Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Year in Review--2008

For several years now, I've been keeping a family scrapbook in addition to the kids' scrapbooks so we could see the happenings of the year-(birthdays, milestones, vacations, progress to the house and gardens, etc).

Since I'm viewing my blog as a way to chart our family's personal history, I decided to do the year in review on line. Look away if you hate those TMI Christmas letters that dish about every little hiccup in their children's lives.

This is for us to look back on in years to come...


January 7--Reilly gets her tonsils out




January 29--Reilly turns 5 and has a dress up party


January 30--Granny Sherry comes for a visit

Feb 2--Shannon turns 37



Feb 19--Our favorite duck, Buck, dies. (racoon incident)



March 18--Brian and Shannon's 10 year anniversary




March 19--New ducklings arrive! "Henry" & "Pearl"



March 22--Jake turns 8!--Has a safari themed birthday--Joe, from Animal Junction, came to our house and gave an awesome animal presentation!


March--Jake starts cub scouts



March--Spring baseball begins (Brian was the assistant coach for the Hooks)



April--Ellie cuts the tips of "Mr. Boon" (our cat) ears off! He's a good sport and still loves to be around children. His favorite time of the day is story time at night.





May 3--I did the flowers for Jen Barclay's wedding (one of my young women from several years back)--She had her reception at the James Laura House in Doylestown. Susan Taylor and Anabel Hansen were there to help with the set up. Susan created that beautiful dogwood branch arrangement! Everything she touches turns to magic! I'm hoping that some of it rubs off on me!



May 2-5---Brian takes the three kids to Williamsburg, Va. to visit Grandpa Wilson, Uncle Brent, and Aunt Renee. They were on a mini vacation, so Brian took the gang to see them since I had the wedding to do.





June--There's nothing like June roses!...Except, well, maybe September's!


June 12--Pete, Judy, Libby & McKinnley drove out from Utah to visit us as well as attend Jake's baptism.



June 14--Jake gets baptized in the Susquehanna River. We waited until June since the water would have been too cold in March. It totally started pouring as soon as we started heading towards the river. Granny Sherry, Corey Gravelle, and our dear friend Rob Merrill were also able to join us.


June 21--Brian turns 45!





June 29-July 5--We went on vacation to Atlantic Beach, NC (the southern most outer bank). We rented a beach house for a week with our friends, the Pynes. We had a great week of sightseeing (aquarium, Fort Macon, Cape Lookout, Beaufort, etc.) as well as fun in the sun at the beach....Shannon even went boogy boarding, but Christine made me promise not to show those pictures to anyone as she is in them as well). We were both pretty disheveled, but had a really great time.



July 19--We had an early birthday celebration for Ellie



July 21--Ellie officially turns 4--We had dinner at Ooka at the Hibatchi grill--lots of fun was had by all)


August 3--Shannon and the kids go back to Butler, Pa. to visit Granny Sherry...We had fun going to the farm show, playing in Granny's yard, and having a bonfire.


August 12-15--Middleton Grange Fair--Brian wins 1st prize on his spaghetti squash!






Grange Fair continued...Just a few of the things that Shannon entered...(lemon balm, verbena, cosmo, curry, and bread & butter pickles were the things that won blue ribbons)


August--Soccer begins--"Flamethrowers"


September--another canning project...Grapejuice! Does this make you proud, mom?


September 2--Jake and Reilly's first day of school....Reilly starts Kindergarten!


September 8--Ellie starts 3 day kindergarten at St. Paul's United Methodist


September--Reilly starts Daisies!


October--Apple picking at Solebury Orchards

October 9--Granny Sherry comes for Time Out For Women (Shannon is in charge of setting up the stage decor). We canned 5 bushels of apples a few days later!

Oct 26-Nov 2--Brian goes on hunting trip to Idaho


October--Granny, Katie and Josie came up to spend Halloween with us! We went trunk or treating at church, trick or treating, and carved pumpkins...such a fun visit....hopefully it will become a tradition....

pumpkin finale!


November--Reilly learns how to ride a bike with no training wheels

November--Shannon gets called as Enrichment Leader

November 26--Granny comes for a visit and stays for Thanksgiving--she helped us make cutout sugar cookies, and spritz and did other fun pre-holiday projects. It was the best Thanksgiving we've had in years! Such a happy memory....!

November 30--Brian gets released as scout master and called as Young Men's President...again!

December--Christmas at home--filled with our favorite traditions!

Happy 2009!

6 comments:

  1. good post. if i did a year in review, it would contain several naked pictures of josie, a picture of a hairball on the floor, and one of elmo messing up our house. (he gets blamed for everything) its a good thing I dont do a year in review. seriously, that is about all that happened. :) Have a happy new year!

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  2. I spared you all the naked pictures and hairballs...and a horrible anal gland explosion from Beano. (Brian's worst nightmare!) Trust me, those things are happening over here as well...It feels good to have it all timelined like that...

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  3. Wow! That was a great recap of the year.

    I wasn't the least bit bored-your did it! Fabulously! And, I love getting to know some things about you that I didn't know previously.

    You're just as good at this a I thought!
    May I ask why all the resistance to jumping in?!

    I'll have to go back and review the photos and comments one more time to say which ones were my favorites!

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  4. That looked like a time consuming blog. Good job! It was great to see the year for your family.

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  5. nice! i felt like i was there. what about your youngest sister getting married in the DC temple? is that "Monson Timeline" worthy? :)

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  6. This must have taken some time to put together, but it's wonderful that you did it.

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