A Year in Review - 2012

2012 started out to be the year of home improvements. In fact, we got several big projects done!

Painted the living room…

Cleaned out ALL of the closets…

Put all the music stuff in the schoolroom and the desks in the boys’ rooms and family room…

Painted the basement bathroom…

Painted Chris’ office…

Started painting the laundry room…

And that’s where it stopped…

We realized that while we’ll have all the time in the world to work on the house, the boys won’t be at home much longer. So we decided to spend the year traveling as a family instead!

In February we went to Cannon Beach…

I attended the Pastors’ Wives’ retreat at Warm Beach…

But the real  travel didn’t begin until after Zack’s graduation in June…

OH YEAH, Zack graduated this spring! He even spoke at graduation! We are so proud of him!

  The weekend following graduation, Zack and the other grads all went up to the San Juan Islands for their senior trip…

Then it was time for Bible Camp at Warm Beach…

  Andy played in the talent show

Before we knew it, it was off to Creation…

  August brought the annual convention in Fergus Falls. The boys hadn’t been back in 5 years, so we made a road trip of it…

First stop, Yellowstone…

  Second stop, Fargo and Space Aliens…

Then Fergus and the CLB convention…

After driving home straight through from Minnesota, we turned around the next morning to go with the youth group on the Great Escape to Leavenworth…

Since we hadn’t done enough camping, the boys and I camped for a week down at my parents’ place at the  creek…

While we were there, our niece Olivia was born!

  we also did some hiking in the Gorge

  

and we went tubing down the river

After fall started, we did some traveling closer to home.

Mt St Helens…

But in October, Chris and I celebrated our 20th anniversary with a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Hawaii! We stayed with our friends the Osbornes and had the most FANTASTIC time imaginable!!! We can’t wait to go back someday…

         Now the college visits have begun! First, Western Oregon University…

The whole family went on the road for Thanksgiving this year! We rented a house on Devil’s Lake at the Oregon Coast! Although there were 25 of us, there was plenty of room for everyone! The weather was even good enough that we could use the kayaks and long boards out on the lake!!!

We also had a second trip to WOU for our oldest son…

And had a very very Merry Christmas!!!

Hope each of you has a wonderful new year in 2013!