Winter Fun

The weather warmed up a little last week so I bundled Elijah up and got a few pictures in the snow. Ethan and Amelia are pretty tough in the cold weather. They enjoy sledding down the snow pile Mark made. Ethan was sweet enough to pull Amelia around the yard on the sled too.

Elijah not so sure about the cold snow.

Looking cute in his snow gear.

Mark making a pile of snow for the kids. He's so thankful for his skidloader with a cab with heat!

The kids playing on the hill a few days later, after it warmed up a bit.

Ethan loves "his" new sled that "he" got for Christmas. The sled was a family gift that he claimed as his own. :)

Amelia on top of the mountain.

San Antonio

I'm finally blogging the rest of our San Antonio pictures. The last two days there we had a chance to do a little sight seeing. Lots of touristy stuff was close to our hotel so we were able to walk to several spots. On our final day a group of us rented a van to tour the TX countryside.

Mark and I went up this 750 ft. observation tower. It was a little scary, but we enjoyed looking at the city. After seeing rows houses and all the business that comes with big city living I'm thankful to live on a farm!

The Alamo was close to the hotel so we quickly checked it out between meetings.

Our group had breakfast in a little town near San Antonio.

They had saddles for bar stools.

I wanted to ride a horse on our day away. Jody spotted this guy (a life sized rocking horse complete with a saddle) in front of a store, so this was my TX horse riding experience. :)

We visited a cave called The Cave Without a Name. It was pretty cool going down 150 feet under the ground. It was 70 degrees, humid and had two bats.

The area we drove through was the heart of Texas wine country. So we made a couple stops at local wineries (the one pictured above was in an old barn). We also saw several peach trees and lavender fields.

This was Luckenbach, TX a little tourist stop.

We ended our day at a fondue restaurant. Something none of us had ever done before.

I thought I would take a picture of our dining experience. Each couple got a huge plate of bite sized pieces of meat to cook in the fondue oil or broth. Unfourtantly I took the picture at the end of the meal, but you get the idea. It was a fun way to end our trip together! We look forward to Washington DC next March!

San Antonio Day 2

Our second day in San Antonio was spent mainly doing FB stuff. We watched the YF&R Discussion Meets to cheer on our Iowa winner, Matt. He did a great job and made it to the sweet 16 (one of the top 16 contestants in the country). We also spent time at the trade show gathering lots of freebies for the kids. :) That evening we meet up for dinner and joined a group from Florida. It was so fun to learn about their operations and what it takes to farm in the south. For example, a good corn yield down there is 100bu./acre while 50bu./acre is more typical. They don't have much for row crops in FL for good reason! Also I wouldn't like to deal with alligators biting my cows or eating my cow dog!

Our group looking official in our snazzy new shirts!

We ate at Dick's Last Resort for supper. This is a restaurant were the waiters are sassy to you and you are sassy back.

This is what they do to you if you have a birthday. Poor girl! It wasn't even her birthday and she still had to where the hat!

If you ask for a napkin this is what you get.

Group shot.

San Antonio - Day 1

Last week Mark and I went to San Antonio, TX for the Farm Bureau Annual Meeting. We went with the other second year YF & R committee members a two Young Farmer contest winners. We always have a great time with these couples and it was so fun to get to know them better! Here are a few pictures of the trip.

This was the view from our hotel room. It over looked the Riverwalk, a tourist attraction in San Antonio. The Riverwalk is full of restaurants, shops and other "tourist traps". We ate most of our meals in this area and enjoyed walking around seeing all there is to see. Our first night there we ate with Schuiteman's at Boudro's restaurant outdoors! Yes it was cold but the restaurant gave us parkas to wear and some of the tables had heaters to keep warm. We sat right next to the water and a duck. :)

Another view from our hotel. I was happy that across the street was a mall. I'm not much of a shopper but I left my coat on the airplane and it was nice to be able to get another instead of wearing Mark's all week!

We met up with the others and went to Cowboy's Dance Hall. Mark and I don't dance but we enjoyed people watching! :) This place was huge! It not only had a dance hall, but also a bull riding arena, live bands and a mechanical bull ect...

This is Mark riding the bull. He made it longer than 8 seconds! :) I have a video of his ride but it won't load, maybe I'll be able to post it later. This wraps up day one in TX.

Amelia's new look!

Amelia and I got our hair cut on Wednesday. I was debating whether or not to grow out her bangs. After talking to two stylists I decided to go ahead and grow out her bangs. The gal cutting Amelia's hair suggested cutting the back shorter so it would blend better. I agreed and said cut it just below her shoulders. When she came over to me 15 minutes later her hair was to cut to her chin! I like it but it's a lot more work than I anticipated so I'm not sure how long we will keep this cut.

Boender Christmas

Our final Christmas gathering was with Mark's family. Jan makes an awesome primerib and we all eat as much as we can! Mark's brother Mike spent some time putting together a slideshow of old family pictures on the computer for us to watch. And the kids could hardly wait to open gifts!

Hopefully next year the cabin will be finished so Grandma & Grandpa won't have to sit with the grandkids. :)

Amelia opening her gift.

Elijah got lots of help opening his presents.

Ethan, Gideon & Cody all got bow & arrows for Christmas!

We had the Ferguson Christmas last Sunday. The family continues to grow so we had our lunch in the shop at Mark's parents house. It was toasty warm and had lots of space for kids to run and ride bike.

I wasn't kidding when I said the family continues to grow! :)

Our family
The boy table. (this is only part of them)

The girl table. (Eden & Eliza were napping). Girls are a little slim in our family. Maybe Brian & Becky will help even things out with their next baby. :)