Williamsburg

Well, today I am going to give you all a small tour of Colonial Williamsburg!

Here is the candy shop, it is filled with everything from candy bins that you buy by the pound to fancy imported truffles. Then there are the caramel apples that are dipped each day in the store and covered with all different combinations of sugary goodness!

The College of William and Mary is integrated into this part of town. There are dorms that overlook the town square and classroom buildings lining the street into town.

Now we have come to the Toymaker of Williamsburg...

They have a huge selection of vintage children's books,

adorable Madam Alexander dolls,

of course there are tricorn hats and muskets,

plus a million figurines from the Revolutionary War, Civil War, and World Wars 1 & 2,

and my favorite item, the title is just intriguing!

One of the shops sells colonial era clothing! Some of it is quite beautiful!

And old fashioned caroling dolls specially made for Williamsburg
(and specially priced for Williamsburg's tourists!)

We have now reached the colonial section (we had been in Merchant's Square)
All of the buildings here are original or exact replicas of the home that once stood there

I love this church building! It sits in the heart of the historical district, standing so proudly high above the rest of the buildings.

Anyone need anything tailored? Severinus would be glad to do it for you!

I think this is either a dorm or a bed and breakfast.
Both are all over the place here and have window unit air conditioners!

Finally, this is a typical colonial era house. It is two stories high with two chimneys, windows lining the front and a flat front. Behind it is 2-5 buildings that were summer kitchens, workshops, stables, chicken coops, etc...

Hope you enjoyed our tour!

Our New Home!

Here is the living room! It is a peaceful haven to relax and read in. It holds our non-school bookshelves, the piano and our record player!

Here is the big window across the room from the sofa's shown above. The trees in our front yard provide a park-like atmosphere!

This is the foyer.

Here is the family room. It has horrible lighting, so the picture is not my best. The window on the right looks out into the backyard, which is also filled with trees! There is built in bookcases and a fireplace on the other side of the room, but those aren't completely box free yet.

This is a small part of our school / toy room. We are waiting for another bookshelf to come in, so the rest of the room is in limbo right now! (The aforementioned room also holds Brian's big screen TV)

Leah and I have one of the front bedrooms!

Mom and Dad have the back bedroom!

Brian and Josh share the room in the middle!
Guess whose bed is whose!

Moving in!

The last few days we have been, cleaning the new (rental) house!

Today the moving trucks (all three of them) are going to deliver our stuff!

We are getting very excited about Christmas! Yesterday we bought a real tree!

Well....the moving trucks just pulled up!! We will post pictures soon!!!!!!!

Love,

Jenny-Penny

FINALLY A POST!!

We have been running insanely lately and the blog has been sadly neglected, so I will now update y'all on what's happening!

1. New Family Photos!
We finally got around to taking updated family photos for both our band and our Christmas card!
Taking pictures of 9 people at once (3 of whom are 10 and under) is a lot harder than I thought!The Kids

Boo

Josh and Leah

The Girls

And this shot is Brian's doing. It is soooo typical of Emily, Jenny and I! (~SMILE~)

2. We are enjoying all of this beautiful weather we have been blessed with!
3. We enjoyed a beautiful ride through our friend's cattle farm during our church's annual hayride!
4. We have been packing and cleaning like crazy!
Getting ready to move is exhausting!
Daddy starts his new job on Jan. 3, 2011! Praise the Lord for providing a new income for our family so quickly!

Applesauce!

Since the Davis Family so kindly showed us how to make applesauce, we decided to try to make some of our own! So, we made 20 quarts of applesauce out of 1 1/2 bushel of apples. It is delicious if I do say so my self! However, we are already thinking that we are going to have to make twice this much to keep our family in stock for the year. We'll see if that happens.

Back to Normal Life!

Well, we have officially recovered from our exhausting schedule from the past week/weekend! Back to our studies, music practice, and basketball! Our break after lunch today was filled with competitive games of P-I-G and Around the World! Mom won PIG and Brian won Around the World, with Alyssa coming in close second (we were playing tallest to shortest). Everyone is back in full swing for our studies, and Leah is very proud to announce that she has moved on to her next math book! She is now learning from a textbook instead of a workbook! A very big deal! Joshua is thoroughly enjoying, "Treasure Island" for his literary studies. Jenny was doing something with a microscope this afternoon, I don't know what, just that she took it out of my room, and then brought it back later;) Emily is studying hard to get all of her High School subjects in, and hopefully some CLEP tests soon. Brian was busy all day practicing which smile he is going to use when he get his drivers license in 7 months. Plus there was a lot college math and history studying going on in between! Alyssa was in her room all day studying furiously for her next CLEP and taking two online courses and study Pre-Calculus. She has officially decided that neither Pre-Calculus nor English Literature are her cup of tea! Boo was running around "studying" with everyone. Mom was running around studying with everyone, making meals, doing laundry, and the list goes on and on. We finished the day by visiting Nana and watching the Duggar's show on TLC! So, this is a normal day for us. Good Night John-Boy!