Christmas Preparations

Some fond memories of the 2010 Christmas year would be:

Decorating the tree, after Donna rescued it from toppling over. Darol would like to blame it on the fact that he let let Jonathan drill the hole in the tree for the stake this year. But the fact is that Darol started the hole, and Jonathan just finished it. It was ultimately unsafe, and Donna had to come through by buying a new stand that would hold it in place. Then the decorators were able to get to business.

With the yearly present to friends of buckeyes, Donna had to give up on her motto, “Presentation is Everything” this year when 4 of the 5 children helped roll and dip our traditional buckeyes. Now she goes for the experience and memory of making them with the whole family. They may look mangled, but they do still taste yummie!

Thanksgiving at the Elliott's

Thanksgiving this year was with the Elliott side of the family.

This means many things - one of them being the usual, delicious deep fried turkey by GrandDaddy Elliott...

...and sweet potato casserole from GrandMommy Elliott

...and good times for all the cousins, who even get along during the mandatory picture time

Donna doesn't like it when people ask who is older, as she wishes it were obvious it were her older brother, Todd.

JET Turns 11

We celebrated Jonathan's Big #11 birthday.

Levi wasn't quite so sure about the "fire", and wanted to keep his distance.

Jonathan loves a lot of things, but one of his favorites would be brothers and sisters.



Other fond memories of ours through his eleven years would be his tender heart for animals and babies, his love for nature and being outside (catching bugs, lizards and snakes), many years of soccer and baseball, climbing fourteeners, a caring big brother, loyal friend, hard worker, competitives, loves his family, and one who is much loved by his family in return. Jonathan, we're thankful for you!!

Timber Team Trip to Pawley's Island

Darol had work in Georgetown, SC.  The family was able to go along and stay in Pawley's Island. 

The water was way too cold for the adults to get in it, but the children didn't seem to mind.





It was also a nice trip in that it gave Donna some time to see a friend and a cousin who live in that area.

Timber Wallclimbers

Don't have much to say other than the children like to climb the doorways.

I guess this is a homemade Crossfit exercise that they have created!

Sky Top Apples and Hendersonville Apple Festival

We made our almost annual trip to Sky Top Apple Orchard and stayed the weekend with Pops and Mimi, Darol's parents.  The children enjoy the time picking our own apples.

We went early in the year, so they didn't have our favorite types of apples ready to pick (Cameo and Pink Lady), but they did have the next best thing on hand - apple donuts!  :-)

Here's a smile to say "thanks for the time off from school to do this!"

The whole weekend was part of a festival in Hendersonville. 

Donna, and all the children except Levi took part in a road race.  Jonathan won the 1 mile fun run - his first win ever in a race.  Good job, JET!

Elizabeth had a good race and finished around 5th place, 

  with Benjamin right behind her.

Abigail even made it the whole way without stopping.

Good Times with Wally

It all started with a near catastrophe one day when we were dragging Donna's parents' trailer hitched to our van.  Darol did not put it in our correctly so it wrenched loose about 2 miles from our house.  We made an immediate stop on the side of the road to check the situation. 

Donna met the owner of the home in whose yard we had stopped.  It belonged to a 92 year old man named Wally Massey, and his wife Sue.  They let us leave the trailer with them for a few days untiil we could get things fixed. 

That was the beginning of a wonderful year of ministry by our family, mainly by Donna, to this precious couple.  The children did yard work for them, Donna took them meals and helped with household organization and we grew close to them.  Sue has since died, and Wally has had to move to the home of a brother-in-law in DC.  Donna helped a lot with his move and organizing that.  We love Wally and miss him very much.

Timbers Trip to Colorado 2010

So here is our first shot at commencing with the blogging...time to catch up with the times.

We had a great time on our vacation to Colorado.  It was a great family time.  We'll let the pictures do the talking on this one. 

We spent our first several days in Colorado Springs.   This shot was from a visit to the Olympic Training Center.  Wouldn't it be nice to have a future Olympian?

One of our favorite things to do is go on hikes. Abigail and Benjamin enjoyed this short family hike.

Jonathan and Darol completed 2 fourteener's - Mt. Belford and Mt. Oxford.  We got "2 for the price of 3", as we had to ascend Belford twice.  Jonathan did a great job.  That gives him 5 14'ers, and Darol 16.  For the trail route description, see

 http://www.14ers.com/routemain.php?route=belf1&peak=Mt.+Belford+and+Mt.+Oxford.

Here we are at the peak of Mt. Oxford. 

Here we are in Frisco, one of the nicest towns anywhere.

Finally, here we are at Cirque Meado, on the way up to Emmaline Lake, one of Donna's favorite hikes.  Abigail made it the whole way up without being carried at all (5+ miles up).  On the way down, Donna, Darol, Jonathan and Elizabeth all took turns carrying her.  It made for a total of 11 miles on the hike, and Pops and Mimi were about to send out the rangers to find out where we were!  ;-)