Cousin Christmas Gifts

Okay -

First - this is cousins only. Aunts and uncles and parents are on their own to figure out how they are doing their drawing.

Second - it was suggested that the Moore cousins combine their forces for good this Christmas to serve those in need.  I, for one think that's a great idea.

The question is: how do we want to do it?

- pick one charity to donate to from here on out?
- draw names and you tell your giver your charity of choice?
- start at the top of the list and rotate through cousins and we all give to that cousin/family's charity of choice?
- stick to the name drawing and gift giving?

Place your votes here!

Will's Belated 8th Birthday Post

This kiddo's birthday dreams came true when he opened the gift from Gramma Jan and Grandpa Marc!  Leo's gut totally photo bombed this photo.

Here's the birthday boy a couple weeks before his birthday, mocking a jack-o-lantern.  

Here's to our Will-boy!  Happy birthday again, Big Guy!  God blessed us big time when you came on to the scene 8 years ago.  You bring us such joy.  Love you TONS, and may God bless you with good health and happiness in the coming year and always.

Love,

Mom and Dad

Happy Birthday, Sabina!

Sabina turns six years old today. Although she lives in Boulder, she recently traveled (with her folks, of course) to Chicago, where we spent some time together. She's delightful, adorable, and pretty dang smart. We hope she has a great day, a great year, and a great life. We love ya, Beaner! Opa and Oma

News from the Falls!

We have had a busy crazy fall so far.  Madison has been playing Volleyball for the Central Mustangs and they had a great run.  We had district tournaments last weekend and took third in our district.  This is a huge accomplishment for our girls.  Our district has some of the toughest teams in the state and Belt will probably end up winning state.  They are pretty fun to watch...a very talented team.  So our divisional tournament was this weekend.  We didn't fair so well in Conrad.  But it was a fun season and now we get a break for a couple weeks before basketball season begins. 
During the break, Maddie is going to the National Catholic Youth Conference in Indianapolis.  She is very excited for this experience.  We are thrilled that she is thrilled!! 
My work is going well.  My job description has changed a bit and my main function is recruitment which is really hard for me.  But I am trying different things and hopefully we will get "more butts in the seats".  I also spent a good portion of the summer writing a $225,000 grant and am anxiously waiting to hear about that.  Hopefully, it will be granted and our school will upgrade our library, middle school science lab and technology in the classrooms.  Big excitement!
Jim is busy working and a bit happy that construction season is coming to an end for the year.  That means reffing season must be quite close.  So he is getting ready for that season.  He is in charge of his ref pool so he inputs all the games and then schedules refs for each game.  Crazy amount of work for a volunteer job!
Sam is really enjoying MSU and Bozeman.  He likes his classes and is enjoying ROTC except for the 6:00 am PT and Class....and keeping his hair cut short and shaving every day!!  Oh well~
Nick is doing ok.  He is ready to be done and home again.  They are not looking forward to the next month and a half.  I would imagine that the holiday season is the hardest for sure.  I know I am not happy about him being gone!  He is job hunting and trying to make some plans post Kuwait.  I know he will be fine...
Jake has 7 1/2 months left in his residency.  He is working nights right now and it sucks!  He still enjoys what he is doing so that is good.  he is beginning to look at post residency possibilities.  Should be interesting to see where he ends up.  I keep saying Montana is a great place to land!!
Miranda just gave the run down of the Meunier family.  They are busy as ever!  And we loved having the kids here this summer!
The biggest news we have to share is that we are going to be grandparents again!!  Ben and Adrienne are expecting a baby girl in March.  We are very excited and love that they are close in Butte.  Ben is looking for work close to Butte but not having too much luck yet.  I know he will find something,,,he always seems to!

So that is the Wingy news.  The Moore family continues to grow!!
love you all and enjoy this wonderful fall season~

Viva la vie!

Hello wonderful family!  Greetings from Billings.  Just wanted to post a little note about life recently.  First off, Nate and I had a fabulous European adventure this summer, spending nearly 3 weeks between Spain and France.  My favorite places were Bilboa in northern Spain.  There is a Guggenheim museum there that was pretty cool and the town itself was nicely laid out and peaceful.  I also loved Barcelona.  The energy of the city is amazing!  We went to Montserrat just outside Barcelona, which was incredible.  It's a monastery, still operational, initially built in 12th century.  It is carved into the side of a mountain.  The views are spectacular!  Paris was fun, too, but so busy!  I want to go back and just experience the city and not feel that I have to see everything.  The museums are all great, but I felt we didn't have enough down time to simply experience the city.  The Eiffel tour is incredible though.  Truly breathtaking.  We feel so blessed to be able to go on such a wonderful trip.  I think I'll forever be indebted to my parents for watching the kids for so long!

Montserrat.  Not our picture unfortunately.  Google it.  Seriously amazing.

Halloween is one of my favorite holidays.  We usually host a Halloween open house and this year I invited both Isaac and Emma's classes.  It was pretty fun to see all the little kids dressed up.  And some of the adults too!  Isaac was Captain America (here wearing some goofy glasses) and Emma was Rapunzel.  Fun!  If you are ever in Billings for Halloween, the door is open!

Nate is going to a conference this weekend in Houston for the National Myotonic Dystrophy Association with his Dad.  There have been some breakthroughs in research in the recent years and they are going to the conference to hopefully learn more about clinical trial opportunities.  It's exciting to think that there is something that could potentially slow if not stop progression of his disease (still not a cure), but I'm always a little leery of clinical trials.  So any prayers and happy thoughts are welcome!

Speaking of conferences, I was recently in Miami at a conference to present some of my research about patient outcomes after the closure of a comprehensive health program with which I was working.  The research was well received and I'm now working on publishing.  Like a boss.

For our Christmas exchange this year, I wanted to propose we all put whatever money we would have used to get a gift for our cousin, sister, brother, whatever and put towards a nice family donation to a charity of some kind.  To be honest, I LOVE!!! Christmas, but this time of year, I start hyperventilating a little bit thinking about how to organize all the "stuff" that we are going to get.  Not to say I don't love presents and all the wonderful, thoughtful gifts we/I have gotten over the years, but I really feel I have enough "stuff" and would rather see my gift go to someone that could really use some help.  I would also suggest we do a "local" charity - at least something that helps people in Montana.  I know there are people all over the world in need, but I think we can all think of families in our own communities who need help.  Perhaps we could throw around some ideas for charities?  Thoughts?

So that's us.  The kids are fine.  Love seeing everyone's updates on here and hope we can all meet up somewhere down the road - holidays, weddings, 90th birthday celebrations, or just a knock at the door.  Love you all!

Happy Birthday, Erin!

Happy birthday to our beautiful, special new daughter!  We always wanted twelve children and we are getting close!!  It is wonderful to see the beautiful smile that you put on Joey's face!  We hope that you have a wonderful, awesome birthday!!!

Halloween in Utah!

So I firmly believe that anyone that dressed up for Halloween OR that had a little munchkin dress up should share via the blog. I know you are all probably Facebookin' all your cute pics but it's been a little slow going over here for us non-bookers! We went a little old school with Carter as Edward Scissorhands!! The three girls were a witch, waitress, and wacko! I also trended back a ways to 2003 as Darla (the fish killer) in Finding Nemo and Jerry was my cute tourist-though his fat suit was starting to give out by the time we took the picture. :)Hope you all had a great Halloween!!