go upstairs and wake up the big kids, but she didn't.  They made it down by themselves and it was time to open presents.  

Peyton's presents included, a new phone, a makeup subscription, and clothes.  

Jack's presents were clothes, shoes, a baseball necklace, and a new phone.

Maddie got a new pretend dental kit, arts and crafts, jewelry making stuff, and an air track.  It was such a BUMMER!!!  Her big present, the air track was torture.  Her knee was still injured so she wasn't able to jump or flip around on it at all.  She still wanted to get it set up.  So Mike set it up and we let her play on it for just a few minutes and then off she came.  

After all the kids opened their stuff the adults opened their gifts.  Now, lets talk about my gift for a minute.  Background: every time we get family pictures we have the photographer take a picture of us all walking from behind.  This started as one of our wedding photos and then as our family has grown so have the photos.  Mike blew all of them up and framed them all.  Mike and each kid gave me one and before they each gave me one, they sang me a song (this was an add on from Maddie's songs she made everyone last year).  It was funny and great!!  There were lots of ripping on mom and dad in the songs.  I taped each song to the back of the pictures.  They will be funny to read one day.  Mark made a YouTube of it as well.

We then all had breakfast.  After breakfast the kids all went off and started playing with their new stuff, Mark, Grandma Jeanne, and GiGi headed home, Grandpa and Grandma Farm headed out to Warrenton, and Mike and I started taking down the Christmas stuff.  Party is over.....time to get this house cleaned up!!

Daisy made the biggest mess she has EVER made!!!!!!  And wasted a lot of toilet paper too!!!

Christmas Eve

We didn't have much for plans on Christmas Eve.  Mike was off work and the weather was nice.....like REALLY nice.  Like 70 degrees nice!!  Maddie and I finished up our last batch of cookies (gooey butter), the kids spent a lot of time outside, and Annie did too!!  Annie laid on the deck most of the day, so Mike finally moved her bed out there.  Once the cookies were finished, we headed to the tennis courts for a little family tennis.  We all wore shorts and were comfortable!  AMAZING!!!  After tennis we went and picked up Chewie from his house.  We babysat him for a few days while his family was out of town.  

We then came home, had some lasagna for dinner, Grandma and Grandpa Farm came and stayed the night.  We played some games, prepped breakfast and hit the hay to wait for Santa to come!  

I couldn't resist taking this picture.  I was "softening" the butter, using the fire that was already on.  Gus sat there and watched the butter melt the entire time, just WISHING he could have one little lick!!  He was really hoping I'd step away for just one quick second.  

Christmas Dinner at WCC

 This was the first year that we didn't attend breakfast with Santa at WCC, instead we exchanged it for their Christmas candlelight dinner.  They light the entire club with candles only and have a local high school choir there singing Christmas carols.  The good was good, the choir was good, the club was pretty....but our seating was not our favorite.  They had a large amount of people sign up so they had to use the veranda for seating as well.....we kind of got hosed, but everything else was lovely.  

Christmas Cookie Time

 Well, the theme is....."DUE TO COVID".........

We didn't get together with my family like we usually do to make cookies.  So we had a couple baseball friends over.  Those girls decorated every last cookie of the 72 we baked!!

They also made the rolo and pretzel ones and then it was time to go.  The other two girls still had school the next day.  Maddie was already on break, but the others were not.  They were not ready to call it a night at 9:30, but the moms made them anyway....

Maddie's First Meet of the Season

 Oh happy day!!!!  She was so excited for the first meet!!!  It was an early one....they competed at 8:00am at Lindenwood.  Her scores weren't all that impressive, but she placed well, so I guess the judges were consistently hard on all the gymnasts.  

Maddie placed second in the all-around, losing to her teammate Jillian.  

This meet was called the "TeddyBear Meet" so they gave out teddybears instead of trophy's for the All-Arounds......just what we need, another stuffed animals floating around the house.  But she was excited!!!

Her second to last even was the vault.  After she vaulted her second one, I could tell she was crying and holding her knee.  She had been telling us for a couple weeks that her knee had been bothering her, but I wasn't really paying that much attention to her.  Jack has been having a little bit of osgood schlatter in his knee and about that time that started for him is when she started complaining.  I thought she was just complaining cause Jack was.  HA!!  She's a tough ole bird, so when I saw her crying, I knew it wasn't good.  The only even she had left was bars, which is typically her best.  She didn't score as high as normal on bars, as she was a little hesitant in her landing, as her knee was hurting.  

But she had a great time, she was just upset at her knee.  The next week at practice she came out in tears as well.  Mike thinks she has "jumpers knee".  We reached out to our friend that is a PT.  He sent her a program to do and we shut her down from practices for the last two weeks of December.  Hoping this solves the problem.....fingers crossed!!

Old lady Tennis

 I've spent a ton of time playing tennis this last year and a half.  It's been a lot of fun on the court, but I also enjoy the ladies I spend most of my time with as well.  The kids love hearing about my matches and any drama that occurred (there's lots of drama in tennis, even in old lady tennis).  They call it Old Lady Tennis, and they think the stories are hilarious!.....and they kind of are!    

I typically play matches with the same partner for the most part, unless one of us can't make a match.  But the four of us in this picture drill a ton together.  

We celebrated our last match before Christmas with lunch.  Fun times, good people!  

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas

 We usually decorate for Christmas the weekend after Thanksgiving, but Mike and I were in Chicago, so it got postponed.  The kids were CHOMPING AT THE BIT, so we did it that Monday night once everyone got home from all their things.  We finished about 9:30 that night.....but we got er done.  

Jess and Mike Meet the Kiewiets in Chicago

 Mike and I left the day after Thanksgiving for a "meeting" in Chicago.  RSNA is always in Chicago this tine of year, but we decided to skip that this year and just meet the Kiewiets for some good food and company.  

Both of our flights got in about the same time so we met them in the airport and Ubered to our hotel.  We dropped our bags, got a quick drink at the hotel happy hour and then headed out to find some Pizza.  We had all the pizza, wings and salad we could hold and then started our walk back to the hotel.  We stopped at the Whole Foods across from the hotel and grabbed some beer and wine.  We headed back to our room and hung out for a while, until the girls could no longer keep their eyes open.  

The next day we met for breakfast and then the boys headed to a pub down the street to watch some football.  Maggie and I lounged around in the hotel until it was lunch time and the boys enticed us with pictures of the nachos they had just ordered.  We walked down to the pub and joined them for lunch.  Nate and Maggie then headed out to a brewery with some of their friends that live in Chicago and Mike and I settled for a nap and more football in our room.  

When Nate and Maggie returned, we had a drink in the hotel lobby and then headed to dinner at Smith and  Lewinsky's.  Our waiter, Gerald was fantastic.....food was even better.  We all shared the wagyu, 38oz, swinging tomahawk.....and it DID NOT disappoint!!  It was the BEST steak I've ever had, hands down!  So delicious.  After we consumed all of that, we saw these HUGE chocolate cakes floating around the restaurant and learned that apparently the only way to get it is if you have a birthday to celebrate. Naturally, we made up that it was my birthday.......the cake did not disappoint either, was worth the small fib.  

After that meal, we had to waddle back to the hotel and go to bed!!!

The next morning, we had breakfast with the Kiewiets and then they headed out.  We were lazy in the room all day.  Mike watched football and I worked on this blog for SEVERAL hours, I had LOTS of catching up to do!  We went back to the same pub for dinner and then called it a night.  We headed out early the next morning.  

Grandma and Grandpa Farm held down the fort at home.  They went bowling and went to the Zoo lights, and hung out.  I think they had a good weekend also!

A Vaccinated Thanksgiving

 We have drawn a line in the sand....the family had two Thanksgivings this year, a vaccinated and an unvaccinated.  Mike and I hosted the vaccinated.  It wasn't the same as being all together, but we are just trying our best to muddle our way through this and be safe and keep others as safe as possible.  The food was good, the company was great.....