Christmas at the Grate's

The dining room (I LOVE the window sill!)

Pictures of the living room.

The Charlie Brown Christmas tree (hey, it was free AND it's real!!)
The snowmen in our room.
Emmy's tree (Barbie, of course!)
The tree in the boys room
The Christmas village
The stairway
P.S.- Sorry for all the haphazard posting, but I can't get it all in the right spot! Any suggestions?? The only way I can view it to make any sense is by clicking on each post separtely in the left hand column...

Elijah's 8th Birthday

Last weekend we celebrated Elijah's 8th birthday at a hotel here in GR with an indoor waterpark. After being presented with many different options for his birthday and party, he opted for no presents from Mom and Dad and a trip to the waterpark! We had an absolute blast. We went swimming and then all joined up for pizza ,cake, and presents. Mom and Dad-Josh, Shelly and Noah and Zoe- and Brad, Sara and Ethan and Lily Emerson were all there. His birthday isn't really until the 14th, but it was the only free weekend we had, so we did it a couple weeks early! Here are some pictures from the event!

Look who we visited!!!

We had an extra special Thanksgiving this year. We we privileged to visit Burke and JoEllen Hummel and meet their precious babies Maylee and Jakobi. I was looking forward to this day more than you can imagine. Seeing their journey through blogland just wasn't quite enough - so while we were in OH for the weekend we took a jog over to Canton. What a blessing it was. I was overcome with such emotion seeing those little miracles. I stood outside of little Maylee's isolette and bawled my little head off. Funny how things affect you. After spending some good cuddle time with Jakobi, we went out to lunch. Let me just say, the four of us should never be allowed in a public place at one time. What a zoo! I think our waitress though we were totally nuts. Oh well!! We had a blast! A special thank you to Burke and JoEllen for taking the time to see us and sharing the babies for a little while!
Note the OSU Buckeye in the crib- this was an endless top for Burke and Jay... endless.....

Vote for Christmas picture!

These are just a couple examples of our vain attempt to get a good picture for Christmas cards. Thought I'd post them and see which y'all thought we should use! We took these at Jason's parents house on Thanksgiving day - let me tell ya- it was a 3 ring circus trying to get everyone to smile. Kelley even had to stand in the middle of Marsha's new dining room table to get a decent shot! P.S.- you can also vote for a new picture... HA!!! Happy voting!

Annie!!!

Last Tuesday night we (well....Grandma...) took all of us girls to the Broadway Theatre Guild's production of "Annie". Zoe and Emmy are pretty obsessive about the movie and can often be heard singing rousing rendition's of "Tomorrow" with way too much vibrato. (I'm not kidding...) We thought they'd love the live version and decided to make a night out of it. We got the girls dressed up in matching dresses and went out to a really nice dinner beforehand. Really, it was just too much fun! Here are some pictures of our evening. P.S.- I have a couple more entries of our Thanksgiving weekend and our visit with the Hummel's that I can't wait to for you all to see, but Blogger is just being a pain in the B-U-T-T!!! Hopefully tomorrow.....

Halloween night

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Random pics from Halloween night. We had an absolute ball. We all gathered at Josh and Shelly's for pizza at 5. Unfortunately the pizza didn't show until about 6 so we thought we'd try to get some pictures taken. Try getting 7 hungry, excited, dressed up kids under the age of 7 to smile nicely at the same time. Yup, pretty much impossible. Seriously, it was a complete circus! Most of our core team came along for the ride and really were a big help. It always amazes me what a blessing it is living life together. Just for reference the kids you might not recognize are Brad and Sara Emerson's- Ethan is Darth Vader and Lily is a princess. It was pretty funny when Ethan and Elijah showed up dressed up as the same thing. Emmy was dressed as Dora (to Zoe's jealous dismay), Ezekiel was the cutest pumpkin ever, Noah was a cowboy and Zoe was an angry pink unicorn(see picture above...). Just another memorable night with the Syswerda/Greenhouse clan!

Annual Syswerda Pumpkin Carving

Pics from our annual Syswerda pumpking carving (hence...the title of post...). This has become one of our favorite holiday traditions. We have a hot dog roast outside (even if it is a bit cold). Then it's off to carve the pumpkins. You wouldn't think this would take long, but it gets pretty competitive and complicated! (See Josh's carving of Dora for Zoe!!!) After the carving, its pie time! This year- Mom's homemade pumpkin....delicious. The kids (and adults) had a rip-roarin' good time. (See picture of Zeke riding the tractor like a crazy person.) Bottom line, I feel TRULY blessed to have been born into such a loving, interesting, loyal, AMAZING (if somewhat crazy...) family. I was just going to write "it's such a joy watching our kids growing up together" but stopped myself short. Whoa- funny how it can turn that quickly... We went out to Ava's grave today to clean up the leaves; we also brought some flowers and a little pumpkin. I told Zoe we were going to see Ava and she looked at me REALLY weird and said, "Auntie Holly, Ava's up in the sky- how're WE gonna get there??????" Kids say the darndest things!!!
Well...I would apologize for lack of blogging, but that would require me being truly sorry. I think every 2 weeks is gonna be the norm from now on!!!