The Yoder's Visit and Penn State Game

Brian's parents and sister, Bethany, came over on Saturday. It's great living so close!
Grandpa did Natalie's hair. Beautiful!
"Hey! Where did everybody go?!"
Dinner together--actually the first time I'd ever cooked for them since we've always lived so far away. Everything turned out okay, so I think I passed. :)
Brian wore his Penn State jersey to be ready for the big game. Another advantage of having family so close is that they can watch the kids for us sometimes! Thanks so much!
Tailgating is a serious way of life around here... people go all out, spend all day (weekend!) and really get into it. Many stores are closed on game days, people wear Penn State clothes all week and you can practically feel the excitement. This was a night game, plus the first Big Ten game, so people had been out there all day and were really pumped up by the time we arrived. I've never seen anything quite like it!
Fuzzy of me, but you can see the miles and miles of cars, RVs, and tents.Practice before the game. It was a "White Out" and literally everyone was wearing white and people had white pompoms. It was so loud too-somewhere around 110,000 people in the stadium!

You can see the few Illinois fans in orange...they really stuck out. :)

People were cheering and yelling and chanting all night. We were both a little hoarse after the game! The video is right before the game: "We are... Penn State!"
The team coming out on the field.
You can see the "S" in the stands... pretty cool.

It was fun to take a break from school and unpacking and just be together. Love you honey. Thanks for getting me into football. I love sharing it with you.

We won 38-24. Still undefeated this week too. Yay!

After the game, another party starts as people head back to their spots. I don't know if you can make it out very well, but you could hardly see the end of the rows and rows of people. On our way home from church the next day, we could still see RVs parked in the fields.

Sitting on Bethany after church. :)
Lunch time.
Bethany and Linda getting in a little XBox before they headed home.
Ready for another day of football... Go Steelers! :)

Trip to see Katherine at Taylor

After 6 days of unpacking and setting up house, my mom and I took off with the kids for Taylor University in Indiana to see Katherine for parent's weekend. It was a long trip but we had a lot of fun and the kids actually did surprisingly well in the car (considering the longest road trip they'd ever been on in Hawaii was about an hour! :) It was great to see you Katherine and meet your friends and see your life at Taylor. Thanks for sharing it with us! Love you! Making the kids run around whenever we stopped.
We got there late Thursday night and all went straight to bed!
I went to chapel with Katherine Friday morning and then we all had lunch at the "DC" (dining commons) with her and some of her friends.

Sisters :)
Katherine bought them each a Taylor teddy bear and Blake a Taylor Nalgene to match the one she'd already given Natalie. Natalie calls it "Tebby" and sleeps with it every night. :)
We went to Outback for dinner with some of Kath's good friends on Friday night. Some fun in our hotel pool.
We went out to a Thai restaurant on Saturday night. Our cousin Maggie who also goes to Taylor came with us. I hadn't seen her since my brother Jonathan's wedding in 2006!Katherine's 21st birthday is this coming up this Monday so we had an early celebration at Baskin Robbins after dinner.
They had no forks... or plates... and it was rock solid, but finally they gave us a sharp knife and we used bowls and spoons. It's the thought that counts, right? :)


Maggie and Blake
Aunt Katherine and Natalie
Katherine goes to this great church called "God's House" and Natalie loved that it looks like a castle.

Lunch at Sonic (my first time, although I've heard so much about it!)

Thanks for the great weekend. It was so good to see you and Natalie hasn't stopped talking about you! Can't wait til Thanksgiving!

On the way home again... getting out some energy at Wendys. :)

Bye Grandma!

The kids (and I) were sad to see her go after being with her for 2 weeks straight. "It's kinda sad and lonely around here now... ... sure wish Grandma was here to play with us." "Guess we'll have to find something to do on our own...
... we'll just sit on TOP of the fort Mommy tried to make us. It's not the same as Grandmas."
I bought new bedding for Natalie's bed and the kids loved playing on the mattresses.

They had so much fun!

Where'd they go?
"I guess we can still have fun with just Mommy."

I know Brian is absent from all these pictures... he's alive. :) He's getting adjusted to classes and still glad to be a Penn State student. Especially since we're going to the game on Saturday night! Look for us on TV! We're super excited about the game and being together just us (the Yoder's are coming down for the weekend). And you'll get to see some pics of him in that post. :)