Summer sitters...

As most everyone knows, this summer I took the boys out of daycare again so that they can play at home. The neighbor girls - across the road - are watching them. Hannah watches them on M/W/F and her 2 younger sisters watch them together on T/R.

Day 1 I knew that I was in trouble when I got home and said "I Love You" to Owen and he replied "I Love Hannah!" Even on our trip to Kings Island when we woke up on Tuesday and I said we were heading home he said "Hannah!!!" Today it was very sweet ... I worked from home and I ran into the kitchen at lunch time and saw Owen on her lap on the couch just leaned against her chest singing. He really adores her.

Ben had his first official non-cousin sleepover last night. Well since he was old enough to want to have kids stay over anyway. His friend Justin got to stay w/us on a weeknight b/c his little brother got put in the hospital with a respiratory infection yesterday. Justin actually stayed with the boys all day today too - and he and Ben played great all day. I think it was actually EASIER on Hannah having them both! Justin was so happy to be staying that he was grinning from ear to ear when I put him down to sleep in Owen's bed last night. Ben, in his very best big boy voice siad "mom, we're going to need the radio" as I left his room. They were both very good boys and slept well all night!

Today they played outside, in the barn, upstairs, in the sprinkler, and in the sandpile. It was a fun day!

Well the boys are winding down their bath and I promised bubbles... so I'd better got on that. They never let me forget a promise that was made...

Jackson and Kaiser Family Reunions

We had two family reunions this weekend... both in Carlisle, both Dad's family. It was the Jackson reunion on Saturday. The boys and I went w/o Jason because he was working. On the way down Ben kept asking about the reunion. "Will there just be people sitting around and talking?" and "Will there be dancing?" I assured him that there would just be people sitting around and talking and that it was unlikely that we'd see dancing!

The Jackson reunion is a catered reunion -- so big plus that we don't have to make/take food! The way the morning was going, the boys and I would have never made it with food! We were at a small church - Indian Prarie - where several of the Jackson grandparents are buried. The boys did their best to have fun in the church fellowship hall, running up and down a ramp and playing with the play tools we sent. My brother Chris and I spent most of our time corralling them. It's hard to be a kid at a family reunion... I remember the misery myself!! Too much talking! Ha!

There was a photographer that got a large group photo. Amazingly the boys sat for several minutes for her on the front row. The last big reunion picture was in 1980 -- I was 7 and on the front row. Ben got a kick out of that. Anxious to see this next one... in 27 yrs!

After, we tried a few photos of our own. The Kaiser and Huff boys in our family...


Mom and Dad with their 3 grandsons.
At the end of the day, Kyle had a nice hug for Ben.
Uncle Chris and Ben rough-housed outside a bit...

After the reunion on Saturday the plan was for Ben to go home w/Mom and Dad and Owen to come back to Greencastle with me. Jonah was also going with Mom and Dad. Owen was convinced that he was too. He kept saying "go to papaws?" I told him that we were going home to have special time... play in the sprinklers, play outside. He kept saying that no, he wasn't going home, he was going to Papaw's!

Mom and Dad were encouraging me to send him with them, but Ben was pretty psyched about going without him! Finally the straw that broke the camel's back... Owen is all strapped into his car seat in my van. He is looking very sad and says "Ben go to Pappaw's? Jonah go to Pappaw's? Why me not go to Pappaw's?" I told him again of the fun that we were going to have, added in that we would see daddy, AND said... "there's not room in Grandma's car and she doesn't have a movie..."

His response after some delay of looking sad and sticking his lip out... "I sit Bama's (Grandma's) lap?"

So we got him out, set up the 3rd seat in their car, and sent him on his way with his cousins. Ben was complaining, but he got over it I guess. Jason and I decided to forgoe the plans to paint the porch and instead go to dinner and a movie since we had no boys! I think it was a fun night for everyone!

Sunday's Kaiser reunion was at Brad and Judy Page's house. They have grandkids, a big pole barn, tractors, kids toys and a sandpile, a gator, pony rides, and a pond. My boys would have stayed all day!

As soon as we got into the barn, Owen wanted to go outside. He had spied tractors and wanted to go "ride." We passed a gator and he got pretty excited.. but the tractors were the real draw. We sat on one for quite awhile while Jason, Jonah and Ben occupied a different tractor.

Ben quickly found a pedal tractor and went to town. Owen, at the time of this photo, was sitting on a "Dixie Chopper" which was his favorite place at the time (it was a different brand but I didn't confuse him with that).

Owen was almost too big for this battery operated 4-wheeler but he was determined to follow his cousin around in the pink Barbie jeep.Owen loves horses/ponies, but he was way too busy to stop for a ride. This is Kyle on the pony - my uncle chuck and cousin Brad walking with him. Owen was ready to jump in the pond when we arrived. After I explained that our plan was to stay out of the pond he started saying "too deep -- that pond is too deep!" Fortunately no one tested out the deepness... not the little boys anyway. Jonah was much more patient with the fishing than Ben was. And he was making up fish stories already. He may be a good fisherman!
Owen didn't make it out of the driveway before he was asleep. We went then and had dinner with Jason's parents and then back to pick up Jonah and give him a ride to his dad's house in Brazil. After such a long day it was pretty easy to get our two little ones to sleep... they were definitely worn out!!

Kings Island

This time last week we were loading up for our Kings Island trip. It wasn't a bad drive - we took a lot of dvds and Jason told the boys they'd have to take turns picking. We usually get about half way to Vincennes (45 mins) and there's a lot of complaining... but 2 hours into this trip we were still okay. The boys had very short naps (like 30 mins) on the way and then we hit "Boomerang Bay" - their water park. The water was freezing in most of the kiddie pools, but the boys didn't seem to notice. We really had to watch Owen because whereas Ben tries to stay in the safe spots, Owen gets himself into too deep water pretty quickly!

One of the favorite spots at the water park was in the kiddie pool that had fountains shooting up. Ben's obsessed with Ninja moves.. kicking and hitting, right now. He was punching and kicking the water that was shooting up. Then he'd stand on the fountain, effectively stopping it. Owen decided to try. He wasn't big enough to stop it with his foot, so he'd try to sit on it... usually missing the source of the water and falling right beside it. They had a great time.

Owen was up for the water slides... Ben wasn't sure at first, but ended up loving them. They also got a kick out of the wave pool... Ben was once again kicking and punching the waves. We left the pool at closing time on Sunday.

We stayed nearby at a Holiday Inn that was very nice and had a candy/cookie/ice cream shop just outside. We took the boys there for dessert and Owen was a terror the whole time we were in there. Hopefully it was just the lack of nap... we don't want a repeat of that scene again. Wow. Then we hit the hotel and bed... the boys slept from about 9:30 Sunday night to almost 9:30 Monday morning! They were definitely worn out. We arrived at Kings Island just before 11AM and stayed until they closed, of course. The favorite rides of the day were the Scooby Doo adventure (you're in a mystery machine shooting scooby ray guns at bad guy targets in a dark building), Diego jeeps, and for Ben... the "Beastie" rollercoaster (it's not named this way anymore - but that was the name when Jason and I were kids). Owen would ride the jeeps over and over saying "diego go go, diego go go!" He also waved to everyone as he rode around. Clearly he thought he was REALLY driving!

I went on the "Beastie" with Ben and fully expected that it would be his first and last ride on that coaster. As we went down the first big hill he was SHRIEKING and I thought that was it. Turns out that he loved it -- and went another time w/his dad. Jason said that as they were about to reach the top of the big hill he asked Ben "Is this where you put your hands up?" Ben replied "No, this is where you hold on REAL TIGHT!"

Owen did get a good nap in the stroller -- though he fought it pretty hard. We went on a pretty dull train ride and it did him in. The boys played games, ate a lot of junk food, spent more time in the water park, and ended the day eating hot dogs and watching fireworks. Oh and visiting the gift shop, of course. Jason had tried unsuccessfully (thankfully!) to win a giant (5-ft) Batman for the boys... so he spoiled them grandly with souvenirs to compensate for the Batman disappointment! Ha!

Tuesday before we left Cincinnati we stopped by the Bass Pro shops. Ben really loved the fish and live turtles in the aquarium. Owen loved the 4-wheelers. We could hardly pull him away. The boys also got a chance to shoot in the indoor shooting range... fun stuff!

I have a couple of pics of the boys headed into KI and then at the hotel and Bass Pro. We had a disposable in the park that is not yet developed, so I'll have to post those later...

Next stop in the amusement park tour... Holiday World in August!

Where to even start...

Since I've been having connectivity issues with our wireless account, I just haven't been posting. And then I got so far behind that I was discouraged about catching up! So I'm just going to start with this weekend... and maybe fill in behind later on. We'll see.

Owen had his second bday party last night. Not just for his #2 bday, but actually the SECOND #2 party. He was a real pro at blowing the candles out this time!

His original party was planned for June 7 - the Saturday of ALL the rain and flooding. Deciding against bringing the 20 kids we invited INSIDE, I called moms and dads and rescheduled for June 20. We decided to go ahead w/the family party on the 7th though...

John, Judy, Jana, Dave, and Laura rode up to Greencastle together. They got an early start and although we had to keep checking road closures (67 closed before they left Knox Co., 40 was closed for awhile on their way up, and 70 closed just as they got to Terre Haute), they made it up in under 4 hours. My mom and dad weren't as lucky... they were supposed to pick up the cake for Owen's party in Terre Haute and get some play sand from Lowe's for the sand and water table they bought Owen for his bday. They sat in traffic in TH and watched a nursing home/assisted living center evacuate by boat. The couldn't turn across the flooded median into Lowe's... so I said forget the sand. Then they tried SAMS for the cake... closed as well. Water was pouring into the front doors. They'd have turned back then but 41 actually closed behind them!! So they trudged ahead and ended up hitting Greencastle only to find that the sheriff had 231 blocked off and they couldn't enter town!! After taking the back roads they made it fine and we commenced party #1.

The backyard was FLOODED so the boys took full advantage and splashed around in the muddy waters. They smelled terrible! Owen esp loved swinging over the water. I'll post some pics here and the rest on FB. It was hilarious. Ben and Jonah were quick to join them but oddly, Justin (son of our friends Mark and Beth) would have nothing to do with it. Justin's the one that got Ben muddy awhile back and Ben STILL talks/gripes about it (apparently Justin made mud with dirt and water - go figure - then somehow put it on Ben or coerced Ben into the mixture??). Anyway, they were all quite a site!

Party #2 -- the friend party -- was last night. The kids were enjoying the playsets in the backyard and the multitude of riding toys on the basketball court. Then we pulled out the waterguns... we had 20+ little guns. First the little boys got involved... then the big boys. Dads were soaking the little ones. Brad (our neighbor) was dunking the little ones in the 52 degree water standing in the refill tub. It was quite a war. I changed clothes in the midst after being hosed down... Jason changed twice since his dry clothes had a way of attracting cups of water. Just when we thought it was all over, Brian Black dumped a cooler (1/4 full) of ice water on Brad. Round 2 of the big guy water fight is planned for later this summer. The little boys finished the fight soaked and shivering. Owen's teeth were chattering and his lips were a little blue when he finally agreed to get dried off!

After more playing - in the sand, of course -- so that all of the sand would stick to the wet clothes -- we had cake. Owen didn't get a cool cake for the first party since SAMS was closed. I took him to Walmart this week to pick one out... we flipped thru the cake book for almost an hour until he settled on a 4-wheeler cake. The icing was so thick ... pure sugar. We topped it off with ice cream and rootbeer floats and chocolate and marshmallows... no word yet from friends that tried to get their kids to actually sleep last night! Ha!

It was a good time. I think the dads enjoyed the party as much as the little ones did...

You're only two once. This party proved that you can act like it for many years to come though!!

More photos... http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=24002&l=73e45&id=518670535

Memorial Day... many posts behind!

We've been having some upload/download speed issues with our wireless connection, so I just haven't been able to do much with photos this last month. Jason's pc is good now -- so hopefully I'll catch up today.


Jonah spent the night last night. Ben's getting big enough that he has specific requirements about his guests. He asked last night that I take Owen into our bed and let him and Jonah stay in the two beds in his room. It was after 11PM when we got home anyway... so they were pretty much already asleep. This morning I heard Jonah in Ben's room saying IT IS TIME TO WAKE UP BEN! This pic was right after they got up...

Now we're playing outside. Jonah's on the trampoline and my boys are in the sandpile. Jonah has asked Ben several times already "why are you so bossy?" I remember bossing other kids just like Ben is ... but I am wondering how do I turn it off with him. Ugh!


We went to Bruceville and Vincennes for the weekend. It was a very busy weekend ... Jason wen to Vincennes on Friday night for Jonathan's graduation and then back later that night to Greencastle. We had soccer on Saturday morning and John and Judy and Laura came up for that. Then Laura, Ben, Owen and I headed for Bruceville with some shopping stops on the way and later, I took Laura home after dropping the boys off with my mom.


That night was bday dinner for Pappaw Kaiser... you can't see it in the photo but we had a "Transformers" bday cake. We also had curly straws and later, spray string! Grandpa ended up taking the spray string and turning it on the boys. Ben didn't like that as well.


Then the highlight of the day... playing in the dirt. We didn't play long in the morning b/c we had to get ready for Jonathan's graduation party. The boys had fun at the grad party (we met Jason there... he came down again on Sunday after church in Greencastle)... but got a little too hot. They are definitely not equipped for summer yet. Maybe Owen's hair needs cut... not sure that is going to happen anytime soon though! I enjoy it too much!

Later in the night it was back to play in the dirt. We had a "picnic" (took dinner to Dad in the fields -- and so we took some out for the boys first). Owen announced when we got there with food "I NOT eating!!" He did eventually eat of course -- he just didn't want to stop "working."



Oh and we also took a trip to visit a couple of cemetaries in Knox Co... to see the graves of Grandma Mengedoht and Grandma McCarter... as well as Grandma and Grandpa Kaiser at the Bruceville Cemetary. I had to keep reminding the boys that the tombstones were NOT for climbing.. but the trinkets on them made them think they were toys somehow. Hopefully other than the broken flag on Grandpa's site (which still had enough stick to poke back into the ground) we didn't leave any remnants of our visit. I remember going with Grandma Mengedoht and Aunt Mary Moore to the cemetary all the time as a little girl... to put flowers on the gravesites. This was a new experience for my kiddos though... so hopefully no one minded the rowdiness out there!

See the rest of the pics from May at:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=21656&l=45ea6&id=518670535

and

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=21649&l=46ea9&id=518670535

Owen loves Walmart!

While the average person cringes at the thought of venturing into a Walmart, my youngest LOVES the place. Everytime we drive by he starts on the Walmart requests, prompting Ben to ask me to find a new way home from the sitters!

So he's very used to me saying "no" when he asks to go to Walmart. This is the usual pattern. Today however, he went for a new approach.

Owen: "yes, walmart mommy. yes. go there. yes."
Me: "no, not today."
Owen: "please. please. please please please. please Mommy! yes walmart!"

I told him we'd go home, I'd change and we would go back. We went to Dollar General first though, and bought little trinkets there. I told him there'd be no Walmart if he got the 4-wheeler he wanted. He said okay.

On the way home from Dollar General it is necessary to drive past Walmart... "please please please Walmart again!"

I promised we'd go there tomorrow!

Greetings from the Huff Family... our Christmas newsletter from 2004!

I'm cleaning up my drives at work and came across this... I'm thinking, what do I do with this? It's electronic... I probably don't have a copy at home. Hey, I'll post it to my blog! So this is a step back in time... verbatim from Christmas 2004!

(note: Just noted that the pic is 1 yr after the newsletter... enjoy anyway - even though they don't "go" together!)

Greetings from the Huff Family!

It has been quite a year at our house… new baby, new house, new job (for Angela) and friends moving in to live with us! For certain, 2004 will be a year to remember!

As most of you probably know, baby Benjamin Stephen arrived three weeks early in February. Saying that Mom and Dad didn’t quite have things ready would be an understatement – no bed, no clothes – even the car seat was in Vincennes when we realized that the baby was coming. With lots of help from family and friends we finally got things together – the baby room was cleared out, painted and organized for baby Ben and we had just started getting the rest of the house back in order when…

April came along and Kathy Willer called me to tell me about a house for sale east of Greencastle. I told her the same thing that Jason did when she mentioned it to him days earlier – that we weren’t in the market for a house. As it turned out, Jason and I decided that it wouldn’t hurt to look at the place and the morning after we did, we made an offer. Impulse shopping at its greatest! We actually had to call my dad to come up and look at the place early on the morning that we made the offer to make sure that we weren’t buying the house from ‘The Money Pit!’

Boy packing and unpacking with a baby presents a whole new set of challenges. Jason and I have both moved a lot over the last 10 years and I have it down to a science. Everything wrapped, boxed and labeled well in advance of the move and unpacked and put away or hung within days of the actual move. Well not this time! When our moving crew arrived I was still throwing things into boxes – and unpacking… well I’m still working on that! We had so much work to do in the house as well – we pulled up carpet, scraped off wallpaper, painted, and cleaned and cleaned and cleaned! Fortunately we had great friends and family supporting us in these activities as well – and literally several members of my family came and stayed for days amidst the mess to make this all happen quickly before I had to go back to work in June…

I changed jobs within Lilly. Not a big deal to do this at Lilly but I’d been at the previous job for 7 years – so a lot of stuff to wrap up and hand off. I did get the new job lined out before I started back at work and set up the expectation that I’d be working from home 2 days a week. It’s been hectic – getting to work earlier than usual so that I can leave much earlier than I used to (no more 60+ hour weeks for me!), being on the road 2 hours a day when I drive in, and getting home in time to pick Ben up from the babysitter’s…

Though speaking of babysitters, we’ve been so blessed. We spent the summer with Kayla, a neighbor and friend from church, watching Ben at our house 3 or 4 days a week. My mom and dad come up at least once a week (versus the 2 times total that they came to my house in 2003) to spend the day taking care of Ben and Jason ‘s parents come regularly when they are in Indiana. After Kayla went back to school, another neighbor and friend from church, Hope, started watching Ben. She adores Ben and he loves her and her three kids. We couldn’t have asked for a better situation!

Backtracking to July – some friends of ours, Brad and Heather, bought the land next to us to build a house. They sold their house very quickly and due to constraints with Brad’s job, were limited on options for living while the house was built. They moved in with us during Putnam County fair week and will be continuing to live with us for at least a few more months while their house is constructed.

In August we started hosting a Home Fellowship Group in our home on Sunday nights. Now if you know my domestic skills (or lack thereof) – this is particularly interesting. I am not a great house cleaner or cook. While we do have pitch-ins to support the group of at least 12 adults and 4 kids under the age of 2, I am regularly cooking, baking and cleaning the house to make it presentable for this weekly activity. We love our HFG and love having our friends in our home so it is well worth it – but what a total change in habits for me!

Ben’s first Halloween and first Thanksgiving were great joys. We had a Harvest Party at church for Halloween (see pictures at: http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/babybenhuff/my_photos) and had friends and family at our house for our Thanksgiving celebration.

As the year comes to an end, we are getting into the routine of being parents, working full time and managing to keep on top of this house (2 ½ baths to clean – yikes!). We are loving every minute with Ben – he grows and changes daily! He’s jabbering – ‘dadadad’ all the time, ‘MOM!’ when he’s mad (among others), getting his first tooth, and is probably weeks if not days from walking. He started really pulling up on things during the week of Thanksgiving and has fallen countless times in his attempts to let go and walk since then. Oh and this week he started climbing STAIRS – yeah! He does have a bit of a temper, but also so much personality – he’s just a joy! It’s funny – this time last year I just never anticipated how life would change so much with a child – nor did I imagine how wonderful the whole experience would be! We’d love for you to experience Ben as he grows as well – so we setup the Yahoo! Photo album mentioned above and will post pictures there regularly for you to enjoy.

Well, I hope your experiences have been as amazing as ours this year and that the coming month, as we all celebrate the birth of Christ and a ring in a new year, will be joy-filled for you and your family. For everyone that we don’t see often enough – we keep you in our thoughts and hope that the coming year will bring us more opportunities to share our lives with one another. We’d love to hear from you – stop by, write, call or email us at (email) anytime!

With Our Love,
Jason, Angela and Ben



P.S. Better late than never? Just about the time the baby announcements came we were in the process of moving – so most of you don’t have one yet. I couldn’t let them go unsent forever, so I’ve enclosed an announcement for you. Also, some of you didn’t get thank you’s for baby gifts yet – please know that they didn’t go unappreciated – just didn’t get the spare moments to get them all out. I’ve enclosed some thank you notes for those previously missed as well.

Our Weekend... the first of May!

Saturday morning we had soccer again. Ben played well... kept up with the guys with the ball pretty well. It's funny, Ben is actually the 5th youngest on the team. Usually they start the 4 youngest on each team and his friend Scot, who is one week younger than him, goes out with that group. When that happens, Ben goes out with the bigger group and it's pretty hard for him to keep up with them. In fact, he usually just runs well behind them and doesn't worry about the ball too much. Saturday they started him in the youngest group. I didn't realize that he had even noticed if he started or not, but he was pretty excited when he came back out. Later, due to the rotation and getting a 9th kid in, both Ben and Scot ended up in the game with the 2 big boys on their team. Apparently deciding that they couldn't keep up, they were on the field holding hands! Melissa (Scot's mom) and I thought it was very sweet. The dads thought it was less cute that their 2 soccer players were walking down the field holding hands!

Owen wore a really cool shirt to church... under his jean jacket. It was mine when I was about his age. This pic is of both boys before we left for church...

This one is actually after church - we had to go to Rockville to pick up Jason's truck - that got worked on this week. The back of the shirt says "ANGELA" - Owen got a lot of attention at church for the shirt! One of my friends that had him in the nursery said that she was taking his jacket off and noted the name on the back... she said that she had to turn him around thinking "I thought I had Owen..." Jason had driven to chruch separately or I might not have gotten him there in a girl's shirt! He overheard Annie talking about the shirt and just shook his head!

I was changing the boys to go outside. I had Ben's shirt off - so he decided to do his "muscle" pose.

Then Owen wanted in on the action... this is his "muscle" pose!
Owen enjoyed being without his shirt! He thought he was very funny.
Ben strikes one last pose!
Owen usually won't wear a hat. I got one out thinking it would keep the hair out of his eyes... it did, and he wore it b/c his big brother was wearing a hat. While we were home for a couple of hours Sunday afternoon, we all worked in the yard. The boys enjoyed riding in the back of the truck.

Sunday night we had our last HFG meeting of the semester... the last one with childcare for awhile anyway. We (adults) roasted hot dogs, ate and talked while the kids were at their classes, then we brought them out to join in on the fun. The 2nd pic below gives you an idea of how many kids we have amongst us, but I should note that several families had already gone home during this time. They had a lot of fun running around and later, throwing things into the fire. The moms stood off to the side and tried not to watch as the dads allowed/encouraged the stick throwing!