The Story

YouTube link for mobile viewing

Merry Christmas!!

With love, the Burkeys

2 to 1

It's that time of year again!!  Remember this and this?  We had our third annual Gingerbread-House-Making-Contest!!  The score is now Andrew & Ann 2 vs. Tim & Kim 1.  Boo.  We had a ton of fun this year but were also very competitive.  We built walls out of our boxes so we wouldn't see what the other one was doing.  Andrew cheated.  A lot.  We also decided to eat our houses when we were all finished.  Not a good choice.  Definitely felt like we were eating chemicals.  Can't wait until next year!!

The walls.

The finished product:

I call this one "Creepy McCreep"

Decorating Andrew:

After Tim took a bite out of the roof:

Can't wait until 2011!!

Blue Screen of Death

Yep.  That's what we got a week ago.  Tim turned our computer on and got the "blue screen of death."  After a week of trying to fix it on his own and researching repair prices, we decided to get a brand new computer.  Praise the Lord for emergency funds and employee discounts!!   We should get our new computer in a few days.  This is our second computer to crash within two months.  No. Good.  Our old Honour Recital computer crashed [I think it crashed, it quit working, that's all I know] as soon as we moved into our new house.  [Too bad, there were some sweet little THR goodies on there that I was hoping to use as blackmail later in life  :) ]  Then I took back a computer that I gave to Bubba a few years ago.  That's the little stinker that just crashed.  Hopefully I'll be able to update you all soon, I have so much to blog about.  So many pictures to share.  Yay for being one week away from Christmast Eve!!!!

Santa Lucia

It's Saint Lucy's Day!!!!!  When I was younger, I always wanted to be the girl with the wreath at our church.  Ahhhhhh.... memories.  Next year I will be ahead of the game and we will celebrate and I will be making Lussekatt.  Tim has no idea what any of this is or what he is in for.  God Jul!!!

Marshall Field's 2010

Can you believe Christmas is two weeks away?!?!  Yikes!!  Last week we had our annual Marshall Field's trip in Chicago.  It was my first time driving a minivan downtown.  Again, yikes!!  Remember this...  2009, 2008, and 2007?  Here are some random pictures from my phone...

 I can't believe I'm driving a minivan.

 FRANGO MINT PIE

 The view from our tables

 A Christmas Tradition:   :)

 Burning off some energy

 The view from our parking spot

 My dinner date

S-U-C-C-E-S-S

This, my friends, is how you spell SUCCESS:

Just a little pecan surprise with some corn bread in the background for the homemade stuffing I made.  Ohhhhh yeah, both we're completed before 8:00 a.m.  Remember this?  And this?  I'm just getting better and better [at making one dish... ha!].  

Here are some more shots of our morning...

 We had our Thanksgiving routine... eat pecan surprise, watch the parade and read the newspaper..... Ahhhhh good times!

 Then we headed down to Indy and spent the afternoon with my family.  

Mr. Trouble never sat still.

 We all came back up to Northern Indiana for a few days.  Tim and his brother shopped on Black Friday.  I chilled at my parents with Amazon and these guys. 

 [totally creeping in on Ben]

I think Jeremy was yelling "TIMMMM" right when I took the shot above.  

They are buddies.  

Trouble making buddies.

  [borrowed this shot from Amy]

Hope you had an AMAZING Thanksgiving!!!

Happy Birthday, Ann!!!

 

You can thank me later ;)

Christmas Cards Can Save a Life

Are you sending Christmas cards out this year?? I was just blog hopping and remembered Angie telling us about the Christmas cards through The Rhema project, which is very close to our hearts.  Go here and save a life:  http://aquilavilla.wordpress.com/2010/11/01/christmas-cards-save-girls-lives/

Please and thank you.

:)

Tim Started the Fire

Last Saturday Tim and I burned all of the leaves that we had gathered into a pile during the leaf-falling-season week.  The plan was to bag them and send them off with our trash company.  We quickly discovered that we had way too many leaves.  So instead, we moved them over to the side of our yard and set them on fire!  At first, we followed our county laws [which I am still very unclear on - Mo any advice?!] and started burning them in the covered fire pit you see to the right of Tim.  But then our entire pile went up in flames; I guess it was a windy day and we had our pile to close the the pit.  To say I was freaking out would have been an understatement.  I had our fire extinguisher on my lap [that's right I was just sitting there, drugged up on cold medicine] and my phone ready to dial 911.  There was a time or two when I thought we should call the fire department, but Tim said he had everything under control [which he did].  In hindsight, I wonder what his reaction would have been if I had called for help without him knowing and all of the sudden fire trucks just showed up.  I can only imagine the look he would have given me.  He had everything under control [In the future I will chill - lesson learned] and now all of our leaves are gone, holler!    

This is about 1/4 of our leaves:

[side note - we only have 1 tree on our property that's not an evergreen]

 See all the blacked grass?  That was where our first pile was that went up in smoke.

Now you can see why I was freaking out, it was huge - plus it was a very windy day.

 This smelled so good!!

27 days of Giving

The Dave Ramsey 27 Days of Giving is back!!!  Start entering!!!

http://www.daveramsey.com/specials/christmas-giveaway/ 

November 5th

Write that date down.  That was the date of our first snowfall this winter.  Way. Too. Early.  Here's a picture of our house:

 Here are our plants & pumpkins... this looks so wrong.

 Of course, in Indiana fashion, here is a picture taken less than 48 hours later.

Nice and sunny, high around 60.

This is why I went straight from my flip flops to my Uggs and then back to my flip flops. 

:)

Knowledge is Power

I want this to be the next book I read: