Happy New Year from Billings!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, KELLY!!

Happy Birthday to the woman who makes life so easy for the special men in her life.  Whether it is whipping together magnificent feasts for dinner or putting together Chevy Silverado birthday cakes for her son, she does it all with love in her heart and a smile on her face.  We love you and thank you!  May today be an easy day for you.  God bless you!

Love, 

Your Five Special Men (and the baby on the way)

Happy Birthday, Hannah!

It's Hannah's birthday today. She and her daughter Mikayla have birthdays so close to Christmas that they sometimes don't get the celebration they deserve. Well, we celebrate Hannah's photographic flair, her community involvement, her wonderful family, and her sparkling smile. We hope you have a great birthday, Hannah Banana! Love you a bunch.

Wingerter Christmas!

Christmas 2012 was a fun filled event at the Wingy house!  Everyone was home including Dee, Jake's girlfriend.  We really enjoyed meeting her and having her spend Christmas with us.

The last photo of all the kids in their letter jackets is so cool.  Maddie was excited to get her jacket and I really like the Central colors amidst all that Bison blue!  And the years...98, 00, 03, 05, 12, and 16.  So many memories in all that time, with many more to come!

Here's wishing you all blessings and peace in 2013~

Best Christmas Ever!

Hey all!  Hope everyone had a fantastic holiday with family and/or friends.  We are enjoying ourselves here in Plano with the Texas Buyskes.  The four boys are a riot (literally) and I can't imagine adding a 5th to the mix.  The big news for me is I asked my girlfriend Erin on Christmas Eve to marry me, and she said yes.  So we are going to be having another Moore wedding in the future.  When we decide on a date and place, we will let everyone know as soon as possible.  I am looking forward to everyone getting a chance to meet her and see how awesome she is.  Take care and have a joy-filled new year!

This is from her sister's wedding in San Antonio in October.

Happy Birthday, Mikayla (yesterday)

Well, we're a day late but certainly no sentiment short. Mikayla became a teenager yesterday, and I'm sure it involved a lot of celebration. I also hope our package got to her on time. Happy (belated) birthday, Mikayla! We look forward to more great accomplishments from you. Much love -- Opa J and Gramma Ann

Spontaneous Gathering!

Wednesday found all six of us in Great Falls due in large part to Tommy's urging for Johnny and I to come to Great Falls.  We all went to lunch with Gramma, Ben, Bill and Jim W.  It was a blast!  Anytime that we all get together it is a good time.  A big thank you out to Tommy and Jimmy for putting together four sets of shelves and cleaning out Gramma's garage.  The rest of us got off scot free with just paying Tommy for the shelving.  It looks GREAT!!  Now to just get Gramma to go through all of the boxes that are marked and throw stuff away.  Good luck with that!  Merry Christmas to all!!

Wingerter update...

I think we have forwarded lists to all concerned parties so I thought we would just update our statuses...if that is a word.  We have been busy; work is busy, reffing stuff is busy, following Maddie is busy...life just seems busy.  Throughout all that busyness we are feeling truly blessed.  Maddie is loving high school life at Central.  the small school seems to fit her right now.  She is playing basketball on the JV team and doing really well.  They have had 3 games and are 2-1.  At Central, families are required to give 30 hours of voluteer work.  Of course for Jim and I that isn't too difficult.  We had our hours done by the end of October.  We are people who really like to be involved (I bet you didn't know that!!) so we are continuing to do what we can.  I just don't think we will be running the scoreboard or keeping book like we did for volleyball!
We attended our first meeting for the booster club in November.  They asked if I had any ideas for fundraisers and, funny, I did!  The president is stepping down after 4 or so years in the position and the next thing I knew they voted for me to replace him.  So crazy!  But it should be fun.
Jim is also in charge of his referee pool this year and imputing all the games (all 1300 of them) into their scheduling program.  So I am definitely not the only crazy person in this house!
Ben is back in the Falls for a while.  He wanted to be here for Christmas so he left Maui a bit early.  No worries I think he already has some possibilities for work lined up for after the first of the year.
Jake will also be home for Christmas.  We are so looking forward to meeting his girlfriend Deanne.  They will be here on Friday.
Nick gets home on Friday also, will be here for Christmas and then he will spend most of January in California gearing up for their deployment in March. 
And we are super excited that Sammy gets to come home too!  He will fly into Billings on Friday and will be able to be here until Jan. 2 when he has to report back to Fort Sam Houston.  He is enjoying the challenge of the Medic course work.  Right now they are working on the paramedic portion and after Christmas he will take the licensing exam to be a nationally certified paramedic.  After that they begin the actual army medic stuff.  Scary thought that this 19 year old could be saving lives in just a few months!
We would love to see any and all who venture to the Falls during the holidays.  Grandma would love to see you all!!  We are having an open house next Sunday, the 23rd, so if you want to come crash our party we would LOVE it!!

Christmas blessings to you all and may God grant PEACE to us all.

Love to you
Mary

ChicagHo Ho Ho

Merry Christmas, everyone, and thanks for posting your lists!

 Diz and I already received the best gift imaginable this year, so our list is short and simple.  Our favorite thing is always a visit from you.  Next favorite is something that you made.  We also like things from Montana, but we live in a very tiny place with no room for any new stuff.  So we like treats - wines and cheeses and teas and coffees and any other treats from you.  Donations to Helena Food Share are also quite appreciated.

We will be headed to San Diego for Christmas, so we won't be able to see any of you unless you would like to join us down there, which you are certainly welcome to do.   Because we won't make it to Montana, we would sure like to see pictures on here of your homes all decorated for Christmas - that means you, Gramma!

We haven't really decorated for Christmas, but here are a few pictures of little John!

Meunier list and updates

Hello all and Merry Christmas and Happy Tidings and All That.  Hope you are all having a wonderful season so far.  I am almost done with everything so bring on the eggnog!  And a little somethin-somethin to wash it down with.  Ha! 

For our list this year, I don't have much to ask for.  We all love doing puzzles or playing games together, so anything along those lines.  I would also love a donation to Billings Catholic Schools or the Alzheimer's Association. 

Life in Billings has settled down quite a bit.  We've finally moved into our new house after the Billings Moores were so gracious to let us stay with them even after our closing date had been pushed back.  Twice.  We had such fun with them, but it was time for us to get going.  I love our new place.  It's so us and very comfy feeling.  Please come visit!

Nate and Emma both started school this year.  Nate is at a program at Rocky Mountain College for computer science and Emma started Kindergarten.  She is LOVING school which is way cool.  Isaac also started a 3-year-old program there and seems to like it.  He's quite the character.  I am still loving my job and am involved in a possible grant program to start a comprehensive medical program for people with dementia and also promote early detection of memory problems.  It's pretty exciting and would be totally awesome if we get the grant.  I also am working on a research study and was invited to present findings at the American Association of Nurse Practitioners (AANP) annual convention in July, so that will be pretty cool.  I am also going to try and run for the state representative position for the AANP.  So, like always, I am keeping myself busy. 

You all should be receiving our Christmas card soon.  I am posting this at work (!) so I don't have any pictures to post, but I wanted to provide a link from our recent photo shoot with Jana Graham, my favorite photographer.  If you're ever in Billings and want some great pics taken, she's your gal.  Mom and Dad and Maddie happened to be in town the day we shot, so they got in on the action too!  Here's the link.  Click on Meunier and the password is family.  Enjoy! 

http://www.janagrahamphotography.com/client-login/

J & A lists

I should post, since I started this effort. Remember to put up your lists! Ann: donation to Helena Food Share; iTunes or Amazon gift card; Montana Book & Toy Co. gift card, Montana river system map (big); interchangeable screwdriver; Birds and Beasley's gift card; Walt Whitman poetry. John: donation to Lost & Foundation; ceramic knife (like the one Abe and Dez gave me two years ago and Marc gave me last year; I keep breaking them. Damn.); iTunes gift card; funky green ties; groat cakes (just came to mind); a nice bottle of Cabernet; racquet balls; a fiddle; duct tape (black). We hope you all have a great St. Nicholas Day tomorrow!

Christmas lists

Guess I'd better get my 2 cents worth in before it's to late. I don't know how John got so lucky to get me again but here goes.
Donation to the Peace Hospice building fund
Gift card to Penney's, Herbergers, or LL Bean
World peace and family harmony--don't think our family has to worry to much on that score!

Hey, John Rubin!

Ann and I had a great (quick) trip to Chicago. As always, Abe & Dez were great hosts, and the star of the show was their wonderful son, John Rubin. We've discussed what to call him -- "John John,"(JFK?) "JR." (Larry Hagman?) "Peanut," (too late now?), "J. Rubin" (a bit too corporate?), "Ruby" (tough in grade school?) "Jack Ruby" (JFK?) "Little John," (it seems to fit) "John Rubin" (maybe the best fit). I like John John, but I'm just a voice in the wind. This will take some sorting out. I will report, though, he is an even-tempered infant -- alert, thriving, absorbing the world around him, and still quite non-verbal. We found that he's quite capable of soiling Abe's office with one simple explosion. Here's just one photo of many, depicting three generations of Moores -- eyes closed, oblivious to the world around them.

Here's another shot. (Sorry for excluding the mom and grandma from this post; it's just too much fun for the guys.)

TX Buyske Christmas List

Our list is pretty simple this year.  We would love a donation made to the Benedictine Sisters of Yankton, South Dakota.  Their mailing address and phone number is

Benedictine Sisters

Sacred Heart Monastery

1005 W. 8th Street

Yankton, SD 57078

605-668-6000

We hope everyone has an awesome holiday season.  We are pumped to be having a contingent of the Buyske Clan coming our way for Christmas.

Marc and Jan's list

Well, since no one seems to be following our fearless leader's wish of putting Christmas lists up - except Joey - so I thought I would put another push out there and say COME ON PEOPLE!!!  Our couple is going to get Griz gear if they don't get something up here pronto!!

My list consists of:  fun potholders with coffee/latte stuff on them.  No fruit or old lady stuff like that, please.  A contribution to the Angel Fund in Helena.  That is it for me.

Marc:  Gift card to Cabelas or Land's End; contribution to Helena Food Share; good paying acting job for Molly

I hope the rest of you will really try to get things up here.  If we aren't going to use the blog and let others know what we would like to do or get lists out somehow then maybe we ought to quit trading names.  It just stresses some people out to not know what to get others.  I don't mean to sound rude during this beautiful season because this is my favorite time of year.  It is so much fun to prepare hearts and minds for the special day of Christmas.  And it is alas fun to buy for others!  There is my post-surgery preaching!  :):):)