Cutey Patootey

Halena and I got to babysit Jud while his mama and daddy went to see Billy Joel and Elton John in concert. We had so much fun and he has grown SO much since we saw him at Thanksgiving. We're thankful to see him more often!! He was smitten by Halena and wouldn't take his eyes off of her the whole evening. My sis and bro are doing a great job parenting. He was an angel for us.

We're Here!!!

Long delay in posting, so sorry about that!! It was a crazy few weeks of packing and then making the commute and getting settled in. We've been here since last Thursday and the kids arrived on Sunday night with Grammy :) We still have some boxes to unpack and LOTS of things to get rid of but we are loving it here!!! It's like being on vacation 24/7 ~ we're looking at it as a retreat with Jesus. The weather has been beautiful and thank God the wind doesn't blow hardly ever here:) Can't wait for our dear family and friends to have a get-away from everyday life and come spend some time with us!!

Here are the kids showing off their "treasures" from the lake (no pun intended - ha!) And a view of the lake from our back deck. We are on the cove so it's small and quiet back here. We are anxious to blog a little more regularly and keep you updated!

Crossing The Delaware

Our dear friends, The Henns, had the kids over one day last week so I could get some packing done. Tanya is the best teacher EVER!!! She gave the kids an assignment, but the catch was, they had to do the teaching!! They could pick any U.S. President and come up with the lesson. Here is what their five kids and our three came up with ;) Enjoy!!

It's Official.......

Well, we've been waiting to share our news on our blog until we had some more time to be sure and now we are sure.......we're moving!!!!!!!! We are excited, stressed, overwhelmed, thrilled, sad - all those things. God is good. We knew we would be needing to pick a new location for John to keep things going, as his company desires. We've been praying it would either be a location that puts us right in the middle of both our families or eight hours or less to mine. I really have the need to spoil my nephew :) God has answered our prayers and we're moving to PA. We will be 6 hours from Cincinnati, 2 hours from Pittsburgh, 4 1/2 hours from Washington DC (which is very high on our field trip list!!) and 5 hours from NY. So, it's good vacation spot. We expect some visitors. We are going to dearly miss our friends and family here just like we miss our family and friends from Cincinnati, here. God is good and is pulling this all together beautifully and we know He is faithful and has always provided. We are trusting him and can't wait to see what work He has for us to do there. We are busy packing and plan to be there by the end of the month so we may be absent on the blog for awhile :)

The Winnabego

Finally... a picture of the boy's car (forgive the picture quality but I think you'll get the idea). Hayden and Holten, and their good buddy, Silas decided to make a camper for their car at AWANA drive-in movie night. It was a real hit!

Happy Birthday to our Princess!

Our Princess turned 6! It's hard to believe we were sitting in the hospital with her in the special care nursery six years ago!!! Time really does fly when you're having fun :) She has looked forward to her day for...well, a year :)!!! On the evening of January 31st we tucked her in and said prayers and when we came out of the boys room from doing the same with them, I peeked in to see if she was asleep already and she looked at me with this big grin (the kind she has when she has PROBABLY done something she shouldn't have) and I said, "Did you do something you shouldn't have done?" She giggled and said, "No, I'm just so excited that tomorrow is February and that means I'm almost 6!" She had a great day. I won't post all the pictures, I probably post too many. (That's all I know how to do! ha!) Anyway, here's a before and after picture of our drama queen. She wanted to get her haircut for her birthday. We couldn't have Carey do it so we had my friend here, at the salon I go to, cut it. Her name is Steph and it was her birthday, too. It was a lot of fun.

The Princess Limo

The kiddos are starting to feel better and act more like themselves!! We thank Jesus for that!! We have a yearly art project around here and it is one of their AWANA events. The kids go to AWANA each week and they have a yearly event called "Drive-In Movie Night". The kids have to make cars out of cardboard and then they take them and sit in them and watch a movie. It's a big hit!! So, I decided that would become one of their major art projects of the year. Daddy and Mama can help with the car but the idea has to be theirs!!! Their creativity can really roll, no pun intended!! So, here is Halena with her dear friend, Lydia, in the "Princess Limo".

It's About Time

We aren't doing very well at this blogging thing, are we?!!! Our desire to keep family and friends updated might become a monthly thing ~ ha! ha! We had a wonderful Christmas and enjoyed having all of Daddy's family here. We're almost through January and there's a little girl in this house who is ANXIOUSLY looking forward to a birthday in February :) The boys get excited about their birthdays but you've never seen anything like the Princess and her sheer delight over turning a year older and all the discussions about "the day!!" We are celebrating as a family on her day and actually having a big party mid-February because Grammy, Auntie LA and Judson are flying out to party with us. We are counting down the days for their arrival.

The two youngest have been sick. Holt has had pneumonia for more than a week now. The first antibiotics didn't work so we've started his second round. Poor little guy has felt yucky for a long time. We anticipate the Lord's healing soon. Please pray for him to be 100% quickly, we would appreciate that. He did lose a front tooth last week and it's just precious.

Daddy will be wrapping up his role running the plant he built last year. We are excited for him to get back into the building role, which means a move for us and we're eagerly waiting for the full list of possibilities and praying for the Lord's will to lead us where He wants us to go.

We have so many friends that we're praying for. We praise God for answered prayer in healing and sustaining so many. Our friend Mary Jo had a great report from Mayo last week. Please continue to pray that God heals her TOTALLY of the cancer; Tangi has not gone into labor after falling when she was 23 weeks pregnant, pray that her hospital bed-rest would go quickly and she and baby would be healthy; Carey didn't have to have her baby too early and everything looks great, baby should come in late February. We pray for all of you and love you dearly!

Happy New Year 2009!

We want to thank all of our friends and family for being the BEST and we pray God's blessings over each of you for 2009!! We are ever grateful for His grace and mercies that are new everyday. We feel very blessed to have each of you in our lives. We thank Him for a healthy, safe and great 2008! One of our special blessings in 2008 was the birth of our nephew/cousin, Judson Paul!! We are crazy about him and enjoyed lots of trips back to Ohio to see him. Our love to each of you who read our blog in 2009! Hope to see you soon or that y'all can come visit us - we have plenty of room for guests :)

Almost 4 Days Left

Needless to say, the kids are counting down until Christmas Day here. Not just on our Advent calendars but in every conversation and action!! It's soooo much fun to listen to them and their excitement. I'm glad Jesus is at the center of each conversation, we're blessed in that. Each day there are new questions like: "what time was he born?" ; "was He really born on the 25th of December?" Those aren't easy questions and like many answers that we have to give the one that always satisfies them and is truth is this one: "there are so many things that we don't know about His birth and God can't wait to reveal all of that to us when we get to heaven, there's so many more things we will learn and get to ask there." We're excited to get to heaven and we're also excited to celebrate Jesus' birth that happened 2000+ years ago. He's the reason we get so giddy over giving each other presents because He is the greatest one we've EVER been given!! Here's some pics of happenings around here this month, enjoy!!!

Singing Time

Last night I had a music concert at the public school where I go to music classes at. I learned songs in different languages and how to sing in a round. My friend, Silas, and I sang a song and held the American Flag called, "You're A Grand 'Ole Flag". It was very fun!! Here is a picture of Silas and I during rehearsal.

9 days and counting........

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RuUpGDfyl7Q

Learning To Roof

While we were in Ohio there were some BAD winds in IA. And when we got home Holten and I went up to the woods only to find half of our "man-shed" (that's what my dad calls our shed) roof on the ground. So that night we told our dad when he got home........ two days later we got started working on repairing the roof. We went to Menards to get the supplies we needed and then we spent the day Saturday on top of the roof putting the new roof on. We learned how to use a chalk-line and how to use a wonder-bar. It was a lot of fun!!!!

Happy Fall/Halloween

From our Gladiator, Daniel Boone and Miss America

HFS (Handel Funniest Sayings)

Instead of AFV (America's Funniest Videos), which is a favorite show of our kids when they get a chance to watch TV, we are going to title our post HFS. So whenever it deals w/ a quote one of the kids make, that I really must put down somewhere so I don't forget, it will be called HFS. Thus the reason I should have started blogging years ago. Because when you have three, as close together as ours, the idea of finding a notebook where you journal that stuff is out of the question!!!! :) Anyway, back to the saying.

Halena and I went to the grocery store on Thursday evening to get some snacks for her K friends. Halena likes to talk A LOT but especially when she is with Mama or Daddy without her brothers along. So, it's imperative that you go ready to LISTEN!!! She told me how much she wants to go to Paris all the way to the store and that she really loves that city. Who knows? That's a whole other post in itself! On the way home she said, what year was I born? She answered on her own after speaking the question aloud. 2003. Then she said, "when was Holt born?" She also answered that one by herself. 2001. In her mind she made it work out that she was older than him really because the year she was born was higher than him (ending in 3 instead of 1) Oh, the struggle over being the baby :) Then she says, "now when was Hayden born?" She couldn't answer that one so I said, "1999". She looks at me and her mouth drops open and she says, "did they have cars then?" Guess I'm not teaching history too well!!

The Best Fall Sport

I played flag football this Fall. I was on a 1st/2nd grade team with my friend, Thomas. His dad was the coach. I played defense and I was the Left Guard. We won 5 games and lost 4. We got a trophy when the season was over!

Lovin' Fall/Harvest Time

We went to an amazing Pumpkin Patch outside of Omaha, NE. When our day was over, and we were driving home, we all decided we want to be pumpkin farmers :) The farm is 55 acres of just pumpkins. (The family has more acreage that someone else farms but they just do the pumpkins.) There are acres of things to do. We have been having beautiful weather here in IA for weeks. The day was perfect and what is better this time of year than caramel apples and hot cider!!! We rode a hay wagon down to the fields and each picked a pumpkin. Here are a few pictures to give you a glimpse of the day :)

Can You Believe We're Doing This?!!!!

The kids and I have been talking about starting a blog for awhile now. We thought it would be a good way for our family to know how we are and what we're up to on a more daily basis or as often as we would post (don't hold your breath:) So, since I'm clueless on how to do one our friend, Jessica, told me it was easy and I could do it. We usually rely on our friend, Coates, to do this type of thing for us, but since he's in Ohio and we're in Iowa, that wasn't going to work. We regularly read blogs: BeitCarr and Blue Ink, Medium Point and got inspired by them.

So, here you have our humble attempt to start blogging and posting pics of the Handel family. We pray it makes you smile and helps you have a glimpse into our busy world of being a tight-knit family striving to grow in our faith and share it with the world.