In Memory of My Maternal Grandparents

This year has been a challenging one for everyone. One of my great losses this year was the death of both my grandmother (her obituary) in May and my grandfather (his obituary) in October. We had a private memorial service for both on November 7th that I was fortunate to be able to attend. My uncle made this special video to show various pictures throughout their lives. I thought he did a great job with the music and family pictures! It was played at the beginning of the memorial service. It was good to hear stories and reminisce with family! It was very special though it was emotional. 

It especially broke me when I was sharing about how I was named after my sweet Grandmom. She was very servant-hearted and hospitable. I have lots of memories of being greeted by her and told that she made rice crispy treats and "Margy Duff cookies" for us! 

Grandmom meeting Anna for the 1st time (4 generations!)

This picture of Kate and Grandmom is one of my favorites!

Granddaddy meeting Kate for the 1st time

My Granddaddy was very musically-inclined with a great sense of humor. I shared about how he would try to connect to his grandchildren by coming up with funny things to say to us each time we saw him. I also shared about how I was able to see how Granddaddy depended on God for an upcoming medical procedure back in 2004 by requesting his family to come and pray with him. It clearly made an impression since I still remember it!

This was the last time that I saw Granddaddy - it was in June when we had a drive-by parade for his 90th birthday. He was able to meet Drew this way!

Every single grandchild that shared memories at the memorial talked about our fun visits in the mountains in Etowah, North Carolina. My brothers and I really looked forward to the 4-wheeler rides there! 

Their ashes were sprinkled in the Garden of Hope at the Penney Farms Cemetery. Here's a close-up picture with their names (Richard & Margaret Leinecker), but they haven't updated it to reflect their deaths in 2020 yet.  

Here's a zoomed out picture so you can see what it looks like. Every name has been/will be sprinkled into the same rock garden.

I will truly miss them and I am thankful for the impact they both had in my life.

Fall 2020

Here's some snippets of life from August to mid-November. The fall season is one of my favorite parts of living in Indiana. I feel like I appreciate the outdoors more now than I did growing up in Florida. I'm sure it is because I am pretty much limited to only being outside about half the year up here!

One Saturday in August, we had amazing weather and we went to the Celery Bog. It's not far from our house and it was lovely to be able to walk the trails without carrying a child or pushing a stroller!

Drew had his first haircut. He looks so much older to me now!

Aunt Heather gifted us money at Christmas to do a family activity and we finally decided how we'd use it in September! We went to a huge local farm called Fair Oaks Farm.

The kids were able to see how they care for their cows and milk them.

Anna and Curtis climbed the milk carton!

We almost forgot to take a picture of the 5 of us, but we squeaked one in. Do you see that big pillow looking thing on the left? We all enjoyed jumping on that together! 

Not pictured: We had a delicious farm-to-table lunch and their homemade fresh ice cream. A highlight for Curtis was being able to watch the Florida football game while we had lunch!

One day while the girls were in school, I took Drew to a local place called Hillside Acres with a friend. We played in the corn pit, saw some farm animals, slid on burlap down a big tube slide, and enjoyed an apple cider slushy. We rode the tractor to the pumpkin patch.

Drew enjoyed picking pumpkins! We brought back some 3 tiny pumpkins/gourds for each child. It was a sweet memory.

I snapped this picture at Columbian Park when we were at a birthday party. I just love the foliage!

I may not be able to go to Purdue's campus, but I am still able to meet one-on-one with RUF students! This picture was taken as Drew and I were meeting with a new student. 

The girls and I went to Exploration Acres to celebrate a 7th birthday. This sweet family has been in our life since we first moved here. Anna and Hannah have been great friends ever since Hannah was born. We enjoyed her costume party and galavanting through the corn maze!

I took this one as I was biking!

It was a family affair to rake the falling leaves. All of us were delighted to fill up the jack-o-lantern leaf bags. I have memories of doing this as a child and I was ecstatic to share it with my own kids!

Here are the final products. :)  I can't believe how big our kids are getting!

Since the kids and I are unable to participate in RUF this semester (due to Purdue's restrictions during the pandemic), we had our own pumpkin carving event.

This RUF pumpkin was the finished product that Curtis made from the RUF pumpkin painting event that we had to miss.

One of the reasons our family loves to carve pumpkins is so we can then roast pumpkin seeds and eat them! Our favorite flavors this year included italian, salt and pepper, cinnamon sugar, and spicy.

I also had my own fun at MOPS decorating a fake pumpkin with some new friends!

Here's a closer up (after I darkened the letters) - I made it so that I could change it as the season progressed. It goes from "Hello Fall" to

..."Thankful" in preparation for Thanksgiving! I was thankful for the help from the other ladies because I am limited in my creativity skills.

Halloween came and we tried to safely trick-or-treat at a few businesses including Pay-Less Supermarkets (part of the Kroger family).

We then took on some neighborhoods and only went to the homes that passed out candy in a way that we felt comfortable. (It's amazing how this pandemic is impacting everything!)

As November arrived, we tried to take advantage of any times we could get outside. Drew and I had a blast playing in the leaves during a recent speech therapy session!

(Side note: He has been really improving in his speech!)

I love this one!

You know, I think we have made the most of this year! This was very therapeutic for me to go back through these pictures and see all the fun we had! Here's one final picture of our kiddos all on the recliner. I sure love these 3!