Merry Christmas 2016

Merry Christmas

I believe it is safe to say that this year has been our most eventful yet…

We rang in 2016 as a family of 3 in North Dakota and are ending it as a family of 4 in Delaware. Although we were anticipating orders to a new base, we found out earlier than expected, in February, that J had orders to leave in April! We received our first choice of plane and base; C17s at Dover AFB in Delaware. But before moving in July J had to spend 3 months at Altus AFB, OK to retrain in the C17.   

On the heels of all the moving news, on March 17, 2016 at 4:02am JM was born. He was 18.5 inches long and weighed 7 lb. 1 oz. He arrived 2 weeks early, so J got to spend a whole month with him before leaving for Altus AFB. Despite the early arrival, labor was uncomplicated and JM came home healthy just 24 hours later. C has been thrilled with JM since the day he came home and is a sweet and loving big sister. She is one of JM favorite people, and just her voice makes him smile.  

Our families rallied around us and until I flew to Ohio with my Mom in early May, we had someone with us to help in ND after J left. The kids and I then spent the next 3 months in Ohio at my Mom and step-Dads house. J was able to visit for a long weekend in June to be a part of my brothers wedding. In mid-July the 4 Scherffs were back together in our new home in Delaware.

My sister and niece came out for two weeks to help unpack. I don’t know what we would have done without her; this was our first move with kids and it was a lot more challenging! We have since played host to various family members; it seems Delaware is a much more desirable location to visit that ND. We have a lovely house with a guest room, so any time you find yourself in the area stop by.

C turned 2 in May. She is smart and is extremely verbal. She has been taking a ballet class here and loves it. She still is happiest outside and loves music and books. JM is currently cutting teeth, loving eating real food, and slowly getting better at sleeping. J is working on loan in the OSS (Operations Support Squadron) as an ADO (Assistant Director of Operations). He is also back to flying the awesome C17 as an Aircraft Commander. We found out in September that he was picked up for promotion to Major and will pin on next summer. He has been working hard and we are extremely proud of him. My big project this year was completing JM baby quilt. But as you have already read, I have been primarily overseeing a busy time of transitions for our family. And I am happy to report that as the year ends we are settled and Delaware is fast feeling like home.  

Although it has been a whirlwind, everything the year has brought has been such a blessing to our little family; especially JM! We hope that you are enjoying the holiday season. We love hearing from you and hope to soon.

Sending our love and wishes for a happy new year.

“Be Near me Lord Jesus I ask you to stay, close by me forever and love me, I pray. 

Bless all the dear children in your tender care, and fit us for heaven, to live with you there.”

Christmas Day 2015

Christmas 2015 is coming to a close. I am sitting on the couch in the same red, plaid flannel pajamas I've worn for... five(?) years by our Christmas tree. J is here, wearing his same red Ohio state pajamas. Frank Sinatra is crooning "I'll be home for Christmas". C is finally, I think, asleep. She begged to go "night night" but then spent an hour happily talking and singing to herself in her crib. Perhaps mulling over her busy Christmas day.

It was a good day. 

Started a bit early. Not because Catherine was excited about Christmas; rather because she got a ladle in the tub the night before and drank half her bath and thus was soaked this morning.

We spent Christmas eve baking grandma rolls, making applesauce, roasting a chicken for our dinner, watching The Muppet Christmas Carol, going to the candlelight church service here on base. Then after C had her bath J and I made brownie sundaes and watched A Christmas Story. He used to watch the TV marathon of that movie with his brother into the wee hours every Christmas eve. He introduced me to the movie when I was in college.

No special breakfast here. C woke up, had a bottle and then came out and saw the presents under the tree. She was interested and started picking things up. She opened a book from Aunt Sara and Uncle Luke. Then proceeded to sit and read it several times. At that point we showed her our gift; a toy kitchen set up in the play room. After that she forgot about any other presents. 

We ate breakfast. We sat around the Christmas tree and managed to open a few more gifts. But mostly she wanted to play with her kitchen.

We had some leftover roast chicken for lunch and then C had a fitful nap. J played on his Christmas present, new Xbox, and I finished my book, Winter Solstice. When C got up again we opened some more gifts and she played lot with her kitchen. J and I worked together and got dinner ready; steaks, grandma rolls, applesauce, peas, mashed potatoes. It was delicious and everyone, including C, ate a ton. She was literally stuffing her mouth with steak and rolls.

No room for dessert!

We video called my sister and mom in the morning. J's parents a little later. My dad in the evening. But it was just the 3 of us at home. It was nice, very low key and low stress. It's nice to just be at home with the normal routine and not making a 1.5 year old get in and out of the car to visit people, or force her to open a ton of things at once when she really just wants to slowly open and try out each present. I'm glad we decided to stay home. Even if we missed seeing our families in person.

But the best part is that tomorrow we do get to see some of them! My mom, sister and niece are braving the plane trip and our frigid weather to come and stay for a week. We are beyond excited!! The guest room is ready, the house is clean, the freezer is stocked with yummy food. And J still has until January 4th off work.

I can't begin to picture next Christmas. A 2.5 year old?! And a new baby; 9 months old. Where will we be living? Who will we be spending those holidays with? Thankfully God knows those details and even now is orchestrating all things to work together. I don't have to worry about it. Just try to be patient and wait to see all the new adventures 2016 is bringing to us.

Merry Christmas from the 3 of us!!

Annual family Christmas newsletter

Merry Christmas 2015!

Last Christmas found us living in temporary housing in Montgomery Alabama for several months with our then 6 month old while J attended Squadron Officer School. Thus no 2014 newsletter. J’s flight graduated number one out the entire school and we were able to stop in Ohio and Michigan to spend holidays with family on our way back to North Dakota. This holiday season the three of us are staying at home in ND after a summer apart while J was deployed and C and I spent time in Ohio.

C turned one on May 6^th and J and I celebrated surviving our first year of parenthood. She’s growing so quickly; we are loving watching her develop her own personality. This year she’s learned to walk, started to talk, eats everything in sight, has ten teeth and more on the way. We also enjoy the fact that she now sleeps through the night most of the time.

We made several family trips this year. We spent Easter in Florida visiting J’s family. July 4^th was enjoyed in Ohio visiting all our families. With all those babysitters, we got away for a night just the two of us to celebrate our 8 year wedding anniversary. We’ve also had multiple visitors to ND this past year including our parents, my sister and niece and my future sister-in-law.

Our biggest family news is that we are expecting baby number two in late March, 2016. C is currently oblivious, but we have every confidence that she will be a wonderful and enthusiastic big sister. Our mid-pregnancy ultrasound revealed a normal and healthy baby in November!

Work has kept J busy this year. He upgraded from an instructor pilot to an evaluator. This is the highest certification and he is now one of the pilots who gives out check rides to his peers in the squadron. He was deployed from July to October in Misawa Japan working as their evaluator pilot; flying missions and training the pilots there. He still found time to golf, go bowling and sample local cuisine while he was away. This fall he returned to be the standards and evaluations shop chief in his squadron and works directly under his squadron commander.

My full time job this year has been C. But when she lets me I’ve been sewing quite a lot. This summer I finished a baby quilt for an Air Force friend’s first baby. I also sewed my first piece of clothing; an Ohio State dress for C. I’ve done a few other small projects, and am currently in the early stages of making a new baby quilt for our second arrival. Although I have been far less sick during this pregnancy, I’ve been exhausted. The past few months I’ve been able to nap when C does which has been a blessing. As always I’ve also been reading, cooking and tending to our little ND nest.

We hope to hear from your family during the holidays. Please let us know how we can keep you in our prayers in the coming year. If you’d like to stay updated on our adventures our blog is: our2911life.blogspot.com

Love and blessings

Therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign: The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel (God with us). - Isaiah 7:14

It’s beginning to look a little like Christmas

We started decorating our house for Christmas on Thanksgiving weekend. To add to the general excitement was a brand new prelit Christmas tree. It’s beautiful. But with our little helper it has taken a lot longer to decorate than in years past. I’ve been getting out one box during nap, between making dinner or cleaning something. We’ve done a few boxes after C goes to bed and before we collapse on the couch. Some things won’t make an appearance, much as it pains me, this year because the hassle just isn’t worth it. I want to enjoy this Christmas, not have to constantly worry about C breaking something special.

And on that note, our lovely new tree is decorated a bit haphazardly this year. The top half is full of our usually ornaments. The bottom is quite sparsely decorated with a few things made of felt that C is given free reign over taking off and putting back on at her leisure. And thus it will continue for a few more Christmases I am sure.

We kicked off Christmas at our house with music and C helping to make her first batch of puppy chow (which might already have been eaten…), which she loved. I had to include a few pictures of her seeing her Christmas tree for the very first time. She woke up from her nap to find it. Last year we weren’t home and had a sad little charlie brown tree. So this really is her first tree. Her face is priceless.

More pictures to come once the entire house is looking the way I want it to.


We’ve also kicked off advent at our house. I’m re-reading a book I bought last year, Light Upon Light by Sarah Arthur. It’s full of different poetry selections, literary excerpts, and scriptures. It’s just enough that I can fit it into my day feeling refreshed instead of stressed about ‘one more thing’ and I’m loving it once again.

As a family we’ve been reading Ann Voskamp’s book, Unwrapping the Greatest Gift, aloud at dinner time. C doesn’t much care about it beyond the beautiful illustrations, but she will in future years. J and I are enjoying the book!

Thanksgiving 2015

For the first time in a long time we did not host Thanksgiving dinner at our house. Instead friends played host at their house in town for 12 people from our squadron. It was nice to have a clean house, namely a clean kitchen, at the end of the day. However by the time we packed up our contributions to dinner, C and all that it takes to feed her (chair, utensils, sippy cup, bib, etc.), loaded the car and made the round trip drive of nearly an hour to stay for the remaining two hour window between nap and bedtime and chase a toddler around a house with two dogs, stairs and no children… I’m not sure it was much easier to be guests. But it was nice to be with friends for the holiday.

I started my Thanksgiving Day food preparations on Monday. The highlight of holidays are grandma’s rolls and they can be made ahead and the dough chilled for up to 3 days. Tuesday turned into cookie dough making day with C. That got a post all of it’s own. Wednesday I roasted butternut squash, cranberries and dried blueberries for a salad I made. I also whipped up a homemade apple vinaigrette. Then I baked a bunch of cookies from dough I had already made and frozen. C was my big kitchen helper again and by lunch time she was tired!

The last thing I did on Wednesday was to make our traditional Thanksgiving morning cinnamon rolls. I have an overnight recipe I use. I probably should have either ordered pizza for dinner, or bought the cinnamon rolls, or possibly both considering I have an 18 month old and am pregnant… I think I’m definitely going to file away the order pizza idea for next year at any rate.   







Thanksgiving day we woke up to snow. The last Thanksgiving we were here, 2013, it snowed. That Thanksgiving I was pregnant with C. Now baby #2 is on the way.

J got up with C and started the cinnamon rolls in the oven. We ate rolls, I had hot tea and C watched her first Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. Last year we spent Thanksgiving with our friends in Mississippi and were in the car making our way to their house from our temporary housing in Alabama and missed the parade. She loved the songs from the Broadway shows; every time they stopped singing she got upset. She enjoyed watching the rest intermittently; mostly she liked the music.

We still had yummy smells coming from the kitchen without making the turkey; after the cinnamon rolls baked I made and baked the dinner rolls. Heaven.

Lunch, oddly enough, was tacos. I can not remember the last time we ate our big Thanksgiving meal at dinner time; so what are you supposed to do about lunch when that happens anyway? Then nap time for C. And finally we headed out for our big dinner.

And that was our quiet 2015 Thanksgiving. Blessed to be together, healthy and have lots of yummy food to share. Next year C will be two and a half and we’ll have an eight month old. Woah! 




There’s not much newsy to report on the pregnancy front. So I thought I’d just slip in a picture of my growing bump and baby #2 on Thanksgiving weekend.

Baking Cookies

Getting ready for Thanksgiving I decided to let C help with mixing up some cookie dough. I discovered two things. This girl loves to help in the kitchen. And she also is happy as a clam provided she can be perched on the stool.

I've been getting so much done lately just by giving her a few kitchen tools and "ingredients" to play with, or by simply letting her sit up on her stool to watch me wash floors/do laundry/vacuum/dust/etc.

We started out making chocolate crinkle cookies and were having so much fun we kept going and made peanut butter cookies too. The amount of flour that ended up on C, my kitchen floors, and the sheer volume of equipment we got dirty (things went in her mouth and then I had to get another item out to replace that thing) was huge. But having such a happy little helper and watching her smile and hearing her laugh and seeing her learn new things was completely worth all the mess.

This was an impromptu event, but it may have turned into one of my absolute favorite days since C was born.

The recipes (both courtesy of King Arthur Flour)

Chocolate Crinkles Cookies 

*Ingredients:

• 1 1/3 cups (8 ounces) chopped bittersweet chocolate or chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup (4 ounces, 1 stick) unsalted butter
• 2/3 cup (4 3/4 ounces) sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 2 teaspoons espresso powder (optional)
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 2/3 cups (7 ounces) King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
• confectioners' sugar* (for coating)
• Note: For a peppermint twist, substitute 1/4 teaspoon peppermint oil for
the vanilla.
*Directions:

*We often call for our glazing sugar to be substituted for confectioners'
sugar, as it's a "purer" sugar: it doesn't include cornstarch. However, in
this case, go with confectioners' sugar; the cornstarch keeps the sugar
from melting atop the cookies as they bake.

Dough: Place the chocolate and butter in a small saucepan or microwave-safe
bowl, and heat or microwave till the butter melts. Remove it from the heat,
and stir until the chocolate melts and the mixture is smooth.

In a separate bowl, beat together the sugar, eggs, vanilla and espresso
powder. Stir in the chocolate mixture, baking powder and salt, then the
flour. Chill the dough for 2 to 3 hours, or overnight; it'll firm up
considerably.

Shaping: Put about a cup of confectioners' sugar into a shallow bowl. Using
a teaspoon-sized cookie scoop, a spoon, or your fingers, scoop out heaping
teaspoon-sized portions of the dough; they should be roughly 1 1/4 inches
in diameter. Drop the dough balls into the confectioners' sugar as you go.
Once about five or six are in the bowl, shake and toss the bowl to coat the
balls with the sugar. (If you try to do this with too many balls at a time,
they'll just stick together.)

Baking: Place the coated dough balls on a lightly greased or
parchment-lined cookie sheet, leaving about 1 1/2 inches between them. Bake
the cookies in a preheated 325°F oven for 10 to 12 minutes

Peanut Butter Cookies

*Ingredients:

• 1/3 cup vegetable shortening

• 1/2 cup granulated sugar

• 1/2 cup light brown sugar

• 1 large egg

• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

• 3/4 cup supermarket-style smooth peanut butter

• 1 1/2 cups King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour

• 1 teaspoon baking soda

• 1/2 teaspoon salt

*Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Lightly grease (or line with parchment) two baking sheets.

2. Beat together the shortening, sugars, egg, vanilla, and peanut butter until smooth.

3. Add the flour, baking soda, and salt to the peanut-butter mixture, beating gently until everything is well combined. It may take awhile for this rather dry dough to come together; and when it does, it'll be quite stiff. Only if necessary, drizzle in enough water to make the dough cohesive.

4. Drop the cookie dough by tablespoonfuls onto the prepared baking sheets (a tablespoon cookie scoop works well here), leaving 2" between them.

5. Use a fork to flatten each cookie to about 1/2" thick, making a cross-hatch design.

6. Bake the cookies for 12 to 16 minutes, until they're barely beginning to brown around the edges; the tops won't have browned. Remove them from the oven, and cool on a rack.

7. Yield: about 2 dozen cookies.

Our autumnal home

Just a few pictures of the fall decorations up around the house this year. Hooray for having the time, sleep and energy do do little things like this again.

Second Halloween

We aren’t Halloween fanatics by any stretch of the imagination. I have in fact never in my life even dressed up in a Halloween costume. But it’s fun to have something to celebrate as winter looms. An excuse to buy candy, bake cookies and carve pumpkins.

While J was on nights I took C down to the local pumpkin patch. We took her last year, but she didn’t care. This year she loved looking at the goats and chickens (making the appropriate animals noises) running in the baby corn maze, and generally just being outside. The pictures aren’t great because it was just the two of us. But it was a fun time. And we picked her first pumpkin out!



We carved her pumpkin on the 29th. J went out of town the next day and was gone over the weekend. His Grandma Mary passed away in September and her memorial service was in Ohio on the 31st. So he and his brother had a whirlwind 48 trip back.

Back to the pumpkin carving. C was very unsure. She doesn’t like to be dirty, at least have her hands dirty. So pulling out the “guts” was my job. J did the carving. Once it was all done she was interested, but not enamored. But once we took her out later that night to light the candle inside she was thrilled with it!


We watched The Great Pumpkin several times in preparation for Halloween this year.


On Halloween night there were never any plans to go out trick-or-treating. I’m glad because it was a dismal day with high wind, rain in the morning and a very chilly and gusty night for the kids. There were a lot of cars out because kids were going up one street and being driven to another. I don’t blame them with the wind.

Anyway, C and I had homemade spice cookies (her first cookie) and handed out candy. She loved it. She would watch out the window and when people knocked on the door would yell “hi!” and help me give them candy and tell them “bye!” She even gave a very impressive growl to a little boy in a werewolf costume. I had many compliments from parents and older kids alike about how sweet and adorable she was. We had lots of fun!


And thus our Halloween is ended. And very slowly (because otherwise J would be quite unhappy) we’re getting into the Christmas spirit. But yes, Thanksgiving is first! I need to order our turkey from the butcher in town and make some things to put in the freezer. Otherwise it’ll be here before we know it and I’ll be too tired to do anything!