Author: Bo

Bo and I both LOVE the snow and were so excited

Bo and I both LOVE snow and we’ve FINALLY got some up here. My rule is that if you can still see the grass or your driveway, it doesn’t count as snow but we’ve actually got a LITTLE bit of real snow lately that sadly will probably all be gone tonight. Here are some pictures!

Bo and I had chloe over for a few hours this weekend to play. I think we had more fun than she did! Check it out…..

Bo & Chloe building a snowman

Racing down the stairs…..

playing “dit du!!” …. (get you…)

B U T T D R O P !!!!!

We had our third and final thanksgiving celebration with Bo’s extended family today. Last I heard there were 36 people at the house, my camera never even made it out of my purse…. We had a great time hanging out with everyone, eating SO MUCH great food and even playing a little poker. Then i really enjoyed the 2 hour drive home, it’s so nice sometimes to have the time just to sit and think/reflect/process since i don’t often make the time to do it myself, it’s nice when i have the chance to do it on long drives.

Here’s the only picture we got today of us….

I figured out how to do pictures with captions this time! Woo hoo, no more guessing who everyone is… i can tell you all! We have 1 thanksgiving left to go on Saturday WAY WAY WAY up north.. i think we’ll spend most of the day driving to/from but it will be nice to spend time with Bo’s extended family again.

Here we are before we left the house. I’m thankful we have a house, we have heat, running water, lights… we are so blessed to have a comfortable home to live in, clothes to wear, food in the fridge, etc. Just having a home has so many blessings in itself to be thankful for.

Here we are driving up to Seattle. I’m so thankful we have reliable (well, for the most part, my SUV can seriously use some prayer right now though) vehicles to get us around to where we want to go and to the jobs that have been provided for us. I can’t even imagine how long it would have taken us to walk, ride bikes or attempt public transportation to get to and around Seattle.

Here we are playing games (ok, Poker) together. I’m so thankful that we have local family who we can spend time with and that we get along to play games together. (even when bo and i both lose at the games we all play)

We have food. And willing family members to purchase, prepare & transport it. Then clean it all up when it’s all done and take everything back home. It’s a lot of work, it’s pretty awesome that people are willing to invest their own time and money into their families.

Yup… more food to go ON TOP of the other food (it’s gravy)… we have the ability to load food on top of food here. We have abundance of pretty much everything we need/want here in America.

Always smiling Aunt Mary (she’s my great aunt but i’ve always just called her aunt)

Aunt Jo (again great aunt, but just aunt jo to me) and gramma up front in the pink.

Mom and Dad…other than kissing ON THE LIPS, we’re best buds. :)

And us, we have each other. What a blessing. We’re learning that it’s true what EVERYONE says, marriage is HARD work, but it’s also true that it’s sooooooooo worth it.

We were missing a few people this year from the family, among them Trina, Joe & Chloe. They were camping at the ocean and while we were EATING our food, Chloe was catching theirs…

It’s pretty amazing to think that 1 year ago I was in the airport with Bri & Chris. Then it was just bri and i.. then i left her and we both went home. I arrived home and it seemed went straight to thanksgiving in the same place we were at this year, though there were far less people there this year than the previous. It’s strange to think i’ve been HOME for an entire year now, it’s even stranger if i try to reflect on the last year of my life in comparison to the one before. I was on the race which was pretty stinkin amazing but in the past year, i came home which was pretty amazing, lived with my parents, got married, went on an awesome honeymoon, bought a house, got a job, have been active in church and the fire department and just been. Trying to learn how to be a wife (then a better one), a better daughter, sister, friend, co-worker, employee and a child of God. I swear, the older I get, the more I know – I don’t know. I’m not getting stupider, (but i bet it sounds like it because i doubt “stupider” is even a word) and it’s not like there’s more to learn but I just keep realizing I know less and less and there is so much to learn that i’d never get to. How fun.

Ok time for leftovers… We hope you had a fantastic thanksgiving and actually “gave thanks”.

Blessings!
Bo and Kari

Thanksgiving #1… We had a fantastic dinner with Bo’s immediate family and had a great time. Now if I would just go to the store and buy bread, we could have leftover turkey sandwiches. Thanksgiving #2 with my extended family will be Thursday. Then we have 1 more with Bo’s extended family on Saturday. Here are a few pictures…

Orv has been a volunteer with the Black Diamond Fire Department for 21 years. He started as a janitor just cleaning up the station on a volunteer then became our official chaplain 19 years ago and has served on call 24/7, 365 days per year for 19 years. He invited me to assist him with his chaplain work about 9 years ago which is when I was first introduced into chaplaincy. I assisted Orv as much as I could and we started an official chaplaincy program at the fire department and recruited others to be involved in the program. I got certified as a chaplain in May of 2003 and certified as a minister in January of 2006 both mostly because of Orv and the work that he did for the department and community. Him and his wife are amazing people with hearts to serve the Lord and an inspiration to me. He served anytime day or night, mostly in the middle of the night being awakened by the pager out of a deep sleep and responding to wherever he was needed immediately. His wife was supportive and loved the members of the fire department as well and never spoke negatively about the time Orv put in there but was always full of joy to see us when we’d get together.

Orv recently retired and we had a small celebration to honor his time with the department. He will sincerely be missed.

We stayed home for halloween to hand out candy to the kids. Sadly, since we live in a brand new development and we’re on the street with the model homes (unoccupied) and there are only a few occupied homes on our street (some vacant lots that haven’t sold yet and some model homes) we got very few trick or treaters. Next year we should get a ton. But we prepared! We carved our own pumpkins! I carved the top off mine so i could scoop out all the pumpkin poop and make seeds and bo actually carved a real design in his….. hahaha