Day 353: The Year is almost over!

Each day I post, that little number goes up by 1.  Only 13 more numbers until 2017! Wow!  What a year!  The great, the good, the bad, and the oh so ugly you just can't comprehend unless you were part of it.  Ok, at least the year is ending on the great, right? Not much to report today.  Jared took my sister and nephew to the airport bright and early at 5 am this morning, with a below zero windchill.  Eeek!  It was cold all day, so I and the kids didn't go anywhere.  Except for Benaiah, he had to go to school and sit for 3 out of 6 of his finals today.  Three more finals tomorrow and he will have finished 1 whole semester of high school!  Crazy!  Stefanie and Auggie made it home safely, with only a small delay which was in their favor.  We all chilled at home, resting up for whatever lies ahead with family outings this week.  So far, the J6's schedule is wide open, so we are waiting to hear from the J4 and J2.  We have to spend all our together time this week because then everyone scatters to various places.  Not me, I stay close to home, lol.  Tomorrow night is movie night, and since someone has to watch Mr. Abishai, well, I'll just have to wait to go see Rogue One with the boys next week.  Or take Keturah since she's going to see Moana with the girls and Grandma tomorrow night.  I have no desire to see animated movies in the theater because I feel like a theater is for big live action scenes, and well, animated movies are usually tamer.

Anyways, today, we hung out, tried to stay warm, and did well, pretty much nothing.  I wrote yesterday's blog (and almost fell asleep, which then required a big cup of coffee), puttered around with Christmas gifts, made a nice dinner.  And we all took the time to shower.  Most of us have dry skin so we don't like take showers every day.  Well, Abishai does.  And apparently, he is experimenting with swimming because he was on his tummy in the bathtub, with his arms down, floating and trying to get.  Say what?! This kid has been in a pool maybe 3 times.  All the other kids were deathly afraid of being on their bellies.  Nope, this kid trips and falls, gets up, and moves along without a peep.  I told him I was pushing up his sleeves when he was eating macaroni and cheese today and he opened the drawer in front of him, pulled out a bib, and indicated that he wanted to put it on.  Oh, and his legs have been super dry, so Jared has been lotioning him up the last couple days and tonight, he just laid there, stuck his leg up in the air to say, "lotion it up Dad!"  He's super smart.  And super observant and catches onto everything quickly.  Show him something once or twice and he's got it.  We are in for a wilder ride with this one.

I don't know why, but Keturah ended up sleeping out in the living room last night.  So, Abishai decided to cuddle her awake.

Abishai found a new fun game to play with!  Break the Ice!  Lots of smashing!  And when it was time to reset it, he tried hard to put the pieces in there correctly.

Even Daddy took a turn with Keturah tonight.  I played Trouble with the middles earlier today.

This was taken on Friday, but I think they felt the same way going home as they did coming here, excited!  It's fun to travel, but it's fun to go home, too.  Auggie and Stefanie.

This is worth the little extra effort to cover up Mr. A's behind.  He's swimming!

A yummy "fire" my sister made the other night.

Brrrr....one positive about living in Indiana is that these temps don't last.  Maybe 1 day out of 7-10 days are this cold.  The rest of the time, it's in the 30's Fahrenheit.