Adult Creations

Kids' presents

Everybody once again displayed incredibly great talent in their gift wrapping and poem writing, including the children. This is only a small sample of the many beautiful works of art.

And Anneke amazed us with the beautiful scrapbook she made for Sarah.

Pakjes!!

All the kids had great fun dressing up and goofing around together.

What are they so excited about?

A gingerbread house!

(Which they promptly and completely devoured.)

Our Dogs

Memories of Thanksgiving

"Now thank we all our God,

With heart and hands and voices..."

Thanksgiving weekend was a special time again with Betty & John and kids over for the weekend, with my friend Emebet joining us for a couple days as well.

"Who wondrous things has done..."

"and blessed us on our way With countless gifts of love"

What a grand full-scale turkey dinner we enjoyed - courtesy of Mom, our excellent cook with the contributions of Betty's garden produce and delicious baking.

Thanks be to our heavenly Father who provides such abundance of blessings to enjoy, and especially for giving us family and friends.

On Monday, we were joined by the rest of the family (except M&R who were with her family, and Chris & Heidi who were at the Creation Museum!).

We enjoyed a simple meal of a good ol' Dutch peasoup and buns, went for the customary hike, and finished with singing.
Joanna loves her Uncle Maurice, & even fell asleep on his back.

As people were beginning to leave, I suddenly remembered that I had meant to ask the guys to put the cabinet back up on the bathroom wall since Dad had a sore back. Graciously, even though they wanted to get going, Ralph & Maurice stayed to put it up and their whole families were richly rewarded for that act of service done at an inconvenient time because as they were were doing that, the most exciting event of the day happened:


They not only let us pet them, but also lead and give rides!
What a fun ending to a special day! (photos courtesy of Sharon - thanks!)

All praise and thanks to God The Father now be given,

The Son, and Him who reigns With them in highest heaven,

The one eternal God, Whom earth and heaven adore;

For thus it was, is now, and shall be evermore.

Our trip to BC

This is extremely late, but I thought I'd attempt to get a couple pictures at least from our trip to BC. We thank God for the opportunity we had to see a bit of that beautiful country!

Our gracious hosts, Jack & Corrine Hummelman, and his brother & wife, took us for a trip to Mt. Whistler, and we even enjoyed some amazing rides on different gondolas and a ski lift up to the very top.

Here I am at the top of the world, with my own miniature version of the 2010 Olympics symbol (I left my mark there).

And John & I even sat on the real one for pictures. :)

The next couple are from White Rock, at the coast of the Pacific pretty much.

Milestones to Give Thanks For

This year there's been other milestones for people in this extended family that haven't been posted on here so I thought I'd do a post to honour them all still.


1) Two weeks after Dad's birthday, the baby of the family turned 35! Congrats Maurice!
We praise God for the way He has worked in your life to bring you to where you are today!


We pray He'll provide good employment soon. (M lost his job a few weeks after his b-day :(

Anyone need a good IT guy? Maurice is a diligent and careful worker, a kind and fun man. )



Wasn't he a cutie!? He was a real charmer too - still is, eh Rachel? Mom?

Of course this picture doesn't do justice as its one of those school mug shots and of course, he had just tried his hand at haircutting!


2) One week after Maurice's birth, Mom's only sister in Canada, Marianne, got married.

Mom was thrilled to show off her new baby boy - and the other 4 kids who were in all in the wedding party!

Mom's family - those who made it from Holland. Mom looks pretty good for just having a baby!

Here's M&Evert's clan today, 35 years later:

Krista (their older daughter) made a beautiful album for her parents which we got to view at the cottage. These photos are from her too (Thx K!)
Congratulations Tante Marian & Oom Evert! and may the Lord grant you many more years together in health and ever closer communion with eachother and the Lord.

Congratulations also to Oom Evert who turned 65 in June! Pray the Lord's blessings on him.


3) In August, Ralph & Sharon's oldest daughter turned 13! Wow! Congrats Rachel C! Rachel is a sweet, caring and willing helper for her mom. She is a diligent student and becoming quite accomplished at the piano under her cousin Heidi's excellent tutelage! She's also working hard at sewing with Oma and we've enjoyed having her over - on her birthday - and other occassions when she's been over to sew....


4) In September, Betty & John celebrated their 10 year Wedding Anniversary in Vancouver, BC! Happy Anniversary and may you be blessed with many more happy years together.


5) 2 weeks later, Rachel Joy, the joy & pride of Maurice's life, turned 30! Congratulations, Rachel! We pray you will have many more years of happy service in your home!

Rachel is a very capeable homemaker and decorator and she spear-headed a house-improvement project for Dad's b-day which took place while we were away camping in Sept. The girls did a great job with the painting and it sure is a huge improvement. We're ready for visitors now :). Thanks Rachel and & everyone who helped!


6) Christine & Maurice's 4th child, Joshua Ralph, turned 13! Wow! a house-full of teenagers they have there - and not just their own, but usually a few to a lot of others. Congrats Josh! Josh is a sensitive, thoughtful boy whose becoming quite handy with his tools and loves to help his dad out. We took him for a trip with Maria to the apple orchard and fun animal farm up north where they had a great time - even though it was raining!


There were a good number of other birthdays and anniversaries celebrated but I can't keep up with blogging as it is so I'm not attempting to post on them all - just the milestones now.


Of course, I should mention the Grand Patriarch & Matriach's anniversary on Friday Oct.30 (because every year of marriage after 34 is a milestone now a days.) Pray for the Lord's blessings on them too and more years in good health together.