These Wonderful Things are the Things We Remember all through our Lives

Well that was a quick week! Even though the first half of the week seemed to drag, the second half streaked by us and now we’ll staring down Christmas week. The kids are so excited and fight over who gets to move the reindeer (on our seasonal calendar) to the next day when they wake up. Actually, I can’t complain since this is the only month where I don’t have any struggle getting them up in the morning! Last Sunday, Matt had a band performance out at the high school. They had a Christmas concert. The 8th grade played three songs: Elves Dance, Away in a Manger & Christmastime in Russia. The band sounded much tighter than last year. Matt sounded great on the drums, although he did have his professionalism tested in the final song. Matt did not get to bring his drum kit from the junior high; instead they used the choir kit. Not only did it have a ripped bass drum, but also had no attachments to hold the triangle or ratchet he also had to play. When he went to set them down on an easel, they fell – making a loud racket. To his credit, he kept his cool, picked them up as he needed them and then placed them back on the easel…where they fell yet again. He was a little flustered, but kept the rhythm and never missed a beat!! 🙂

Later that night, we worked on Science Fair experiments for both Matt (who expanded on last year’s earthquake scenario) and Abby (who tested Matt’s findings from last year). Ann helped Matt with his presentation board and it looked fabulous as always…

On Monday, Abby & Ann went to dance class for the final time in 2009. They will have the holidays off and pick it back up next year. That night, the boys and Gigi went down to her basement and began digging out plastic bins for us to box up some old clothes at home. While we were down there, Gigi found a box of old pictures from Ann’s youth. We hit the jackpot!! I ended up brining home the whole box and scanned in about 250 pictures of Ann and her family. There are some great ones!! You can look forward to seeing them alongside the ones that Mom gave me over the next year in the Waybac feature! Matt had the week off from wrestling, much to his liking. I think he was ready for a short break away from everything. He hasn’t stopped participating in sports in nearly two years, so he was due for a rest. I got to travel – both on Monday & Wednesday – down to the Louisville / Clarksville area to visit a couple facilities that are going through a Joint Commission survey. It was pretty cool to see it from the other side and just be a fly on the wall. Here is our fifth and final version of Elfing Ourselves:

On Tuesday, Matt had pep band practice. That night, Sandy showed us her new camera. She purchased a very, very nice Nikon SLR. She took a few pictures while we were there that were pretty cool for just being off the cuff…

On Wednesday, we received a bunch of Christmas cards from friends (Paul & Dayla Drake – their boys are getting so big & Brooke is so grown up and pretty…and looks a LOT like her momma – and Corey & Dawnan Hopkins – their daughters are adorable) as well as family (Keith & Rosie)…

On Thursday, Ann had a Secret Santa breakfast party with her gals and that evening, we attended my company’s management Christmas party at my boss’ beautiful home in Tipton Lakes in Columbus. There are pictures from that night that I hope to get and post here at some point. That night, my cousin David sent me a nice email with their version of a year-end wrap-up. This year, it was done by his daughter, Monica. I have included their montage from that newsletter. Matt and I were pissed that ComCrap took away our NFL network, but thankfully the Colts were carried on the local Fox network affiliate. They maintained their records being undefeated this year (14-0) as well as the amount of straight wins in the regular season (23-0).

On Friday, Lukey was in the newspaper (along with his class)…well, his letter to Santa was in the paper that is! He is so sweet… Tonia, Ann’s friend from work, also sent us pictures from their Christmas party at the Garage Pub & Grill. Thanks Tonia!

On Saturday, we woke up to our first significant amount of snowfall. This was Molly’s first experience with snow and she was a riot!! Lola enjoyed it just as much and the two of them tore through the yard like never before! They were a sight to see. 😛 The kids joined them and quickly started up a snowball fight. The dogs and kids loved running around outside…until they got too cold. They came in and threw their clothes in the dryer, put on jammies and grabbed a tall cup of hot chocolate. We were again very upset with ComCrap, as we missed the Cowboys / Saints game that night. My Cowboys upset the undefeated Saints (one of Matt’s favorites) in a game I could only see the highlights of…). We were hoping Drew Brees had a good game (Purdue alum), which he did. We did, however, get to watch the Purdue (#4 in the nation, baby!!) vs. Ball State basketball game. It wasn’t even close, as the Boilers blew them away by 20 points. Barney and his boys went to the game, along with Lindsey and her boyfriend. They said the Conseco Fieldhouse was nearly empty for this intrastate matchup.

On Sunday, we were up early to hit the highway and head up to Lafayette. We got up to Dad & Barb’s house, only to find their road closed. We found a way around finally and asked what was up with that amount of construction that far out in the boondocks. Apparently, they are rerouting highway 26, calling it the Hoosier Heartland Corridor, set to complete in 2013. It will bring four-lane transportation from Lafayette to Fort Wayne. It sounds like a nice alternative to the current highway 26, but is a shame it is running so close to Dad & Barb’s neighborhood of pristine wilderness. It was great spending time with them and the kids loved playing with their dog, Tater. It was only the second time we’ve seen them this year (Granny’s funeral was the other). We enjoyed catching up, eating brunch (her egg casserole is the best I’ve had) and exploring their wooded land. The kids followed dear tracks, trying to catch a glimpse of the elusive, gentle, herbivores. We saw a herd of them venture up from their path, so they had to come within a few feet of them and never even saw them! We later saw a couple more that came up and ate near the house. When Luke caught his first glimpse of them he exclaimed, “Ooh! Deer jerky!!!??? 🙂 I was outside filming when he yelled that from inside the house. I chuckled so loud, I actually scared them away. It was so funny…you can see it in the clip collage video below. We opened presents and headed over to John & June’s for our annual family reunion / Scheumann Christmas party. Before we left, Matt took a sticker off his new Purdue sweatshirt and put on Grandpa Scheu that read, “Touch Me…I’m Heavenly.” 😛 He got such a kick out of it that he wore it the entire afternoon…

It was a smaller party this year. Obviously, we were missing Granny. Also missing this year were Aunt Sue (stayed in Texas), Billy & Blancha (apparently Billy no longer ‘does’ Xmas), Jackie & Clint, Cathy & Tom (snowed-in down in North Carolina), David & Becky (North Carolina), Jason & Erica, Aunt Mary & Bob and Steven. Making the venture this year was Vickie, Daniel (freshman at Purdue) & Seth; Chuck (a few weeks removed from open heart surgery – so no wrestling with Luke) & Cindy; Dad, Barb & our family; Sally & Scottie (looks great!), Chris (who just got out of hospital with kidney stone…we teased him about needing to drink more beer to alleviate that issue in the future!) and 3 outta 4 of his kiddos (Conner, Jack & Carson); of course John & June; Barney, Steph, Haley (freshman at ISU), Nick & Ryan; Kimmy (Chuck nor any of his boys showed up) and her two little ones, Braden (now 2) and her newest – Gaven, who is 2 months. He is precious. I had to hold / rock him to sleep just to see if I still had ‘it.’ 😛 He was such a good baby… Lindsey was up from North Carolina, where she is teaching 4th grade; and good old Uncle Ed and Aunt Judy were there as well. We enjoyed a catered lunch from John’s newest golf course (Coyote Crossing). We loved watching the NFL package on their satellite, as we could flip through all the games for the day! Matt & I teamed up for a couple games of pool; first defeating Daniel and his girlfriend and then Seth & Conner. We never did get any of the old farts downstairs that day… It was really weird not having Granny there with us, for the first time. Dad & I spoke about next year stopping at her grave and dropping off flowers on our way to John & June’s house…it just wasn’t right without her in our life today…

Here is our weekly video montage from the week…

Well let’s get on to the Waybac section; which this week is dedicated to Christmases past…
Leading off; we have a great oldie of Maryann with one of her brothers in the early 50’s.

Next we have two from 1969 in Lafayette. The first is from Grandmaw & Grandpaw Brown’s house (love the silver tree!!). The second is our young family at our home on Shortridge St.

Here we have four from the seventies in Greensburg. The first two are circa 1974-ish and features the Owens children under the tree as well as a great picture of Grandpa Owens and Ann & Dee Dee; which was featured in the local newspaper. The second are from a couple years later – about 1976. The first one is the three Owens children under the tree again and the second one is at lunch with Grandma & Grandpa.

The next batch is from the eighties in LaPorte. The first three are from 1981. There are two from our living room on Kenwood; one of just the tree & stockings and the other of the Smith family during the Bryan Christmas. The third one is from out at the LaPorte mall (which was featured in the movie, “Prancer??? – notice Aladdin’s Castle in the background!!) of Rob with Santa. The last two are from 1989. The first is Rob opening his Nintendo game system. We played it until the controllers wore out!! The second is one of my favorites and includes our young family with Grandpaw Brown; our first Christmas without Grandmaw…

We end this round of Waybacs with a nice one from a simpler time…here we are in Columbus with Matt, Mom & myself during Matt’s first Christmas in ’96. I think I need to make my Cowboys hat a little bigger, huh? 🙂

Well that’s it for this week’s edition of the Scheu Family Blog. As always, we thank you for keeping up with our family and we’ll get caught up again next time. Until then, have a great Christmas everyone…and here’s hoping it’s a white one!
Later, Scheu