When Peter chooses to begin his schoolwork before feeding Molly breakfast:

She has a way of making her presence known.

What to do when the pond is melting in the backyard? Bring the skates into the city, where–thanks to artificial underground refrigeration–there’s ice no matter what the air temperature!

The kids worked off Mom’s delicious brunch by skating at Maggie Daley park, in the rain even.

We kicked off last weekend–which actually began Thursday evening–with Senior night for the swimmers. The seniors chose to wear sportcoats and sunglasses with their speedos.

This of course was just slightly outside of Jake’s modest comfort zone, but he was a good sport about it.

The following night was spent wrestling in Rockford at the Midnight Rumble tournament.

It is aptly named.

The team prayed together before the tournament began.

Derek struggled through the tournament, not only because of his tough opposition but also because this morning person does not do well with late nights.

After sleeping in a bit the next day, the boys took an impromptu trip with Jim to the new Top Golf just around the corner from our house.

It was like the Wide World of Sports all in one weekend!

This is the new word I learned a couple weeks ago as we celebrated my Grandpa’s 90th birthday. It means “a person who is from 90 to 99 years old.”

It was a good opportunity to give thanks for the undeserved favor God has shown on our family. Here’s grandpa in his youth.

He raised four daughters!

Thankfully, he had a sense of humor through it all, which often appears still today.

All the girls got together and planned a great party to celebrate his 90 years of life. My Aunt Jan came up from North Carolina with some of her kids and grandkids. It was fun to see them and reminisce about our childhood.

Aunt Chris and Ronnie. Only in God’s wisdom and perfect timing did Chris move to Michigan so that she may employ her nursing knowledge to regularly check in on Grandpa.

Aunt Ellen and her kids. Ellen catered the event through her new catering business. Best lasagna ever!

My mom and her brood.

Grandpa is steadfast in his faith in Jesus Christ and is finishing his life well. He has told of God’s mighty acts to his four children, ten grandchildren, and eighteen (and counting!) great-grandchildren.

Even when I am old and gray,
do not forsake me, my God,
till I declare your power to the next generation,
your mighty acts to all who are to come. (Psalm 71:18)

A couple scenes from the morning after the party: Peter and Hannah made breakfast for the Johanik/Giere clan.

And we played a rip-roaring game of Uno.

With all the boys in the family, any activity ends up in a wrestling match.

Today we are celebrating Molly’s seventh birthday. If dogs could contemplate life…

Peter began the tradition last year of making kibble- and treat-laced pancakes for the birthday canine. Molly is quite aware of what’s happening here!

As much as I cringe at the amount of hair we vacuum up regularly and the poop we pick up daily, this dog has added a lot of richness to our lives.

“The righteous care for the needs of their animals…” (Proverbs 12:10)

This is what we call it when Derek has the day off of school. Peter continues to highly cherish these days and likes to plan how they will spend their hours together. Yesterday they played on the ice.

The younger ones sure are motivated to finish schoolwork on days like this!

Back in September, we celebrated Happy Autumn. Today, we have happy winter.

Stopping to draw the leafless trees.

The anticipation built through November and December. Then the temperature dropped for a few days, and the skates came out. But, true to Chicago weather, it wasn’t long until the temperature warmed up for a couple days–just enough to melt the ice.

But we waited. The weathermen said it would freeze soon enough, so we drew pictures

and kept the skates out until the pond was solid once again.

Jake went out with the drill yesterday afternoon and declared the ice thick enough for open skate. Since there was no snow on the ice, it was particularly slick. Molly was hesitant.

But the kids had a blast.

Here they are finding their skating legs.

As Jake saw Ruthie struggling on her skates, he took her under his wing and taught her a thing or two about gliding.

She was so excited to show me what she learned and exclaimed, “Look what Jake showed me!”

Jim had compassion on the kids out in the single-digit temperatures and built a fire for them.

It was much appreciated.

Ruth found this scene at Jake’s invitational yesterday quite funny. Instead of Where’s Waldo, we called it Where’s Jake?

Here’s a new favorite app for Bible reading:

It’s free, has the Bible in a bazillion different languages, and the best part is that it reads out loud to you with different voices and sound effects in the background. It also includes the full length Jesus Film…in half a bazillion languages.

Here’s the website with more information.

While most residents of the midwest are thrilled over the unseasonably warm, mild winter we’ve experienced so far, the residents of this “waterfront” household have been wondering since late November when ice would form on the pond.

After much waiting, their desire has been fulfilled. Jake and his trusty (or should I say trusting) canine companion went out a couple days ago to measure the thickness.

He drilled until he hit water, then measured.

He declared it thick enough for people, just don’t drive your snowmobile on it yet. So out came the snow crew to carve out a rink.

Happy people!

Knowing that the next couple days will bring temperatures above freezing, they are getting as much ice time as possible, day and night.

Jeremy practiced lines, segments and rays in math class today.

He turned into a spiritual lesson by observing that “A line is like God because it has no beginning and no end; a ray is like us; and a segment is like Molly.”

And whoever said math doesn’t contain meaningful life lessons?

Due to my own logical, mathematical mind, our homeschool tends to be heavy on the math and grammar side of things, which means that the valuable right-brained activities are sadly neglected.

Fighting against my left-brained nature today, we did some art. We learned about primary colors.

The kids chose from a stack of idea cards and painted using only red, blue and yellow paint.

It’s fun to see the different personalities crop up in situations like this.

While Jeremy tediously (and minutely) traced his picture with a pencil before touching paint to his paper,

Ruth slopped on the colored fun, and if she made a mistake, she turned it into something else.

Peter was a nice balance between the two.

I’m especially looking forward to our next art activity on the color wheel: red plus yellow equals orange. We can turn just about anything into a math lesson!

We found a recipe for a new way to dish up bacon and eggs. Peter was excited to try it and began by cooking up the bacon.

Next we formed the bacon into muffin cups

then cracked an egg in each.

They baked for several minutes in the oven, and once we slapped on some cheese, and they turned out beautiful and tasty!

Happy girl.

Some of us squirted Cholula on top, which put them over the edge in flavor.

After a fun, relaxing break, we are back to the routine of school. We sweetened the deal, so to speak, by starting a new science chapter:

Not content to simply perform the egg white experiment, Peter and Jeremy recalled an Australian dessert I made a couple years ago as part of our study on world geography, and they decided to use those egg whites to make something pleasantly sweet: pavlova. When I left to pick up Derek from school, the egg white foam left from our experiment was sitting in a bowl. When I returned, Peter (with Jeremy and Ruthie) had transformed it into this.

It’s like a giant marshmallow with an outer crust. By itself, it’s nothing special, however when you add whipped cream and fresh fruit, it becomes a delicious sweet treat.

FCA was asked to provide breakfast for the Midlands wrestling tournament at Northwestern this week.  It became a fun family affair as we prepared breakfast for 100 kids the night before.

Peter made granola, one big batch at a time.

Meanwhile, the rest of us cut bagels and fruit, and assembled yogurt parfaits.

While Peter waited for the granola to cook, he passed the time by practicing drum rolls.

The next morning, Peter and Jim drove the food to NU and served it to the kids.

While Jake and Derek may be on Christmas break, they realize that this applies only to academics, not athletics. Nearly every day, Jake has been in the pool and Derek on the mat.

Derek competed in a tournament the morning after Christmas (wrestlers were allowed an extra two pounds to account for the holiday calories).

It was a JV tournament, so Derek did remarkably well. It makes a difference going up against kids of the same age.

He ended up taking 2nd in his weight class!

His fan club did a lot of waiting and cheered for their brother whenever he was up.

The fam.

After staring at worsening water stains on the ceiling near the kitchen, Jim lifted the upstairs toilet off the pipe, and what did he see?

A cracked base. He considered doing the repair job himself (he who often says he enjoys any home improvement job except plumbing), but realized the magnitude was too great and so called a plumber. When the plumber came, I couldn’t help but think It’s always darkest before the dawn, for now we had a hole in our ceiling.

With Christmas Eve a mere two days away, I was ready to live with a hole in the ceiling for the time being and just explain the craziness to our family. But Jim was not so willing to compromise. He can now add “drywall mud and tape” to his resume.

And wouldn’t you know it, just as things were beginning to look brighter, behold, the kitchen sink was leaking and had formed a puddle underneath. Ahh, more plumbing work for Jim. So he put the ceiling on hold in order to fix the kitchen sink.

And now? You’d never know there was a hole in the ceiling a week ago.

And the water from the kitchen sink (and toilet) is staying in the pipes, where it belongs.

Jim’s family came over Christmas Eve. It was a delightful time. Cousin Grace bonded with Molly.

Ruthie loves being like a big sister to Gracie.

Ruthie received a motor scooter for her doll, and thankfully Uncle Dave was near to teach bike safety.

Christmas morning, we lit the final candle of the advent wreath: the Christ candle. If there was no Jesus, there would be no reason to celebrate Christmas.

One of the kids asked why we exchange gifts at Christmas. We worship a generous God who loves to provide for His children! His greatest gift being His Son, Jesus Christ. All the kids decided to buy gifts for their siblings, so most of the gifts Christmas morning were from and to each other. (The younger ones are thankful for Dollar Tree)

Molly feeds off of the kids’ excitement and truly loves Christmas morning. She hopped with excitement over her new bed, then laid in it the rest of the morning.

Ruthie and Doll, matching beauties.

We then headed into Chicago to celebrate with my family. Grandma and Grandpa with all the grandkids.

We had a fun time opening gifts

and hanging out.