Our Snowbunny!

Our first big winter storm hit last weekend and left us with a winter wonderland outside! It really feels like Christmas now! Ellie was excited to go out in the first real snow of the year, and we had fun dressing her in her thick snow attire! Below, Ellie and Papa are getting ready to go out in the snow on another day of the storm...the snow was really showering down that afternoon.

Ellie Ferreira and Ellie Mae coming in from sledding. They weren't too sure about how they felt going down the hill with Joel, but they loved being pulled together in the sled on the flat ground. After a little bit of time, though, the two Ellies decided on their own that they wanted to go inside to play at Ellie Mae's house -- they must have been really cold to suggest leaving the great outdoors!
Allan snapped a few photos of Ellie in front of our tree the other day -- here are two of our favorites...

Pause Family Christmas Party

There is a program at Hume called the Joshua Wilderness Institute, a nine month long program for college-age students that emphasizes intense study of the Bible, life skills, work ethic, evangelism, etc. The students have two Thursdays each month to "pause" from their hectic school, study and work schedules to spend time with a family (assigned for the year). We have been super blessed to be able to be Pause parents for the second consecutive year, along with our close friends, the Davies (we share one Pause family because our own children are still little enough to require a lot of our attention on any given night -- between the four of us adults, we figure they get the equivalent of at least two regular people!). We have six fantastic students and are having a terrific time getting to know them!

A tradition of Pause is the annual Christmas party and gingerbread house competition between all of the Pause families. Last year, Joel, Ellie and I were on a plane to Disney World during the party, and thus missed the festivities. During our absence, our family's very well-intentioned gingerbread scene (under the direction of the Davies) suffered a series of mishaps and ended up winning the award for "Most Inappropriate." Last night, we had the chance to redeem our group's standing -- any other award was to be considered a victory. Much to our excitement and surprise, we did not just win a different award, we won first place! (Well, technically runner up, but they decided that it wasn't fair for the staff entry to win, so the runner up became the first place -- whatever you call it, we'll take it!) We like to tease the Davies that this is the difference that our influence makes, but in reality, we'll give the credit to our students. :)

The first picture and the one below are of Ellie Mae and Ellie Ferreira singing Christmas carols. They had a great time together all night, and especially enjoyed tickling one of the Joshua students during the quiet story time!

Our Pause family hard at work: (left to right) Will (from South Carolina!), Damon, Julie, and Tom (they also had an ugly Christmas sweater competition, which explains Tom's fun stripes!).

Jake is another of our Pause kids, and loves the little ones! Connor and Olivia Davies are on his lap.

Here are a lot of us with the finished masterpiece: Jake, Tom, Brittany, Jen, Ellie Mae, Ashley, Breanna, Julie and Connor.

And the winner is..."Alone Time with God" - a depiction of the Wildwood fire that happened at the beginning of the year, rumored to have something to do with solo time in the woods, a campfire and a certain Joshua student. The fire was really put out by a helicopter with lots and lots of water, so our scene is fairly realistic! Poor student, but we hear that he is a good sport! :)

Thanksgiving Week in Stockton

Thanksgiving Day with Two New Cousins!
Ellie has two adorable new cousins, Morgan (left) and Reese (right), born two weeks apart this summer. She has visited with them once before, and had a great time getting reacquainted on Thanksgiving Day. Ellie loves babies, so having two to follow around and "help" made for a terrific day! We were trying to capture Christmas pictures for my mom and Rupert's annual card in this series -- lots of cameras flashing and parents waving their arms in the background, especially when we finally got all three girls on the same chair!

Baby Ben Laponis

One of my closest friends from both high school and college, Mindy (Shore) Laponis, had her first baby in August. Mindy made the trip to Stockton from San Jose early in the week so that we could meet little Ben for the first time. We had a great time catching up and after 16 years of friendship (high school, Cal, Delta Gamma, bridesmaids...), it was so fun to get to see Min in her new role as a mommy! Ben is super cute! :) Ellie loved getting to spend the day with a baby friend!

Ellie Loves Lep Kuchen!

Our friend Elisa grew up with a wonderful Christmas tradition in her family involving Lep Kuchen (German spice cookies). Two Saturdays before Thanksgiving is "Batterday Saturday" and is the time to make multiple batches of the dough for these cookies. Each batch typically makes between 85 & 100 cookies, and needs to be refrigerated for a minimum of one week. The Saturday before Thanksgiving is "Lep Kuchen Day," the day for baking all of these wonderful treats! Elisa typically makes two batches, while her dad makes four -- the idea is to make enough to last for the season. When we all moved to Hume in 2002, we began to join the Watsons for these two traditional days. Over time, Lep Kuchen Day has come to symbolize the coming of Christmas to us, too. Last year, the Watsons moved back to Arizona :( , but Elisa and her family graciously gave us this recipe that has been in the family for generations, and let us keep the Hume branch of Lep Kuchen Day going! We baked our two batches while in Stockton, and were excited to find out that Ellie Mae loves Lep Kuchen as much as we do! Our hope is that this tradition will feel like her own as she grows up, so that when she is an adult, she can look back like Elisa and remember Lep Kuchen Day as a wonderful part of every Christmas. In these pictures, she has a cookie in one hand, a cup of milk in the other, and a big, happy smile (yes, it is the morning, but at least Lep Kuchen have nuts and dates!)!

November Catch-up

Trick-or-Treating!

Ellie Mae was very excited to be a princess for Hume's trick-or-treating day this year, and even more excited to find out that two of her little friends were princesses, too! Hannah (left) was Cinderella and Ellie Ferreira (right) was a fairy princess. The girls had so much fun together as we drove around to different neighborhoods and walked door to door. The candy collecting was great, but riding on the back bench seat together was definitely the most exciting part for these little 2 year olds...they were absolutely delighted to be together! Our favorite part as moms was watching them climb into the car at each stop!

Rainy Day Snuggling!
I love it when Ellie wants to curl up on the couch together! She'll often bring her crayons and coloring book with her so that we can color together. We usually start each morning snuggling this way. :)

"Baking" with Mommy
Ellie loves to help Mommy bake...sometimes she is interested in helping to pour ingredients in the bowl, but mainly she wants a taste of every ingredient. I recently let her taste unsweetened baking cocoa thinking that she would never want it again, but as it turns out, there is little that Ellie doesn't like in the food category, especially when it comes from Mommy, and she actually asked for more! In these pictures, we made a birthday cake for one of our Joshua pause family kids and Ellie's contribution was licking the beater. The amazing thing was how much chocolate cake batter landed on her face, hands and clothes compared with how much she actually ate -- not much at all made it as far as her tongue, but she was thoroughly pleased! There's nothing quite like cake batter and whole wheat toast for breakfast! :)

Tea Party
Ellie was invited to a two-year-old tea party last week at the home of Michelle West, a mom on the hill of older kids with a heart to get to know the little ones (she is also hosting a three-year-old tea, a four-year-old tea and a boys tea!). Hannah Gerber and Ellie Ferreira were at the party, and the three girls had a terrific time! They started the morning on the giant trampoline outside, and had fun bouncing with each other and lots of little rubber balls. Ellie is still talking about going "bouncy bouncy" every day! After jumping up an appetite, they went inside for apple juice "tea," cheese, fruit and little cookies that they were able to decorate with frosting and lots of fun colored sprinkles all set out with beautiful dishes (Michelle really set a lovely table, complete with place settings for each mommy and bracelets for the girls!). Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures of the actual tea. The girls also played with fun toys and playdough. They ended the party with another round of jumping on the trampoline. Peter Carey joined in the fun on his way home from a walk --he is just 16 months old, but had a blast being bounced by the girls while sitting down! What a fun party!

Friends!
We've had two fantastic weekends in a row with lots of former Hume visitors! We had so much fun that we forgot to get the camera out! We did manage to snap a few pictures of Ellie and Kiefer Watson as they enjoyed a late morning snack...Kiefer is four now. Ellie had a wonderful time playing with Kiefer and Cooper, Kiefer's 15 month old brother, last weekend while the Watsons were here at Hume! The Watsons were here from Arizona for a three day weekend, along with the Sees, now in Fresno. Beth Mlakar also stayed with us for the weekend while they were up (Beth is teaching in San Jose now)...Ellie Mae loves her Cool Aunt Beth, or "Cool Beth" as Ellie calls her! The weekend before we had the Downs family at our house, and had such a terrific time catching up with them and spending quality time! Ellie really enjoyed playing with everyone, kids and adults alike, and particularly warmed up to Yvonne (we knew she had taken to Yvonne when she was willing to cuddle with her right after her nap on the last day -- this time is usually reserved strictly for Mommy until she wakes up fully!). We love our friends! :)

Pumpkin Patch!

We went to a fantastic pumpkin patch down in Reedley two weekends ago with a bunch of Hume friends. The kids had a great time walking along the paths through the old oaks on the farm, watching miniature trains, riding a real "choo choo train," playing on tractors, taking a hay ride, and of course, picking out pumpkins! It was such a fun fall Sunday activity! We followed the pumpkin patch with a trip to Bear Mountain Pizza for lunch on the way up the hill. We're looking forward to returning during the Christmas season when it becomes a Christmas tree farm -- they promised hot cocoa or cider along with the train ride for that season!
Above: top - Ryan and Jessie Minnasian, Jaron and Becky Ferreira; bottom -- Jen and Ellie Mae, Jen and Jade Tilley, Ellie Ferreira, Bunnie and Hannah Gerber, April and Peter Carey. The only person missing from the picture is Joel -- he bravely went with the group as the only dad (the others were all working), but still had a lot of fun with Ellie Mae! He'll probably do some heavy recruiting for the next trip!

The main path up to the trains from the entrance featured a fun suspension bridge. This was Ellie's first experience trying to walk on shaky ground. She and Ellie Ferreira did a great job of falling down together every few feet while smiling and laughing before they finally asked for help!

Friends! Ellie, Hannah and Ellie Mae on a journey together.

Ellie and Jade on the train together.

Ellie found a box of pumpkins her size and immediately took to the task of relocating them to a new pile. She is serious about her "jobs"!

Hay ride with Hannah! The hay wagons were pulled by a John Deere tractor.

Ellie decided to drive Ellie Mae and her baby brother Jaron "to Target"!

Ellie, Ellie Mae and Hannah

Ellie Mae's Great Auntie Pam would be proud -- a true farm girl driving tractors! (Aunt Pam has her own grape ranch and has given Ellie overalls and toy tractors to influence her farming side!)

Ellie was delighted to get a turn in the driver's seat!

Checking on her passengers!