Taylor and Cousin Nathan's Dedication!

Happy end of January '09 all! Hope all you "out of towners" are enjoying your warm weather-us hoosiers are still not getting out of the 20's!! Gotta love the snow though.

Well, this past Saturday night was a monumentous occasion at Pathway Community Church. Taylor and his cousin Nathan were dedicated in front of family, friends, and the church body. It was special that Taylor and Nathan were dedicated at the same time considering in the past the church has always done each child individually. Both boys did really well up on stage and Taylor couldn't keep his eyes off Pastor Ron! This picture below shows Ryan, Samantha, Nathan, Heather, Taylor, and I all up on stage with Pastor Ron:

This picture was taken after the dedication at Dave and Aleta's house where everyone that attended the dedication was greeted with a wonderful dinner and great conversation. We just love this Norwegian sweater that Taylor got from his great Uncle Eric!

And lastly, this picture below is of Pappa and Taylor with his hood up at Dave and Aleta's house. I think Pappa Ken likes his grandson just a tad!!

Heather and I again want to thank everyone who was able to attend. We also want to let all family and friends that were not able to make it know that we kept you all in our hearts during this special occasion and can't wait to see you all sometime in '09!!

On another note, I want everyone to not take life for granted, and to live everyday as if it was your last. The reason this is on my heart is that within the last month, at Shambaugh, two co-workers have had some terrible health problems creep into their families. I know that God has a plan for all of us, and at his own will, he may feel that anyone of our times have come to join him for eternal life. Take this thought and know that he wants us to be loyal servants and get the word out about how wonderful it is to have him in each one of our lives-teaching us, guiding us through life's ups and downs. And one of my favorite verses and Dave's all time favorite verse that you can hold close to is out of the book of Jeremiah, 29:11 "For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future"... now lets go out and live life to the fullest!!

Taylors' First Christmas and New Years!!

Hello and Happy New Year family and friends! Can you believe it's already 2009?! It feels like '08 was a blur! Well here are some pictures from Taylor's Christmas...

This is a picture of Taylor with his new stuffed animal Cat from Deb (Grandma Deb) Taylor's wonderful caretaker:

Here is Taylor and I holding his present from his Great Grandparents Pedersen:
His shirt from Great Grandparents Pedersen:
His First Christmas Ornament from Great Grandparents Pedersen: Taylor looking at his gift from Nanna's close friend Maryann:
Taylor's Ornament from Maryann on our tree:
Taylor and his eyebrow in his first Christmas hat:
Heather holding Taylor with his Santa hat on with Rylan and Conner looking on:
Rylan on his new Tricycle from "Ho-Ho":
Nanna loving her present-an 8x10 of her three grandchildren:
Daddy holding Taylor during Christmas at Nanna and Pappa's house:
Conner holding Taylor:
We hope you enjoy these pictures, and from Heather, Taylor, and I we wish you all a wonderful and prosperous '09 and we will continue to update you on all the happenings with our family!

God Bless!

Five Generation Picture!!

On December 14, at Warren Methodist Home in Warren, IN, we were able to get our exciting five generation picture taken!! This picture means a lot to each one of us in the picture and we are all so blessed to have a wonderful mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, and great-great-grandmother Miriam Rice! In the picture is Great Grandma Rice, Grandma Jackson, Mom, Me, and Taylor!!
Along with us this day was "Pastor" Conner who entrigued all of us with his telling of the story of Jesus' travels after leaving Bethlehem with Mary and Joseph!! What a wonderful Nephew!!

A picture of all of us listening intently to Conners' story...

Thanks to all of the family that made the trip to Warren with us-it was a day we will never forget!

Thanksgiving and Christmas!!!

My sister and her husband were home from Cali this past week for Thanksgiving because they are not able to come home for Christmas this year. So, we had my side (Trietsch) Christmas this week as well as celebrating Turkey day. This also happened to be the first time Holly and Randy saw Taylor and Nathan for the first time.

They didn't put these babies down all week. This one right above is my mom holding Taylor and Holly has Nathan.

Then on Wed. night we had our own little Christmas party. Of course Taylor and Nathan made out like bandits. Although I must say us "bigger" kids did pretty well too. During gift opening we put bows on the boys so Randy decided to join in the fun and we couldn't resist getting a picture of that.

Then we wrapped up that night with a photo shoot for grandma and grandpa with the two boys. I think we had 3 cameras on them at all times. You have to be fast with boys that are 2 months and 4 months old!!

I will wrap up this post with final pictures of us going downtown to see the santa and the reindeer. It was a lot of work taking a 4 month old down there. Not sure I will do it again but it was his first time seeing Santa lit up on the building.

We hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving! Taylor has his 4 month check up with the doctor in about 2 weeks so we will give you an update then.

Firsts

We haven't posted in awhile so this happened a couple weeks ago. Taylor is doing some new things. He has always been good about taking is pacifier but he has learned a new trick! SUCKING HIS THUMB!!! I am not sure I really want him doing this, but in the middle of the night he will spit out is paci and go for the thumb. I think he has caught on quickly in that if he does this in the middle of the night I can't pull out the thumb and stick his paci back in. Clever little devil isn't he. Here are some pictures of him sucking his thumb.

His other first is he is now eating cereal. He will be turing 4 months old in just 6 days, so the pediatrician said he could start having cereal and oatmeal. He has done pretty good with it but he is still learning how to eat and not thrust out his tongue with all the food coming right out. Here is my big man eating his cereal. He is sooooo cute!!!

He of course has to get some milk to wash it down!!!

Taylor's First Trip to "The Zoo!!"

Good morning to all!! We wanted to share Taylor's first visit to the Fort Wayne Zoo which was all decorated for Halloween. Heather and I decided to dress him up as a "pea pod." There ended up being 10 adults watching 3 kids trick or treat through the Zoo! Here are the pictures we took:

Conner and Rylan as dinosaurs!

That's one "darn good" looking family!!

Hope everyone is doing well!

Jason's Trip to Bend, Oregon...

Good evening all!! I wanted to fill everyone in on my trip to Bend, Oregon to visit the Jeld-Wen window manufacturing plant and to do some fly fishing in the Deschutes River.

My boss Mike and I met Mike Stoffel, Jim Ley, and Mike Ley at the Fort Wayne Airport and flew out around 7 a.m. on October 2 to Minneapolis and then to Portland and arrived around 11:30 a.m. We then jumped in our rental SUV and headed south 2 hours down to Bend.

We made one stop on the ride down to Bend at the Detroit Dam. Nothing too exciting about the Dam but the scenery was of course beautiful. Here are a couple of pics:

After checking in at "The Riverhouse" we all headed to are own rooms to relax and wind down from the long trip. The next pictures are of the suite I stayed in:

We toured the window plant all Friday morning and then had meetings at the plant in the afternoon. As I was laying in bed Friday night I couldn't wait till the morning to go out into the Deschutes River and do some fishing.

In this particular river the entire one side is an Indian Reservation and you're not allowed to set foot anywhere on it. Also you must have waders and fish from the river and not from the boat! So this was all new to me Mr. City boy who just started fishing about a year ago. Here are some pictures of the river and surrounding scenery. By the way I did catch a 17" mountain white fish, and had a couple of trout on my line, battled to get them in, and lost them...

This picture is of some horses down by the river on the Indian Reservation side...

Here is our fishing crew: Kent (Angola, IN), Neal (Guide), and myself (man I need to lose that belly!!)

On our trip back to Portland on Sunday we stopped at the "Timberline Lodge" on Mount Hood. Here are a few pictures of the entrance and a glimpse of snow on the vehicles around the lodge-I had to laugh because I was taking those pictures in shorts and a sweatshirt!

Hope everyone is doing well and Heather, Taylor, and I wish you all a safe and Happy Halloween!!