Look Who is in the Local Paper

Noah's basketball team participated in a Coaches vs. Cancer basketball game two weeks ago. Although the boys lost they game they were able to help raise more than $1200 for the American Cancer Society. The hospital had a booth with helpful information about cancer treatments and prevention. The local Relay for Life committee also had a booth with information about Arlington's Relay for Life event in June. I have been a relay captain for three years now. My teams have raised more than $5000. We are hoping to raise $2500 more this year. If you would like to see the slideshow of the pictures from the game please visit the following website. Noah is in several of them (he is in the center of the photo below).

http://www.arlingtontimes.com/sports/

January Birthdays: Mom, Dad, Alyssa

Last weekend Mom, Dad, and Alyssa came to our house to celebrate their January birthdays. Dad on the 21st, Mom on the 23rd, and Alyssa's birthday is the 30th. The weekend started with Noah's game at Lake Stevens Friday night. Noah plays JV and varsity. The JV team won, but unfortunately the varsity lost.

On Saturday while Noah was at practice the rest of us went shopping so Alyssa could spend her birthday money. Then Saturday night we had a delicious seafood dinner at the Anthony's in Anacortes followed by DQ ice cream cake at home with the neighbor girls.

Snow Day #2

Noah had Bradey and Shawn come over today to hang out, play video games, and go sledding.
They decided that the sled needed help to go faster so Noah brought out the WD40. After Shawn got them started down the hill he jumped on and all three boys went flying down the hill. I am going to make a big pot of pasta for dinner, and the boys plan on watching NBA games and raiding my snack cupboard. Once their clothes dry they might venture out again but I think they're in for the night.


I felt sorry for the poor birds yesterday so when Noah and I ventured out to the store I stopped at the local farm supply outlet and bought more seed and suet. Since I hung the feeders we have had lots of birds in the backyard. However, these birds look very well fed. They must be hitting other yards too.

January Snow

Tipper's first snow. He was more interested in coming inside to sleep on his chair rather than wrestle with Boo in the yard.

Most of yesterday we had no more than a dusting of snow. It looked like powdered sugar all over everything. By late afternoon the temperature had risen to 37 degrees and we were just wet here at our house near the water. However, just a few miles inland snow was around all day. When we went to bed last night several schools in the area had already canceled classes for today. My district chose to wait till morning. I woke up at 3:30 this morning and took a peek out the window and saw nothing but green grass in the front yard. But by 5:30 when Forrest's alarm went off the ground was covered, and by 5:45 I received my call that school was closed. Noah's basketball game is canceled for tonight, but the boys are practicing if they can make it to school safely at 11:00 AM. We let Noah drive a bit in the slushy slick stuff yesterday. Maybe I'll give him another driving lesson today after practice. Thank goodness for all wheel drive. Here are a few pictures of our beautiful snowy neighborhood.

December 2011

Here's the year end wrap up. December has been a very busy month. Between practices and games Noah has basketball 6 days a week. Alyssa finished her finals early and has been home since Dec. 5th. She doesn't not return to college until the 7th of January and her classes resume on the 9th.

On Christmas Eve we got together with our neighbors, the Collins family. The kids exchanged gifts and we enjoyed a yummy fondue dinner.

We had another Christmas celebration with the Lewis family with more gifts and Erin's yummy cheeseburger soup.


Our tree was on the small side this year since we chose to put it in front of the window so it could be enjoyed by the neighbors rather than placing it in the center of the room to take advantage of the vaulted ceiling height.Noah and Alyssa collaborated on the decorating of the sugar cookies.

Noah scores on a team from Vancouver, WA during Christmas break. Alyssa's long break will allow her to see 10 of Noah's games. She is the surrogate big sister of Noah's friends. 2011 ended with a grand party at the Bryson compound. Noah didn't sleep at all and has been dozing off and on all afternoon. I hope to do a better job keeping my blog up to date in 2012.

Basketball Season Starts

The basketball season started this past weekend with the Garfield High Jamboree. Noah got to suit up with varsity. He even got to play for a few minutes in the first game against O'Dea. These are the only photos we took during Thanksgiving weekend. We completely forgot to get the camera out on Thanksgiving Day. We didn't even get our Christmas card photo taken. Here Alyssa poses with her real brother and her surrogate little brothers, Kaleb and Shawn.

Noah listens intently during a time-out.

Since he's only a sophomore sitting on the bench during varsity games will be the norm. Most of his playing time will be when he plays JV. Noah was so excited to get into the game and play his first varsity minutes. He didn't even remember touching the ball till he saw this photo. He did well. He didn't turn the ball over, he made good passes, and he played solid defense. The regular season starts tomorrow. Good luck Eagles!

Good Bye Alexander

Our four weeks with Alexander flew by. I don't know if Noah's German or Alexander's English really improved much, but the boys did become good friends. Noah and his friends were very welcoming, and Alex was just part of their group. He went to football games, Homecoming, the Absolute Air Park (a warehouse filled with trampolines, Noah's fall league basketball games, and he had his first experience trick-or-treating. Alexander got the full Halloween experience by going to the pumpkin patch to choose his own pumpkin. Unfortunately his was so hard he had to borrow a small handsaw from Forrest so he could carve it. We also took Alexander to our friend's huge haunted house in downtown Seattle. He didn't seem to like it much. I didn't either. I did like the part where our friend who owns the haunted house business let us go behind the scenes for a special tour. Before his trip to the U.S. Alex had only played Xbox once. As you can see by the photo he loves it. Alexander and Forrest share a love of race cars so Forrest bought a racing game for the Xbox, and all three of my boys love it. Alexander flew home four days ago. His trip home took 25 hours (including a 4 hour layover in New York). I hope that we will be able to visit him sometime in Stuttgart, and we told him that he always has a place to stay with us if he ever comes to Washington again.