Jenni and Jim--the parents

This was a good year for us. I filled my time this year doing lots of Lego building. We inherited Jim's old Lego blocks from when he was a kid and we have added several sets of our own. It makes a great big pile that mostly gets cleaned up and only some of the clear pieces get sucked up in the vaccuum.

I also completed my Master Gardener training this year by doing lots of volunteer work at local parks, the fair, and the county plant sale. I also attended the state confrence at Purdue and learned enough about weeds and identification that I am a wealth of knowledge when driving down back roads.

My other activities this year include lots of volunteering at the kids' schools, being the family shuttle driver, head chef, house cleaner, gardener, food preserver, baker, and family blogger. I did manage to squeeze in some time for fun during trips to Washington DC, Purdue football games, a John Melloncamp concert and I met the famous Mollie Busta of the Big Joe Polka Show fame. I also spent a fair amount of time at the neighborhood pool hanging out, getting tan, and chatting with all the other moms.

Jim also had a banner year. In early Febuary, he started training for the Indianapolis 500 festival mini marathon. He ran on the first weekend of May and completed his 13.1 miles in just under 2 hours. And didn't even hurt himself! Jim continues to work for Beckman Coulter and makes trips up to Chaska, MN and Boston about every 3 weeks. He's also been filling in the role as assistant scientist to Evie as she completes her many science experiments.

We celebrated our 12th Anniversary this year. Since the kids have been born, we haven't been able to do that big trip that normally comes around Anniversary 10. This was the year. Jim cashed in his frequent flier miles and we went to Europe for 12 days!

Conviently, we were in Munnich for the original Oktoberfest and it was every bit as fun as you would imagine it.

There were these great big pretzels to go with the great big beers.

We also visited Paris to see Laura and Jean Marc, Jim's sister and her husband. We took in all the sites, ate anything that looked good, drank lots of wine and relaxed. We didn't even miss the kids too much until the day before we returned home.

We are looking forward to 2011 and hoping for a nice healthy year for our family and friends. I plan to join Jim in running the Mini Marathon and we hope to get a family vacation in as well as trips to visit our far flung family and friends.

Have a great Holiday season! Thanks for checking in on us!