My sister DeAnna gave everyone a puzzle for Christmas with our pictures from last Thanksgiving on it. We put it together a few weeks ago. I enjoy doing puzzles, I have never done one with pictures of people I know in it. It made it even more fun! It was a very cute idea!
Allison has been working hard at wrestling. Her meet tomorrow is for Regionals. I haven’t been at her last few meets so I am excited to see her.
She took 4th at league. Here are some pictures with her and her team. We are proud of her for how hard she works at wrestling.
One of the fun things about our new house is its location is out far enough away from the city that we see lots of wild life. We see lots of animals in the flesh around our house. We also see evidence of them, or hear them, or smell them. Some of the most common ones are deer, coyotes, racoons, opossums, snakes, mice, horses, cows, donkeys, chickens, skunks, and all kinds of birds. I think we have even had a bear wander through our front yard as it was passing through but I am shunned when I say that by certain family members.
I believe one of our regular animals we see has already made an appearance in Terry Family Shenanigans. Thomas the hawk. He likes to perch on the peak of our roof over the back deck and then dive off and catch food when small animals come out of the tall grass into our short grass. The past few weeks he has been around a lot and we have seen him in action. He is beautiful and big. It is hard to say but I bet his wing span in between 3-4 feet. We think he might be a Thomalina instead of a Thomas. There is a very young hawk that has started hanging around too. He looks like a minature version of Thomas and usually perches on the rim of our trampoline net or the rail of our deck. We haven’t gotten any pictures of the new friend yet but we have a few of Thomas. Someday I’ll get out my real camera and stalk him a bit to get some good pictures but we took these really quick when we saw him hunting.
I went to the chiropractor and when I got out of the car I was greeted by these two ducks that were hanging out on the sidewalk. I had never seen them before but I am guessing they are local residents because they had a food and water bowl our for them.
But, the big surprise of a new animal we saw the other day was on our way to Emilee’s softball practice. We were passing a field with a bunch of donkeys in it and Emilee noticed one of the donkeys looked a little different. We don’t know how this guy made it to Olathe Kansas but we hope he is enjoying life with his donkey friends.
Emilee had her first school dance. Her middle school has a dance for the 7th and 8th graders in the winter each year. She looked beautiful and is growing up way to fast. She picked out her dress, she wanted it to be purple and she decided how she wanted her hair to be done. She originally thought a bun but changed her mind and went with curls, half up, half down. She went with a group of her girl friends. A few of them came over to our house to take pictures before and then arrive together at the dance. Emilee said she wanted to go in her dads car so she could arrive at the dance and have ‘drip’. I am not sure I said that correctly. But we took her and her friends to the dance and we had the song “Shut Up and Dance” blaring on the speakers when we arrived and they made their grand entrance. They had to run because there was a blizzard happening and it was a freezing 15 degrees at the time but it was still a grand entrance. It was pretty stinking cute. They all had a fun time. Emilee said they danced a lot and they had good snacks to eat.
Here we go! A new year of experiences, growing, changing, learning, and memories to add to our lives.
Emilee went to Arkansas for the last part of 2025 and spent a few days with her cousin Lizzy. They had a great time and loved getting to be together. She was with them for New Year Eve and we picked her up New Year Day. We hadn’t opened presents yet so when she got home we opened some with her. Our family pajama pants this year were Dr. Pepper pants. Some of us are very big fans of Dr. Pepper. And speaking of things that people are big fans of, Emilee is also a big fan of Bluey…the cartoon for preschool kids…but there is apparently a big following of middle school kids that love it too. She got a pair of Bluey pajama pants for Christmas and she got her dad a pair for Christmas so we had to get that on camera.
A few days after the New Year it was warm enough to practice shooting her bow so we went outside and used the new target she got for Christmas.
Matthew is now in his Black Out Year. It is a term missionaries use for the year of their mission that they are gone from home for the whole 365 days of the year. The crappy part of that is the definition I just gave you. The silver lining is when it is done it will be just a few more months until he comes home. He is doing really well. His Portuguese gets better everyday and he is learning and growing a lot. We are proud of him and excited for the opportunities he is having. He is missed a lot. We went to dinner the other night at Costa Vida where he used to work. He called us while we were there and talked to some of the people he used to work with which he thought was awesome. On the way there we made this video for him so he could hear one of his favorite songs and see some of the Kansas sunset. Allison was in the car with us but didn’t want to be in the video.
Allison is working hard at wrestling. She is doing early morning practices and spends most of her weekends at meets. The most recent meet at Blue Valley North West she took 3rd place. Here is a video of her at a match in Topeka.
Emilee is still doing her weekly riding lesson. She moved to a new barn this year. She is getting pretty good and comfortable on a horse. It is fun to watch her.
Our Christmas was a little different this year. Things had to be moved around and done in a different order or way than we had planned. It wasn’t very merry. But we all love and care for each other and we are all working on things that will hopefully help us have a more Merry Christmas next year.
Matthew is going to have to go through these pictures and label them with names and places when he gets home. He tells me about them when we talk on the phone but by the time I get the picture downloaded and on here, it is hard to remember all the details. These are more pictures of his time in Escada. The Bishop and his wife are really good at taking care of them it sounds like. They make sure they are fed each day. On Christmas and New Year Eve day they went to the Bishops. For Christmas Eve they went to another members house for a celebration. It looks like a beautiful area. They have Cana (I believe that is what he calls it) here. It is pure sugar water squeezed from sugar cane. Matthew-our soda addicted child- loves it and likes to stress me out by telling me it is healthy because it is ‘natural’ and even better than soda while he drinks a 24 ounce glass of it for dinner. I told him it is like getting hit by a truck or a car, it doesn’t really matter, neither is good for you.
We got to video call with him a lot on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and New Years Eve and Day. That was nice. I think he was a little lonely and home sick so I am glad he could spend a part of his day talking with us. Since he is three hours ahead of us we actually got to celebrate midnight with him on New Years. He watched a lot of fireworks from his apartment. They live on the third floor so they had a good view. Time zones are a weird thing. For three hours, he was not just three hours ahead of us he was in a different year than us. Isn’t that crazy?!
Matthew said there was a mini Zone Conference they went to in Recife this week. The current Mission President- President Martins and his wife will be done in July. The new President and a member of the seventy came to this meeting to introduce themselves and see some of the mission.
We are lucky to have a pretty good view of the sunrise and sunsets from our house. They are beautiful the whole year but this time of year seems to be extra vibrant and colorful. I came upstairs the other day and the whole upstairs floor of our house was a pretty pink color. I went outside and watched a gorgeous sunset. The pictures have a little more orange look to them, it was actually more pink, but they are still pretty.
This is a sunrise picture I took when I left for work. It gave everything a purple tinge. My camera doesn’t do it justice.
Allison had a meet for wrestling in Basehor. This wasn’t her best meet as far as winning her matches but I am impressed with her dedication to wrestling and how much time and effort she puts into it. It is fun to watch her and cheer her on.
I love Calvin and Hobbes comic strips. I have several books of them. Every few years I come across them and decide to read them again. I did that about a week ago. This one makes me laugh, and I remember reading it with Matthew when he was 6-7 and he thought it was hilarious too. I sent him a picture of it in his missionary photo album that our family has for him.
Emilee is still doing her riding lessons once a week. She is getting pretty good. She is still doing English riding style and does 1-1 1/2 foot jumps. I don’t know a lot about riding but I have been watching her enough to be able to tell who can ride a horse and who is sitting on a horse bouncing around. Emilee definitely looks like she is confident and knows how to work with the horse.
Since it is close to the end of the year my phone is putting collages together and showing me ‘a year in review’ or ‘people over the years’. It showed me this one of Allison and I thought it was pretty cute. She is a funny, sweet, fierce girl. I sure do love her.
Emilee has a Bluey (kids cartoon) shirt that she got this year and wears to school. It is a little bit of a thing for middle school and high school kids to wear/have items that are kids cartoon stuff. Allison has a Barbie lunch box, and Emilee likes Bluey. Matthew teases them both and gives them a hard time about it. We were Christmas shopping and Emilee found a big Bluey stuffed animal. She sent Matthew a picture and told him it would be on his bed for him when he got home.
This might be the last year I get a cute decorated Christmas list from Emilee, my other two already don’t do it anymore. So here is the list she gave me. My kids know they don’t get everything on their list but I like to have lots of ideas. They also know I don’t give living gifts but they still put them on their lists sometimes.
