New Year's Eve

As 2007 came to a close we celebrated the introduction of 2008 with the Cooks and the Brooks. With eight kids running around the house at the strike of midnight, it gave us the first glimpse of what 2008 will have in store for our family. We all had a great time eating appetizers and white chili, playing dress up, and playing the Wii bowling!

Christmas in Akron

This year the Denorme grandkids took a family picture during Thanksgiving.

We went to Akron for the day to visit Oma and Opa for Christmas. As usual the grandkids had a great time visiting each other. Cousin Drew enjoyed watching all the commotion as the other kids opened their gifts.

Christmas Morning

Santa has arrived! The kids were up at 7 AM at the side of our bed eager to go downstairs! The morning was packed with excitement as they opened up their gifts. Webkinz and Geotrax were hot items this year. The Wii has been loved by the whole family! Jennifer is high scorer on bowling! Now that Caleb can read his name he made sure everyone knew what gifts were his!

Christmas in Beach City

We made our way to Beach City to celebrate Christmas with Jen's side of the family. We were able to catch Jordan's high school basketball game Friday night. His team won and the kids loved watching him play! The next day all the families gathered to enjoy a traditional Jennings dinner and exchange gifts. Great Grandma enjoyed being surrounded by her great grandchildren. Jordan, on the other hand, was chosen by the kids to be their snowman - he was a good sport!

Noah's 1st Grade Christmas Party

Noah's class had a Christmas party where they enjoyed great food, games, and gifts. One of the games was building a snowman by wrapping Noah up in toilet paper. The kids had a great time with this activity and Noah loved being the snowman for the day! Kids - please do not attempt this at home.

Rumblin Tumblin Caleb

Watch out Bart Connor there is a new gymnast in town! Caleb started his gymnastic season again. As you can see, he is a real shy kid which makes it difficult to take his picture! He welcomes any fans that would like to see his gymnastic workout to drop by at Buckeye Gymnastics.

Saint Nicholas is coming!

The kids prepared for Saint Nicholas to arrive by putting their slippers by the fire place. They left him a plate of cookies and some carrots for his donkey. Saint Nicholas left them some chocolate and a Webkinz in their slippers.

The tradition continues............

Miller Wedding

Over the Thanksgiving break our family attended the Miller wedding at Atwood State Park where Jen's good friend Christy married Gary. During the reception the kids had a great time visiting and playing games. As the picture shows, Noah enjoyed his time with Emma. Cute couple don't you think?

Project Ears: Day 4-5 - Success

We continued enjoying the parks and spent most of our time at the Magic Kingdom. One of those "family moments" was sitting at the edge of the lake at the Grand Floridian on our last night watching the Disney fireworks in our PJ's and eating snacks!



Project Ears a success measured by these smiles!

Project Ears: Day 3 - MGM

After sleeping over 12 hours we were ready to hit the parks again. Our plan brought us to MGM studios where we had lunch with the Little Einsteins. While walking through the park we ran into Lightening McQueen and Mater which was a treat for the boys. Our favorite attraction of the day was the new stunt show at the park. Even Caleb enjoyed it despite the loud explosions! During the day we were able to enjoy the warm Florida weather and swim at the pool. Later that night we went to the Magic Kingdom to hit some rides and watch the fireworks. The kids were able to be "captains" of the monorail during our ride home.

Project Ears: Day 2 - Animal Kingdom

We woke up early today.... let me rephrase that.... the kids woke up early today ready to hit Disney again. But before we could go to the park we needed to have some breakfast. There is no better way to start your day than breakfast with Mickey. The family went to Chef Mickey's breakfast buffet where we ate everything under the sun and were able to meet Mickey, Minnie, Pluto, Goofy, and Donald. When breakfast was over we went to the Animal Kingdom. We spent most of the day at the park but by 4 pm the kids were running out of gas. I had the great idea to head back to the hotel and take a family power nap. Then we could get up to see Epcot in the evening since they had extended hours that night at the park. To make a long story short, no one in the family woke up until 5 AM the next morning! Chloe tapped me on the shoulder and said " Dad, it's 5 o'clock, lets head out to Epcot!" I told her is was 5 AM not PM and to go back to bed! I guess we were tired!

Project Ears: Day 1

Here are some highlights from our first day:

5:30 AM - Kids are awakened from their deep slumber.
5:32 AM - Caleb realizes we are going away and is wide awake and ready to get dressed - they still have no clue where we are going!
6:40 AM - We pull up to Port Columbus airport and the kids are getting excited to get on a plane. Caleb at this point is flipping out with excitement to board a flight. He does not care where he is going along as he is on the plane. Chloe is starting to figure out where we are going when she notices the gate is for Orlando. She and Noah are whispering to one another trying to unravel the mystery!
7:45 AM - Nose up, wheels up..... we are airborne and the kids are pounding fruit gummies!
10:30 AM - All three kids are now fully aware that we are going to Disney World as we board the Disney Magical Express at Orlando Airport.
Noon - We try to check into the Grand Floridian but our room is not ready. Time to grab some lunch as Caleb keeps reminding me every 5 minutes he is hungry!
12:43 PM - We walk into Planet Hollywood in Downtown Disney and who do we see ...... Grandma and Grandpa! Surprise #2 for the day!
Afternoon - We walk around Downtown Disney and of course need to go through the Lego and Disney store! We then end up going back to the hotel and get our room.
7:00 PM - Surprise #3 - we board a red monorail to the Magic Kingdom to celebrate Mickey's Very Merry Christmas.
7:30 PM - As we walk down main street it starts to snow! All the characters are in Christmas costumes and Christmas music is being played throughout the whole park. Check out the picture of the Castle.
Evening - Surprise #4 - We run into Noah's school friend Kennedi at the park. The kids have a great time riding all the rides and watching the fireworks.
10:45 PM - Everyone is tuckered out and time to hit the hay!

Project Ears Begins!

It's 10 PM Wednesday night and we are packing frantically as the kids sleep. Tomorrow we plan to wake them up at 5 AM and wisk them away to the airport to board a flight to Disney World! They have no clue! We will keep you posted!

Out with the pins!

Today Jen and I took Chloe to Childrens Hospital to get her pins removed from her broken arm. She was very brave and the doctor was able to "pull" three pins out in less then 5 minutes. Chloe said it did not hurt at all. She then had a new cast put on but much smaller and waterproof! She picked tie-dyed for the color this time. In two weeks she will get this cast off. The bones in Chloe's arm seems to be healing well.

Caleb's First Field Trip with Grandma

Grandma took some great shots of Caleb with his pre-school class at Freeman Farms for his first ever field trip. He went on a hayride, picked a pumpkin and fed the animals. Look who is sitting closest to the cookie tray during snack time! Grandma even bought him a popcorn ball!

Playground fall.

This past Sunday our family spent the afternoon at High Banks Park with Noah's 1st grade class enjoying a picnic. After all the kids were done eating they went to play at the playground area. About 20 minutes later I see Chloe walking up the hill holding her arm. I go out to see what is wrong not thinking much of it since she is not crying. When I meet up with her I notice she is pale white in her face and she says to me "Daddy, I hurt my arm and I think it may be broken". As I looked down to her right forearm it was evident that the arm was broken and we needed to get her to a hospital. The nurses at the picnic jumped into action and build a makeshift sling using an icepack, pizza box, blanket and medical tape. We then drove Chloe to the nearest Children's Close To Home location. They took x-rays of her arm and determined that she had broke both bones in her forearm and her elbow. This meant that we needed to head downtown to Childrens Hospital to see an orthopedic surgeon.

At Childrens downtown the doctor announced that Chloe needed surgery the next morning and had to stay overnight in the hospital. Jen and I stayed that night with her and saw her off to surgery around 7:30 AM Monday morning. The surgeon came out to see us about an hour later and said everything went well and he had to placed two pins in her elbow and one in her forearm. She was fitted with a purple cast which she will have for the next four weeks. After four weeks they will take the pins out and place her in a smaller cast.

The rest of Monday was consumed with Chloe resting, receiving balloon gifts, and talking with visitors. She realized how much she was loved that day!

Noah the Little League Star

Noah enjoyed his first season on coach pitch baseball. One of his favorite positions to play this season was catcher. He enjoyed rooting on his teammates especially when they needed to put on their "rally caps"! Go Sharks!

Noah's Visit to Oma's

Noah took a week long vacation at Oma and Opa's house where he spent a lot of time with cousin Alexis.

NHRA Race

Noah and I went to our first NHRA race in Norwalk. Noah loved watching his JEGS drivers race.

The Bet

During VBS this year I bet 300 kids that they could not raise $2000.

VBS was a 5 night event and after the 4th night they had only raised $1100 therefore I thought I was in the clear. To my surprise, somehow they were able to bring in $1700 on the last night bringing their grand total to $2600 - therefore I lost the bet and most of my hair!

Eldora Prelude to the Dream

Noah, Wendy, Keith, Brian and I journeyed to western Ohio to find the famous Eldora dirt speedway in the middle of a corn field. We were entertained by a handful of NASCAR drivers racing in the 3rd annual Prelude to the Dream. Noah had a ball watching all the races and explaining to Keith who all the drivers were. He also shopped at the souvenir trailers finding the coveted Harvick 29 Reese's racing hat! Thank goodness Aunt Wendy brought the goggles!



Noah was very interested in Kenny Wallace driving the JEGS car. He was looking all over the stands for his friend from school, Kennedi.



Tony Stewart, Eldora's new owner, was an obvious crowd favorite in the 20 car. For some reason Keith was convinced that Montoya raced for Toyota so I won a lunch off that bet. He must have figured that they rhymed so they must be working together!



Caleb's favorite driver, Kevin Harvick, was on hand for the big race but stuggled since he had never raced on dirt before! That didn't stop Noah from cheering for him.



Keith's favorite driver, thanks to advice from Kevin Smith, Bobby Labonte qualified first out of all the races for the final race of the night. A wreck in the final race forced him to the pits early - Keith didn't seem to notice since he kept rooting for him during the rest of the race!



Another crowd favorite, Jeff Gordon had a great night battling head to head with Carl Edwards during the final laps of the main event.






After all the dust was settled, Carl Edwards emerged victorious!