Knapp Christmas Letter 1999

My family Christmas was this past weekend and my mom had all of our past Christmas cards and letters taped up on the wall.  It was so much fun to look back and laugh and see what we were like.  I am going to share my favorite letter with you.  It's from 1999...

     Season's Greetings to all!  This year I suggested that each on tell a little about him/herself.  You can weave them together and get a picture of our busy household.
     My name is Darrin.  I'm 5, and I love kindergarten!  It is fun to learn things and play with my friends.  I also like playing with our dog, Shana, and building things with Legos.  I had the chicken pox.
     I am 7 years old.  My name is Travis.  I am in the second grade.  I am working hard this year.  I like school.  I like to read books.  It is fun.  At home, I like to ride my bike and help Dad sell pigs.
     My name is Wyatt.  I'm 9 years old, and I'm in 3rd grade.  I like my teacher, Mrs. Moehle.  I love to read!  I have a BB gun; I'm not a good shot yet.  I like to help Dad in the hogbarn.
     Hi!  This is Derek.  I'm in 6th grade.  I like Social Studies and Language Arts.  P.E. is my favorite "special".  I like to go coon hunting, fishing, and helping Dad in the hogbarn.  In the mornings, Dad sings hymns to us to wake us up.  It is very annoying.
     I'm Krystal.  I am 13 and in the 7th grade.  I enjoy reading, crafts, sewing, baking, and playing the piano.  I babysit and enjoy that very much too.  I was in volleyball this year.  I like talking and having fun with all my friends.  I love writing letters and have lots of pen pals.
     Hi!  My name is Trevor.  I'm 15 years, 6 months, 22 days, 3 hours, and 23 seconds old.  Marital status: single.  Health: good.  Social Security #: available upon request.  For a more detailed description check your post office. (As you can tell, he keeps things lively around here! :)  I am a sophomore and in FFA.  I like fishing, hunting, and figuring out how to fix things.  My current project is overhauling the four-wheeler.
    Hi!  I'm Kyle, and I am 16 years old.  I am a junior at Mediapolis High School.  I am in FFA.  I can be found hunting, fishing, camping, or working.  The highlight of the year was when I got my own truck.
    Hey, Jordan here.  I am a senior this year.  I've finally gotten around to spending some of that rotten money that I had been keeping around by purchasing a car, a computer, and a few power tools.  Since purchasing the preceding items lowered my funds, I am looking for a higher paying job.  I also got a little hunting in this year.  Labor Day weekend a few cousins and I went to Kansas dove hunting.  Also in the hunting agenda this year were pheasants, rabbits, ducks, geese, coyotes, and coon.  I plan on going to South Dakota next spring for a prairie dog hunt.  At school I have been keeping busy in an Independent Study course with my shop teacher.  My duties range from editing movies and maintaining the network to building a shed for our dust collector.  I am also the Vice President for the local FFA chapter and attended National Convention in Louisville, Kentucky this year.  For more information e-mail me at rem_22_250@hotmail.com.
    Brian & Lorna- The time seems to go faster and faster each season.  May we all stop and pause awhile, thinking about where we are in life.  Be thankful for the little things.  It is a constant struggle to keep this household focused on the big picture and not on the things of this life.  May we constantly strive to lay up our treasures in Heaven, not on earth.  Brian's health has been good, thanks be to God and the many prayers of you loved ones.  May you have likewise experienced His goodness in 1999.  We pray God's grace, mercy, and peace for you in the new year.
                                                                     Love, The Knapp's


I hope you all enjoyed this letter as much as I did!  We all got a good chuckle out of it and I wanted to pass it on to you :)  I am hoping to get pictures downloaded of the weekend so check back soon!

Our Christmas

My gifts for Jacob that I had Lilah help me wrap.  I love brown paper packages tied up with string!

 Jacob's gifts for me... yep... this is how it is every year!  I don't mind though really.  It's the thought that counts :)

 He is a Tundra maniac (thanks Mark & Erika Mueller!)

 Definitely a good sign for his shop!  Don't touch them!  Don't move them!  Don't borrow them! Don't even look at them!

 My loot.  He got me some winter running gear...

...and a ipod/phone running arm band, a blowdryer, lots of chapstick (I use it all the time and have to have it everywhere!), work gloves, warm socks, wireless mouse, and miscellaneous others.

We hope everyone had a blessed Christmas and that we always keep the real meaning of Christmas in our hearts!

Game Night

We got some ice and snow right before Christmas.  It was so pretty on the trees and grass, I had to get a few pictures.

 After Christmas Eve services we had the Luthi cousins out to our house for games.  It was good to be together again!

 Then there was the anti-social one who wouldn't put the Tundra comic book down :)  P.S.  Don't tell him his picture is on my blog~ he will not be impressed!  He barely lets me get pics of him as it is!

Work Christmas Open House

We had our bank Christmas Open House a couple weeks ago and this is what it looked like.

 Kansas Maid Pastries donated the cinnamon rolls.

 In the morning we did coffee, hot chocolate and cinnamon rolls.

 At  11:00 we put out little smokies, summer sausage, cheese, pinwheels, fruit, cheeseball, and cookies.

 A close-up of my snowman cheeseball.  I used almonds for the eyes & buttons, pretzels for the arms, and shaped a orange pepper for the nose.

I also made the snowman cupcakes.  I used mini M&M's for the eyes and mouth and a orange tic-tac for the nose.

I didn't get a picture of the water bottles, but the labels said "melted snowman" on them.  Yep, we had a snowman theme :)

Deer Hunting Outcome {Warning: Graphic}

I finally got my deer one afternoon when I got off work.

There were 2 deer in the field, Jacob & I both shot at the same time and they both ran a little ways into the creek and never came back out.  When we were heading to the house to get the truck and load them, there was another one in a different field that Jacob got.  A guy that works for Jacob's dad loves deer meat, so we gave them all to him!

Here is the picture I text my brothers and dad so they could be proud of me... haha.  My dad said it looked like a coyote on his phone and my brothers told me I got Bambi and that it didn't count unless I gutted it.  But my husband was pretty happy with me even attempting and then hitting it on the first shot that he didn't care what size it was.  Verdict on being a deer hunter:  Probably won't do it again unless it's warm or another decides to jump out in front of my car.  I didn't mind it, but I didn't get a thrill out of it like avid hunters do.

Camera Dump

Since it has been a little longer than I anticipated since the last post I will try to do a quick catch-up.  I have been busy getting ready for the many Christmases that we have this year and also trying my hand at deer hunting.  I decided to give it a try again this year since I hit one with my car earlier this fall.  However, I decided I am a fair-weather hunter and not that interested in sitting in a blind at 6:00 in the morning with 15 degree weather...  Now, the first day I went out it was 40-ish and I really enjoyed the peacefulness of the  morning and had some quiet time with God.  I never did see anything.  But I still enjoyed it.  Not so much after that...

My wonderful hubby trying to make me as comfortable as possible so that I would WANT to continue to deer hunt.  It really couldn't have been any easier of a hunt.  I walked outside about 100 yards and climbed up in the hay blind.  I didn't have to climb any trees or walk down in the woods or anything like that.

I had my friend Lilah over to help me with some Christmas baking one Saturday.  Then we did some crafts together.

Being silly with Aunt Jannette

We made this book about her family.

She wanted a list of questions to ask each of her family members (the same list I used for the other books I made) and then we cut out some shapes with my Cameo that she colored.  This one is for her mom and she is helping her mom clean.

I got my Christmas decorations up before we had the church over to wrap gifts for the Hartford Training Center.

The fireplace.

The sign I designed and made.  I had an old vintage coffee sign that I got at a flea market and never used, so I painted it and cut out the vinyl lettering to put on there.

I just loved these sparkly brown deer to go with my neutral/rustic theme

I looked all over for wreaths to hang in my windows.  Since I needed 14 of them, I decided it was way too expensive to buy that many wreaths and instead bought a plain garland.  I cut the garland up and put the berries in.  I got 3 wreaths out of one garland, so it saved quite a bit of money.  Then I just hung them with burlap ribbon.

Don't mind the plastic wrap that is sitting under the window sill :)

I put the Willow Tree Nativity set on the piano this year with lights under the snow.  Jacob built me the stable one year for Christmas out of our old barn wood.  I got around to staining it this year.

All the gifts we had to wrap Friday night.  We (Kent, Marissa, & I) shopped for 77 residents of the Hartford Training Center and then the church came over and we wrapped and tagged everything.  The kids always have so much fun with this!

On Saturday, Marissa had the ladies and their daughters over for a Christmas brunch.  It was delicious and so enjoyable to spend time together!

These glasses out of the toy box were a huge hit!

Then we made cookie jars.  We cut out circles of fabric to go over the top of the lids to make them festive!

Teagan trying to hide behind the counter so I don't get her in the picture of ingredients.

 The finished product.  These are always so fun to make and give as gifts or even have on hand when you need a quick snack to take somewhere.

This week I am focusing on getting everything ready for our Christmas open house at the bank... so stay tuned!

Painted Sign & Christmas

Here is the sign that I finished for my sister-in-law.

 We also had our Schulz family Christmas this weekend and one of the games the kids played was with a candy ball.  Kelli wrapped up candy with shrink wrap and the kids had to try and get out as much candy as they could until the next person rolled a double.  As soon as they rolled a double they had to pass the candy ball on.  I thought this was a super creative game and the kids had a ton of fun!

It was so good to see everyone at Schulz Christmas!  Our whole Knapp family was home so we got some family pictures taken.  Here is a taste of how they went: