Missy had a baby girl, Peyton Mae, on Fri.  April 17th.  Mom and baby are doing well.  Peyton weighed 7lbs. 15 ozs. and was 19 3/4″ long.  Cole and Makayla just love their new sister and Noah is pretty OK with her too.  Congratulations Missy & Phil!

Granny’s birthday was on March 12^th so we met Dexter, Tammy, Ryan, John, Diane and Eric at her house for a little party. We got take out Chinese for lunch and then had cake and ice cream afterward. Everyone sat around talking and enjoying each other’s company. The next day we met Vic, Vanessa, Ben and Sam at Chik-fil-a to have a little birthday celebration for the boys. We had fun watching them play on the indoor playground and talking to Vic and Ness. Afterward, we drove to Louisville to see where Matt works. He manages a document storage site in a huge limestone cave underneath the Louisville Zoo. His company had a few large rooms to store documents. There is also storage for RVs, boats, cars, etc. It’s all pretty impressive. Matt showed us around his area and we saw his office. There sure is a lot of stuff stored there. Then we followed him to New Albany. We got to say Hello to Angela, who was almost ready to go to work, and to see their new ferret, Samson. Matt took us out to Qdoba’s for supper after Angela took left for work. We stayed the night at Granny’s since Ben and Sam’s party was scheduled for the next day. Ben got sick so Vic had to call off the party. Before going back to TN, we visited Valerie and Layne. Vanessa was there so we got to see her too. We had a good time talking and playing with Layne. Then we headed home.

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Vic and the boys arrived on the afternoon of March 6. All the neighbors came over to check out how much the boys had grown. Sam got sick overnight so Vic had to take him to the doctor. He had Type A flu. Neil and I had gotten flu shots so we were in good shape. We kept Ben and went to play on the playground at the park. Sam felt bad all the next day so we stayed home and played with Ben. Sam perked up a couple times for about a half hour but didn’t eat anything all day. The next day Sam started to feel better so we went out back to ride the big wheels. The boy’s legs are still too short to reach the pedals so Neil and I pushed them with a broom handle. They were flying up and down the sidewalk and making reckless turns onto the patio. Luckily, no one crashed. Later, we took the boys to the playground. Then Vic gave them some Play-Doh when they got home. Both boys collapsed after all that activity and took a two hour nap. Vic decided to head home the next day since she was starting to feel ill. I guess all of them were sick by the time they got back. We really felt sorry for them and wished they could have had a better time.

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Grandma died and Feb 23. We took off for Mom and Dad’s the next day. When we arrived, Dave’s family and Di were already there. We talked with everyone awhile and then had a short birthday party for Mom and Di since it was their birthday. Afterward, we went to Batavia to stay at the Best Western. The next day, we went back to Mom and Dad’s to have lunch and then go to Visitation. Family time started at 2 PM so we viewed Grandma and sat around talking with one another. Grandma looked good and all the flowers were beautiful. She would have liked that. Visitation started at 3 PM and ran until 7 PM. Several members of our family and friends stopped by to pay respects. Around 4 PM I started to feel a little sick. The feeling kept getting worse and I had to go outside to cool off for awhile. Then, about 5:15 I had to excuse myself from a conversation and head for the bathroom to be sick. Di helped me get cleaned up and I thought I’d be OK but that didn’t last long. Shortly after that, Neil told me that he wasn’t feeling well either. We decided to head for the motel. Neil got sick in the parking lot and then at Mom and Dad’s when we stopped to pick up some clothes. We barely made it back to the motel before we were both sick again. We threw up all night long and the next day. We had to miss the funeral because we were just too sick. I started to feel a little better around 6 PM and offered to go to the gas station next door to get some crackers, ginger ale and Gatorade. On the way over, there were a bunch of signs but the only one I noticed said “Pizza” on it. When I got to the counter, I was $.70 short. I told the clerk I’d put back the Gatorade. She said “It looks like someone’s sick.” I told her that my husband and I had been sick all day. She told me to take everything and she’d make up the difference for me. That was really nice. I tell this story because I was traveling once when I was young with Grandma and Grandpa. I got sick one morning and Grandma was trying to find something that would make me feel better. I told her that I thought some pizza would help. They got some for me and I did feel better. So, why did I only notice the “Pizza” sign and someone who I didn’t know felt sorry for me and offered to help a stranger? I believe Grandma was watching over me. That made me feel a lot better. Neil was sick the rest of the night but I kept feeling better. The next day, we packed up and moved in with Mom and Dad. Everyone else had gone home. All we did was lay around all day. Mom told us about the funeral. Dave as well as a couple other people talked about Grandma and what a good person she had been. After the funeral there was a reception at the Fire Hall in Warsaw. Everyone could visit and eat. Then the family went to Grandma’s to talk and look around the house a little. Everyone picked up candy since Grandma would never let anyone leave without some. Mom was holding up pretty good – tired but OK. Neil started feeling better after a nap and suggested that we try a fish fry. I’m not sure that’s recommended after having been sick for two days. We shared one and got through it but it sure didn’t seem as good as usual. The next day, we didn’t feel like driving home so we lay around all day again. Neither of us had our appetite back although we did try fried rice for supper. Sunday we still weren’t feeling up to a drive back to TN so we stayed another day. We kept feeling better all day long. Aunt Peg came over for a visit. She seemed exhausted and a little forlorn but OK. She stayed to have pizza with us. Finally, Monday we felt okay to go home. We stopped to see Granny on the way back. We were glad to get home but sad that we had to miss the funeral and time with the family.

An awful ice storm with accumulation of more than 2″ hit KY on Jan 27th.  Trees, limbs, electric towers and poles, electric lines, etc. were all dragged down by the excess weight of the ice.  Electricity was lost almost everywhere for at least a few hours.  Granny fared the best, only losing electric for about four hours.  The kids talked about going outside and listening to transformers explode along the street at 3 AM as the electicity went out.  Matt and Angela had electric back pretty quickly but Vanessa and Al were out for four or five days.  John and Diane didn’t get electric until about the 4th or 5th.  It’s now Feb 11 and Vic and Glenn still don’t have any and don’t have an idea when they will.  Here in Paris we had just a little ice but almost all rain.  Fifteen miles north of us was one of the worst hit areas.  I guess we were just lucky.  Stores in Paris sold out of bread, water, batteries, chain saws, generators, etc. really quickly.  We decided to go to KY on Jan 31st to help as best we could.   Our first stop was in Hodgenville to pick up Ben and Sam.  Vic’s family was staying at Glenn’s Mom’s house (no electric until around Feb 8th) and the boys needed a change of scenery.  We took them to Granny’s house.  Vanessa, Al, John, Diane and Eric met us there.  The menfolk cleaned up downed branches outside while the womenfolk babysat.  We had a good afternoon playing with the boys.  Vic had told us to bring them back fed, awake but worn out, and after dark.  We got them worn out with no problem and stopped at McDonald’s on the way back to Hodgenville to get them a little to eat.  I ran inside while Neil was supposed to keep them awake in the truck.  By the time I got back to the truck, Ben had passed out and we couldn’t wake him up no matter what.  Poor little thing.  Sam lasted another five minutes before he fell asleep drinking a milk shake.  We did get them back after dark so we managed to accomplish two thirds of our mission.  The next day, we went to John and Diane’s house to see the damage there.  Their yard was a huge mess with limbs everywhere.  It was going to take them a long time to get it back to normal.  After that, we drove out to help Glenn and Mark (his brother) clean limbs and trees of their fenceline.  Glenn was afraid the calves would escape.  Luckily, it had warmed up and most of the ice had melted by then.  On the other hand, the ground was total mush and really cow poopy.  I told Glenn that he was lucky I’d grown up on a farm because every other steep put you in slimy cow poop.  If I was a high maintenance city girl, I would have been out of there in less than two minutes.  Anyway, we worked our way around the fence and got it all back in working order.  All Glenn needed were a few fence posts to have it cow escape proof.  When we got back to Granny’s we ordered pizza and watched the Super Bowl with John and Diane.  That was a really good game but I thought the commercials weren’t all that hot this year.  The next morning we packed up the stuff in Vic’s freezer and transferred it to Granny’s freezer.  Another day, and they would have lost a bunch of food.  Since no one else needed our help after that, we decided to head back to Paris.  We enjoyed seeing everyone but wish the circumstances could have been a little better.  It’ll be a long time before everyone is recovered from that storm.

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We drove to NY on Christmas day (almost 800 miles – make sure you bring sandwiches because no restaurants are open) to visit Mom and Dad.  The next day we couldn’t wait to see Grandma since she’d been in critical condition a couple weeks before.  We picked up Aunt Peg on the way to the nursing home.  Grandma was doing a lot better than we expected and we had a good visit with her.  After the visit, we dropped off Aunt Peg and went back to Mom and Dad’s to have a fish fry (a must if you’re in NY on a Friday night).  Saturday we hung out around the house with Mom and Dad.  Sunday we went back to Warsaw to pick up Aunt Peg to have breakfast at Tim Horton’s.  We talked for a couple hours and then got some Timbits (doughnut holes) and coffee to take to Grandma.  Grandma wanted to see our pictures so we took the computer and showed her a bunch of them on slideshows.  She seemed to be doing even better.  After that, we went back to the farm to have subs and visit with Mom and Dad.  Monday morning we picked Aunt Peg up again and she took us out to lunch at a Mennonite place in Warsaw.  They have really good homemade lunches.  Aunt Peg needed some help with her computer so we went back to her house for a little while to fix her problems.  Then we went back to see Grandma one last time.  She was still doing well so we talked and then said our goodbyes.  We were very happy to see Grandma in such good shape.  We dropped off Aunt Peg and went back to the farm for the Sonricker Christmas Party.  The next day we gave  Mom and Dad big hugs, thanked them and drove home.  We had a really good visit to NY and enjoyed catching up with everyone.

We had the Sonricker Christmas party at Mom and Dad’s on the 29th.   Mom made roast beef, sloppy Joes and cheesy potatoes.  Roxie brought dill dip w/bread, a variety of quick breads, cream puffs (my personal favorite), and a bunch of cookies and candy.  I made nachos and some dip.  Kev, Roxie, Jeremy, Jen, Missy, Phil, Cole, Makayla, Noah and Aunt Peg came over.  We had an early supper and then talked and played with the kids for awhile.  Later we opened presents and played some more.  I had a great time playing peek-a-boo, hide and seek, and giving horsey rides and until I got too tired.  We all got to catch up on each other’s lives and had a great time watching the kids antics.  We were just sorry that Dave’s and Di’s family and Grandma couldn’t be there.  It was a fun night and everyone enjoyed themselves.

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Our crew got up early to get ready for the annual Judd Christmas get together at our house.   Neil and the boys cooked the meat on the porch while the girls did a little cleanup.  Matt and Sonny made a trip to Trollingers to pick up some awesome ham.  Al got busy cooking about eight dozen eggs.  It took awhile.  I got the biscuits going – about nine dozen.  Everyone started to show up around 10:30, Granny, Dexter, Tammy, Ryan, Stephanie, John, Diane, Eric, Denise, Todd, Justin, and Josh.  Tammy brought sausage gravy and hash browns.  Granny made apples.  John and Diane brought sausage balls, John’s homemade bourbon candy and little smokies.  Johnny and Angie arrived around 11:30 and we decided to eat then.  Neil said the prayer and everyone started dining.  Afterward, Steph started the cleanup and washed all the dishes.  You go girl!  That was great for the younger generation to pitch in.  I think Matt helped in drying.  After that, we started a picture taking session that ended when Sonny brought in blocks he’d made for Ben, Sam and Layne.  He made them in memory of ones Pops had made for him and the other grandsons.  That got Granny and Vickki boo hooing.  Valerie and Layne arrived around 2:00 and then Missy, Todd, Ellie and Abigail around 3:00.  The little kids exhanged presents and then Granny handed out ornaments that Tammy had gotten handmade in China.  They were neat.  Next was a game of Dirty Santa.  Several gifts were stolen (mainly by Ryan) and I think everyone had a lot of fun playing.  Then it was time to get a family photo since this was the first time the whole family was together.  Everyone got in position and Vic and Eric set timers on their cameras to get the shot.  Diane had brought a frame and had everyone sign the matting.  We took a copy of the best shot and placed it in the frame to give to Granny.  It was pretty cool.  The family spent the rest of the day playing, talking and snacking.  We all had a wonderful time just being together.

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All our kids came to Paris on the 19th to have a Christmas celebrations with us.  We sat around talking and watching old slides.  The next morning we all got up early to get ready for the Judd Christmas.  See the Judd Christmas Party entry for party particulars.   After the party, we snacked on finger food and watched some more slides.  Then I pulled out some old home movies starring Matt, Sonny and Vanessa.  Everyone laughed themselves silly at the kid’s antics.  I think their spouses got some enlightenment.  After that, we exchanged gifts.  There were a lot of nice presents and I think everyone was happy.  The little kids played for another hour until they were just too tired to go any farther.  They’d had a big day running around the house, eating and shooting each other with Nerf guns.  Matt and Angela had to leave early the next morning so Neil, I and the little kids dug through our stockings before Matt and Angela left.  We all got some more neat things.  Vic, Vanessa’s and Valerie’s families all left after lunch.  Sonny’s family stayed for another day.  I played with Trae and Savanna all afternoon.  Savanna and I made some brownies for Tara’s birthday.  Trae was the decorator with input from Savanna and I.  We had pizza for supper and then sang “Happy Birthday” to Tara while presenting her with the brownie birthday cake.  It was a little early for her birthday but was fun.  Afterward, Sonny, Neil, Trae and I played poker.  Savanna was my chip girl.  She got to put in chips I needed for betting and got to rake in any I won.  Neil was the winner for the night.  The next morning Sonny’s family got cleaned up, packed and loaded the car.  I sent them off with some road snacks.  It was way too quiet after they were gone.  We had a great weekend with everyone, really enjoyed ourselves, and were missing everyone as soon as they left.

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