Luke's 8th Grade Basketball and Counting Down to Christmas Break!!

Luke played for his 8th grade team this year!! Luke loved playing for his school again with all of his buddies! He played power forward for his team. A favorite moment was when he was down the other side of the court and his teammate made a sweet, long pass to him ready under the bucket and Luke scored a sweet layup right before half. Get ready for lots of various pics of 2-4 on Hart!

Ben kept the scorebook again this year as well. Ellie and Drew loved to sit with Dad on the team side!

Kolbe's mom is a teacher at Hart and helped us out again this year SO much!! On away gamedays, Luke would ride home with them and then she'd drive them to the other school to play. She snapped this pic of our boys before leaving for a game. :)

Kevin would step in to help Ben out if he couldn't do it and Elle would still be right there with the scoreboard.  Good job, Ellie!

Luke fell to West both times this year and Danny, his buddy from church/Little League/Upaward basketball didn't let him live it down! They were both on 3rd string, power forwards, and we all had so much fun watching them guard each other and duke it out.  

Ellie and her squad.

Haircuts by Dad.

I had the best time with my best girls! Banchie Christmas 2023 in Grand Rapids and the Amway Grand did not disappoint.

LOVE my banchies.

All the Christmas parties continue!

At the Johnsons for their annual Christmas partay!

My Lauren Moore is having a baby!! I babysat Lauren starting when she was just weeks old and now here she is married, a pediatrician, and having a baby!! Love the Moore family!

Drew off for his fieldtrip to VanHoosen Farm!

Ellie was invited by her principal to be the 6th grade representative at their school professional development! We are just so proud of her! She showed up on her day off of school with a handful of students from 6th all the way to 12th grade to help inform their teachers and administration about what's working and what could be improved from a student perspective. Of course, I asked to stay because one of Ellie but two because I wanted to learn how to run this kind of PD for teachers. It was super cool!

The 6th-12th grade students would pass around the microphone as a consultant from Oakland Schools ran the circle conversation. The teachers and admin sat around the circle like a fish bowl to observe and take notes. SO proud of you, Elle! What you have to say matters!

Luke's buddies planned a dinner date out with them and their moms!! I was so excited for this! The moms and our boys had a Christmas date night downtown together at Kruse and Muers. Love this so much! I did have to take Luke right from baseball practice sooooo, hence the shorts in December.

Once December hit, Drew wore his Santa hat to bed every. single. night. I mean, the pure joy. 

Drew's list!

Getting our Christmas on!

Cookies!

Ellie's Christmas party with her girls!

The STEMi was at Hart Middle School for the week. Ben worked it one day and called the main office to have Ellie go to it after school...And he surprised her there! (Luke was at basketball)

We were all headed to the tree farm to cut down our family tree for the year and I thought, I should just call the farm to make sure of their time. Welp, they told me they were all out of trees!!! WHAT?!? Good thing we found out and then headed to Lowe's our next favorite spot.:)

It was Drew's turn to pick out our tree!

Family photo with our tree, not at the farm, but at the magical place called Lowe's. It works!

Ben surprised the kids and on the last day of school before Christmas break and took them out to eat for breakfast before school! They were there with a bunch of the staff from Hart so they felt pretty cool.

Greeting Drew off the bus to start Christmas vaca!

That night we launched break with The Nativity at our church with the Cosbeys!