Not much but a little something....

On Christmas we had a great chat with David’s mother Marion. David sent her a link to my blog and she posted a comment that she loved the pictures, but would like to see more of her son. As a mother I can understand that request. So that is why I have posted this photo of David. The reason why a majority of our photos don’t have David in them is because he is on the other side of the camera as he is in this photo. This photo was taken by one of the Lynden parents at one of the many football games that David shoots. He emailed it to David to let him know that the table had been turned that day. Lol Marion I will try to do better at posting more photo’s of David. From one mother to another I can understand your request.

Today started as a typical day in the Willoughby house we did our weekly cleaning of the house. The whole family pitches in and cleans. Today also included putting all the Christmas Decorations away. As my friend Stephani said to me this week that it is kind of depressing putting them away. I have to agree. My house seems a little bare now that they are put away for the year. But it also feels good to have a clean house.

This afternoon we went down to Mt. Vernon for a family get together with Karla’s mom’s side of the family. Quick introduction Karla is my dad’s wife. Here is the most recent family photo that I could find on our computer. This was taken a couple of years ago when we were in Florida. Please note that Karla is about five months pregnant with Samantha.
Anyway Karla’s grandpa had arranged a delicious catered meal for the family. It was a large family gathering and not everyone was there. My dad said it was planned for about 100 plus people to be there. After dinner there was a little program lead by Marty, Karla’s mom. There was singing, a skit and a little commentary done by one of Karla’s cousins. I wish David had taken his camera it would have been nice to get some photos of the event. It is always nice seeing families getting together and having a good time.

We brought home and extra guest my step-cousin Miles. He is 13. He is Karla’s nephew visiting from Idaho. He loves to play the same game that David plays, World of Warcraft. He is staying the night so that he can get his game fix. Plus it is a night without the girls bothering him. The girls are my little sister Mandi who is 14 and Alyssa, Miles’ sister she is 15.

The house is clean and the groceries are put away. I have my last load of laundry washing, so that means tomorrow will be a good Sunday of relaxing. As you know by previous blogs this is my favorite kind of Sunday. I am sure it is the last thing Ken and Jordan want to do especially Ken. He has been stuck home everyday this week. But one more day of rest will be good for him since he has been suffering a bad head cold. Don’t worry Ken come Monday when your swimming coach is pushing you do to one more lap in the pool I am sure you will wish for another lazy day. lol Jordan on the other hand might be happy being able to play her Wii all day. lol

Speaking of Jordan she is finally done with this last dose of Steroids. Lets hope it is her last. I noticed in our Christmas photos that she is suffering from the puffy look. The not so wonderful side effect of steroids. Please pray or send positive thoughts that she stays healthy the rest of the winter.

That’s it for now. Just a little update on the Willoughby’s Please leave me a comment or two.

Merry CHRISTmas!!!

It was an exciting Christmas for us this morning.

Jordan woke us up at 7:00am. This is after she had already been up for a couple of hours. I heard the TV on at 4:00am. I went out and told her to go get a blanket and a pillow to lie on the couch until 7:00. I was hoping she would fall asleep until at least 8:00. lol No such luck!!! Right at 7 she popped into our room and jumped on the bed telling us to get up it was Christmas. So we got up and she played Santa, passing out all the gift, while Ken, David and I sat rubbing the sleep out of our eyes.

Here is Jordan’s reaction to her new cell phone. As she opened the present I was calling her phone. She started yelling “YOU GOT ME A CELL PHONE…..AWESOME!!!! Thanks mom.



The is Ken’s reaction to getting his 80gb Zune. He was so excited. It was what he wanted and didn’t expect at all to get. I love Jordan’s reaction to it as well. You would think that she didn’t already know he was getting it. lol



I did take some video of it all, but Karla has to work her magic on it for me and I will post both of their reactions. I must say the pictures are great but the video will be better.

Then the whole family got a Wii for Christmas. Ken knew it was coming, but Jordan had no idea. They have been playing it all day.


Then my Dad, Karla, Mandi and Sammy came over and we exchanged gifts and had brunch. It was all very yummy and fun. I would post a picture, but I think we were chatting so much David, forgot to take some pictures. I can say that Sammy has master the art of opening gifts. She also has the perfect reaction to any gift whether it is hers or not. It is so cute. Next month is her birthday it will be fun to watch her with her gifts.

After my Dad and family left, David and I took a much-needed nap and the kids played on the Wii. We then got up and got ready to go over to Karla’s Mom’s house for a family dinner. It was a great time. It reminded me of the Willett holidays when we all got together, lots of laughing and talking.

Now the kids……that includes David are in the living room playing the Wii. I am going to go get ready for bed because I have to work tomorrow. It is back to reality for me, not easy after a four-day weekend. UGH!!!!

Parties and Trees.

Am I seeing double......no it is just two Michelle's
Once again it was a busy weekend for us. Friday night David and I went to my companies Christmas party. That is what the above picture is from. That is Michelle and I dressed up for the evening. It was a fun night. We eat dinner then headed down to the casino for a little gambling. I started with $40.00 at the Craps table. When I got down to $26.00 I stepped away from the table and gave my left over chips to David. He then took them over the play some blackjack. After several hands we walked away with $100.00. NICE!!!! We then spent some time with the other David and Michelle relaxing up in their hotel room. It was nice just relaxing with them. They are fun to hang out. After I almost fell asleep I knew it was time to head home. (See Ken’s blog for what he did while we were at the party)

Saturday morning we went with my dad, Mandi and Sammy to get their Christmas tree. I asked Dad to include us in getting the tree so that Ken can experience cutting down a live tree. As I think I said before we have a fake tree due to my allergies. As you can see we all took a hack at cutting down the tree……hack at it. Hehehehe. I know my good friend Stephani is laughing at that one. I know she loves a good pun when she hears it.
Check me out!!! I am cuting down a tree.
Mandi showing Ken that a girl can do it better.
How many girls does it take to cut down a tree?
Sammy is showing David how to did it correctly.
We finally did it.

Last night Jordan, Mandi and I went to Church. I have started attending Christ The King. Jordan and I have been trying to go to the Saturday eve services. Stephani pointed out to me that Saturday eve service is perfect. You are already up, dressed and ready to go. I tend to agree. Mornings are not easy for me to get up. That makes the Saturday Service perfect for me too. Jordan was attending the Kids Zone, but decided a couple of weeks she wanted to trying going into service with me and she loved it. At first I thought she would get bored during the sermon, but she does listen to them. I can tell because she laughs in the right places, then comments about it after the service. She really likes going into the service with me. Personally I love having her there. We both agree that Pastor Grant is a great minister. He is very passionate about his job.

Today is Sunday and it has been another lazy day for us. David played on his computer most of the day. Jordan and I made special treats as gifts for her Girl Scout leaders. Then this afternoon David took Ken in to get his hair cut. I love it. It shows off his hansom face so much better. I do prefer short hair on men then longer hair. As soon as we get a picture I will post it so everyone can see how cute he looks.

Little up date on Jordan she is doing better. Still having episodes with her asthma, but less and less. She is still on a ton of meds but is on her way to being 100%. This illness was an improvement to last year. Last year she usually missed 3-5 days. This year time she only missed 1 day. That is an improvement. Lets pray that we continue this upward trend.

Sick...sick....sick......here we go again!!!!

The big pill is her antibiotic.

Well it is that time of year again. I was really hoping we could go a little longer without it happening, but it happened, Jordan is sick……again. For those of you that don’t know Jordan she has very bad allergies and asthma. We really have to attack a cold fast and quick. It started with a cough about a week ago, but didn’t seem too bad. Then last night she started to have tightness so I gave her a neb treatment. Then this morning she needed another neb treatment first thing in the morning. I knew we needed to have her checked out. If I don’t watch out she could go downhill really fast.

When she is healthy, (if you can call it that) she is normally on an in-hailed steroid, two allergy pills, and a nasal spray. She is on all of that plus a strong oral steroid, a strong antibiotic, and nebulizer treatments three times a day. It is a lot of meds for an adult to take. She is only ten, but she has dealt with this all her life. She takes it with stride. I guess this it is all she knows. As a mother you feel bad when your child is sick. You want to make them feel better and take all the pain away. She is doing better after a visit to the Dr’s office and should be ready to go to school tomorrow.

Snow Day #2

I told Pateros to say cheese and she stuck her tongue out at me.

First snowman.

Look out behind you!!!!

Second snow man....maybe snowbaby.

Jordan said it was a snowmantha after Samantha.

Let it snow, let it snow, let is snow.....

Saturday morning we woke up to snow. Jordan was so excited that she went running into Ken’s room to tell him it was snowing. At that time we had a small layer on the ground. It covered the drive way and you couldn’t see any of the rocks, but you could still see a lot of the grass in our yard. It hadn’t snowed enough for it to cover up the yard. Ken was so excited that he said I want to touch it. I told him to go get dressed in some warm clothes and he could go out. While both kids got ready to go out David got the camera ready. It seemed so fitting to have our first snow of the season on December 1st. To me the official beginning of the Christmas season. Here are a few photos of Ken’s first experience of snow.

The first touch.

Total instinct one must torture their sister with snow.

My hands are feeling a little cold.

Dave told him to taste it. Every kid does it!!!

Ok dad please take the picture we are getting cold.

It continued to snow the rest of the day. A normal person would have just stayed home where it was warm and safe. I have never said I was a normal person. lol The kids and I headed into town for the day. I had a dentist appointment and Ken had his first American friend’s birthday party. On my way to the dentist appointment I dropped Ken off at the mall so he could get his friend a birthday present. Jordan and I headed to the dentist.

I am happy to report that I have no cavities. Won’t my dad be proud? He won’t be too happy to hear that I might have to get braces again. Especially after all the money he spent on them the first time. He used to always tease me by telling people they could hit me anywhere but the mouth that he paid too much money for my perfect teeth. It has been over 20 years since I had braces and my teeth are moving back and I have a strange click in my jaw. So my dentist is having me see the orthodontist in the clinic to see what we can do about it. There will be more to this story later when I learn more. But my ortho appointment isn’t until late March so you will have to wait on the edge of your seat until then. Because I know you can’t wait to hear the end of this story. lol Remember how I said earlier that I never did say I was normal. lol

Anyway we left the dentist and picked up Ken at the mall and headed to Fred Meyer’s to get groceries for the week. Then it was time for the party. Since Ken’s party was at Park Bowl, which is across the street from our Church. We dropped Ken off at the party then Jordan and I headed over for the Saturday evening Church service. To our surprise as we were walking into Church our good friends the Zerbst family was walking in as well. Stephani and I have known each other since we were kids when her family lived out in Custer. About six years ago we ran into each other when our girls were attending the same preschool. Summer, Stephani’s oldest is Jordan’s best friend. We all sat together and enjoyed Pastor Grant’s service. He is a great speaker. I really enjoy his sermons.

As we sat in Church it continued to snow A LOT. When we got out there was a nice layer over all the cars. The Zerbst invited us to join them for dinner. We headed to have some good old Mexican food at Mi Mexico. It was nice spending time with Erich and Stephani. The girls got a chance to catch up with each other. All in all it was a good evening.

After we left the restaurant we headed over to fill up the car with gas and to get a movie. I was trying to kill time until Ken’s birthday party was over. I am used to kids birthday parties lasting a couple hours and their done. Lessoned learned teenagers like to talk, eat, talk and eat some more and I think they also got some bowling in every once in a while. lol At nine we headed over to the bowling alley to wait until the party was over. Ken looked like he was having a lot of fun with his friends. After we sat down to wait Jordan started to get a bad stomachache. After several trips to the bathroom and seeing that the party wasn’t getting over anytime soon. I wasn’t about to ask Ken to go home yet. So I told him that we would head home and to call when he was done that dad would come and get him.

Jordan and I headed home to unload the groceries and get some Tums in her poor little tummy. Once home, a couple of tums and a couple more trips to the bathroom Jordan was feeling better. David went and picked up Ken at the party. He then showed Ken how much fun snow can be in a car and an empty parking lot. I guess they did a couple of donuts and slide around before heading home. That is something I will not let Dave do when I am in the car. Boys will be boys.

After a whole day of snowing you could no longer see our yard it had a full blanket of snow. It was a very beautiful site. Now it is Sunday and a majority of the snow is gone. You can see the grass again. I hear that a warm pocket of weather is coming our way…..warm meaning about 40 degrees. But warm enough to melt the snow. At least Ken got a chance to see and experience the snow. That’s it for now. I hope you enjoyed this Willoughby adventure.