Trip to Ohio

As we turn to the next page in our lives we are not sure where we are headed. Monica is currently looking into a few PhD programs across the country. Rob and Monica took a quick trip to Ohio to interview and enjoyed the trip and sight seeing. It is a huge city and a beautiful college campus. Right now our list of prospective programs include Ohio, Oregon and Iowa so we will keep you updated. The "SHOE" at Ohio state is amazing and it was way cold there! While we were there Monica was able to see a very good friend Robin that she use to work with when she worked for Monsanto it was so fun to see her and her family! Dr. Birkenholz and his wife Pam were great host and made us feel right at home! Grandma Kay came and stayed with the kids a great way to spend her first week of retirement - she did great, the kids loved it and we appreciated it so much!

Vegas - Menaw's Retirement

One of the most exciting parts of our Christmas break was a quick trip to Las Vegas to surprise Rob's mother Kay with a retirement party. She retired on 12/31/08 after 42 years of working for the government. She has done her time and deserves a break! All of Rob's family was able to join us and Ray was a major part of pulling off the surprise. We surprised her at a restaurant for dinner and then bombarded her house with grand kids and hungry people for 3 days! She loved every minute of it!! She said it was a fitting way to end her career - she started her career for her family and ended her career for her family! She now has a full-time grandchild babysitting job as she flies from state to state to visit us! We also attempted family pictures while we were all together (minus Adam - we missed him dearly!) that was an adventure! Congratulations Kay! The grandkids enjoyed eachother and of course we headed to the fun park race track and the big boys had more fun then the little ones. Our niece Jana got engaged over Christmas and her fiance Rick joined the entire family for a few days - we hope he still wants to marry her!!

Christmas Memories

I thought I better get an update on all of the exciting things we did over the holidays! We had a wonderful Christmas in Benson, the kids were in our church nativiy presentation Casey was Joseph and had an awesome costume! Jaynee was a beautiful singing angel. Tyler our nephew was able to join us for Christmas. We spent Christmas morning at home and then headed to Payson to see Monica's family. We enjoyed time with Grandpa & Grandma, Curtis & his family. Garrett our great-nephew was the center of attention and so fun to love and be around! Sorry for all the slide show I just love to share so many pictures and it is the best way, ENJOY!