Salutations from the Baxley family! Another year has flown by faster than ever. 2011 brought us a flurry of activity and some organized chaos. Here’s the annual update on the Baxley clan.
Nate continues his job at the Univ. of Illinois doing what he loves to do, developing websites for the LAS and Education departments. He’s still dabbling in a little woodworking and remains our on-call repair guy for our house plumbing, electrical, septic, and computer repairs. Sharon continues with her domestic goddess duties and mothering 6 children and keeping up the garden and orchard. Here she enslaves the kids with gardening tasks. (insert evil laugh here) No really, some of the kids seem to get into the gardening thing. Whatever goes and gets them to eat healthy. Sharon has plans to add more fruit trees to our orchard in 2012 so we can have a business selling produce when the kids are older and we can use the children as employees. (insert another evil laugh here.)
All the kids are doing great. Noah, 10; Marie, 8; and Calvin, 6, are all doing super in school this year. Molly, 5, is in pre-school a few mornings during the week. Dominic, 3 and Patrick, 21 months, are both hanging at home with mom and keeping her busy with potty training and diapers.
They all still love being outdoors whenever they can get out. The kids are still happy with our mega playset Nate and his dad built and it gets a lot of use. This year the kids themselves added a hay bale pile next to the tire swing and began a game to see how high they could swing from the pile.
We made a few nice improvements on our old farmhouse in September which included more insulation, new siding and new windows. The house doesn’t look too much different on the outside beyond taking the front porch roof off, but we can already tell a difference in the heating bills and there isn’t a breeze blowing through the inside.
Back in June we traded in the minivan for a Chevy 12 passenger van. So any money we’re saving on propane is spent on gas. But really, we do love it and it has lots of space to haul all of our family and extra people too. FYI: the van interior does hold at least 9 bales of straw alongside 6 kids and 2 adults.
Here’s a few more pictures from our 2011 year. Swimming in the pool out back, the Penfield tractor show and meeting Mr. Lincoln, Patrick’s 1st birthday, a trip to the beach on Lake Michigan with the Norths, and my favorite: Calvin dressed up as a storm trooper holding up Molly with a banana.
2011 brought lots of fun family times for us. We’re looking forward to 2012 and to more traveling and making memories together. God has truly been watching over us and has blessed us with 6 amazing, healthy, and happy children. We’re always here out in the country, life is quiet and slow (as slow as having 6 kids can get) so please stop in to say hello any time!
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Love hearing from you and seeing your wonderful family.