Greetings! For some reason I have no longer have time to
journal.
As a result, this our letters are getting longer. The bold
words are to help you find areas of interest.
We will be moving!!! Our PO Box will remain the same. Joey spent the spring
working around the new property with Papa.
He power washed soot from the existing foundation, cleared up brush; did
whatever he could to make the property ready to build. In the summer, Joey dug out the footings and laid the block
foundations. He built up the block
pillars that will support the overhang beyond the original foundation. An outhouse
appeared during the summer to save on porta-potty costs--and it is quite posh--it
has a flush toilet and a sink! We hired Joey’s cousins at Shetler
Construction to be our contractor and Fall brought them up the hill to get
started on the frame and roof. Joey really
enjoys working with them! He somehow
managed all of this on top of his hard work at Blazer and odd projects here at
our current home. Seeing him more often
will be a definite highlight of being all done someday. 
Joey traveled to Seattle for a week with Blazer Industries in March when Benjamin was 3 weeks old; he could work longer AND get more sleep. We (Joey, Pam, Emma and Benjamin) went to COVE in June with the First Baptist Youth Group. In September, Joey went to another Men’s Round-Up and came home raving about Lawrence Irvine’s great sense
of humor. Pam still enjoys photography
with kids and families. She has
officially stepped out of the wedding photography world, but made an exception
for JJ & Ruth’s wedding. She organized
her 11th and final gigantic rummage M.O.P.S.
Sale and has stepped out of the group. She hopes to rejoin in a few years as a
Mentor Mom if they’ll have her back! She escaped from the kids
occasionally to rejuvenate. She enjoyed
a Women’s Retreat at the beach while 37 weeks pregnant (and returned home to find
a new a covered front porch courtesy of Joey)
She headed Central Oregon with the Shetler Girls and a newborn baby in
May. October held a weekend escape into
Helen Santar’s basement with Mama. 
Joey and Pam keep the 💖romance 💓 alive. Our 12th Anniversary brought a Cabela’s trip and movie date--Baby Benjamin chaperoned. In the fall we canned 40 qts of apple sauce together and went to all the Foxes Football home games. The whole family joined in the Silverton First Baptist First Annual Cottage Grove Resevoir Annual Church Campout. We can just call it S.F.B.F.A.C.G.R.A.C.C. for short. We were once again blown away by how our amazing our church family loves on us and our children. We were even able to enjoy a quiet “date” with morning coffee by the campfire while our children were whisked away to a nearby playground. We are already excited for next year!
The kids are all doing well. Benjamin Rumney Shetler arrived on February 24, 2016 at 7:55 AM via (fifth and final) C-Section weighing 8 pounds 9 ounces and measuring 20 inches long. From that day until June 8th we had three children aged 2 and under. We will end the year with four aged five and under. Not nearly as impressive, but surely just as loud. Visitors are always welcome and we will even provide the ear plugs. They all play together pretty well, though Katelyn once declared, “I like Evelyn on the floor.”
Emma is in 5th grade. She is an amazing helper. (She took on all the kids for her sick Mommy
one day-and did awesome!) She is quite the baker now that she can read the
“destructions.” She has grown up so much
these past few years. She has a deep
love for cheesy jokes. They don’t even
have to be funny. She loves math and science. She has no idea what she wants to be when she
grows up but she hopes it will not involve college. Her current goal is to stay home with us
forever. Emma enjoyed her fifth trip to
Canyonview Day Camp (once again fully paid for through our church.) She passed the swim test and was so excited
to finally get to go down the waterslide. 
Katelyn is into negotiation. No “no” is final in her mind. If she can work some angle or find a loop
hole, she will. She can bargain with the
best of them. She loves people and is
our most social of the bunch. She is
also the most ticklish and will burst into giggles before you even touch her. She loves Cubbies and her Cubbies Leaders--We
were driving past a construction site for some apartments and Katelyn excitedly
exclaimed, “Is Crystal there?!?” (She works Crystal Myers in the conversation
frequently.) And she is finally old
enough for VBS!
Gideon is “three and
a G.” Gideon is NOT a morning person. He
learns alongside Katelyn, and is a quick learner. 
Evelyn is not to be
left behind and decided to use the toilet too (sometimes). She learning quickly how to distract and
pester her siblings. She loves to sing
and dance and will often escape mid-diaper change to show off her Nakee-Dance
moves. She is Tiny and Mighty. Beautiful and Impish. She is now in big kids Sunday School and
loves it! She loves Benjamin’s baby
food. She licks the wash cloth when you
wash her face. She likes the taste of
soap. She has two speeds: Fast and Faster. She has two noise levels: Loud and Asleep.
Benjamin has conquered rolling and crawling. He is currently mastering standing. He allows anything into his mouth-except
bottles. He is great at sticking out his tongue. He has a magnificent belly laugh. He spends his days reminding mommy to
vacuum. His favorite activity is obliterating
and eating paper; we are willing to hire him out if you need to destroy any
documents. However, if you need sensitive information revealed
to the world, Katelyn is your girl. She
has neither talent nor desire for discretion. She loves embellishing to the great
delight/fascination of her listeners and mortification of her mother. She claims to want to be a fire fighter princess
as an adult, but I think she would be an asset to Wiki-leaks. All the kids have a sadistic drive to slowly
dismember all my cute wicker baskets. I
find wicker pieces all over the house and Benjamin will eat them if I don’t
find them first - Yum! |
| In Love! |
I (Pam) am so thankful to all who came to help out as I recovered from the c/sec and while Joey was in Seattle. And also to my BFF Emily Middleton for taking my four older kids so I could be home alone with Benjamin for a few days. The break was appreciated. 
z You know how exhausting that first month can be with a new born? Well, feeling a bit brilliant, I (Pam) combined Benjamin’s two-week check up/circumcision with Evelyn’s 18 month appointment. I had childcare for the other kids and even had Ruthie LaFerriere there with me to help out. It should’ve been smooth sailing. I stayed with Benjamin for his procedure as I had with Gideon and upon completion I thought, “Alright, just get through Evelyn’s appointment and I can go get my nap.” Then Dr. Rob picked up a heart murmur in Evelyn. That turned into a very long day as I headed directly over to Silverton for a chest x-ray. So now I am tired and terrified and running high on post partum emotions. So thankful for Ruthie being there, I might’ve broken down otherwise. Two weeks later we were back in the hospital getting an Echo Cardio Gram. I wasn’t sure how I’d keep my Evelyn laying still on the table for one whole hour, but it went surprisingly well. The technician had a lovely Irish brogue that soothed us both. He could have read the phone book to me and I would have been happy. He was quite obviously smitten with Evelyn by the end of the visit. Benjamin was a good boy too, only waking to nurse. The results from that test were forwarded to OHSU and we had our appointment two weeks later up in Portland. The wonderful Abby Bennett (my soon-to-be-sister-in-law) joined us to help out. Evelyn was diagnosed with an Atrial-Septal Defect. It will require intervention but she is too little so we will wait until she is about four years old. We will have yearly visits with the cardiologist but, in the meantime, he said we don’t need to modify her life and she will be fine in the wait. What a relief!!!! Bonus!- a month later our whole family enjoyed a trip on the tram! 
2016 Conversations with the Kids Our kids have very interesting names if we go off the
mispronunciations: Evelyn calls Emma
“Muh-ma.” Gideon calls Katelyn
“Hate-win.” Katelyn calls Gideon “Geen.” Katelyn calls calls Benjamin “Blueberry
Baby” and Ben-German. She called Evelyn
“Eloh-win” and she now has everyone doing it.
Evelyn referred to Benjamin as BeeBee Ben-Man and eventually Benniman.
Katelyn on Appetites Mommy, when I am a human like
you, will I have a baby in my tummy?
Will it eat all my food and make me hungry?
Gideon on motivational
catchphrases “Onward and no word!”
Gideon on Retorts You’re a Milton Mommy! [Pam
had admonished with, “Gideon Milton!” ]
Katelyn on Animal Magnetism “Papers
stick to the fridge with maggots.”
Katelyn on Weather
Phenomenon “It’s piddling outside. It’s making piddles. Can we go jump in the piddles?” Also The rains came down and the fox went up
Katelyn on Lord of the
Rings Characters
“Mom-look! When I
pull Daddy’s ears up like this he looks like an Elk!” [Elf]
Gideon on Sounding out
Words
G: Mommy’s name is
Ham. P:
P-am. P-P-Pam G:
P-P-Ham.
[He used the letter H to start words all the time.]
 |
| So Proud! |
Katelyn on Religious Sightings I went to the zoo and saw where Jesus
died. But the rock was gone.
Katelyn on the Original Sin God told even Adam not to eat
the fruit. [Eve and Adam]
Katelyn on Menu Selections
and Fine Cuisine ~I don’t want to eat this stuff, it makes me crazy. ~I’m
the only-est. The only-est means….I
don’t want to eat apples ~Egg
me. ~Mom, I don’t want to eat somebody’s
cat. That would be yucky. VERY yucky!
~I like the cupcakes with the sprinklers on it. ~It’s fragile when we put boogers in our
milk. ~She likes to eat Apple-cados [avocados]
~P: Want a PB&J for lunch? K: YAY!!!
Um, what is a PB&J? P:
Peanut Butter and Jelly K:
Oh, I don’t like that.
Evelyn Bedtime Routine Is not complete without a “JesusAmen” and a kiss.
Katelyn on Future Plans Katelyn: I am going to take my kids camping.
Pam: You’re going to have
kids? K: Yes. P:
Well who is your husband going to be?
K: I don’t know his name yet. I’ll just give him a name. I’ll call him Joey. [aww, I
think.] Like a kangaroo. Not like daddy. I’ll call him Joey Prezman. And I’ll name my kids Green and Blue. The girl will be Green and the boy will be
Blue.
Gideon on Prayer Requests
Dear Jesus…please help
us have a good night’s dress. [good
night’s rest]
Evelyn announced, “I’m toot!” while
holding up five fingers.
Katelyn on Christmas
Activities
She enjoyed making her BenGerman House [try again]
Gingerman House [Nope. Gingerbread
House]
Mom, we forgot to do our tablet this morning. [advent]
Katelyn on Anatomy/Zoology Mommy, you need to clip Evelyn’s snails.
They’re shark.
Katelyn On Anger Management You’re going to the dungeon!
K & G on negotiating a
movie choice
G: [I want to watch]
“Cars!” K: “How about Cinderella,
Gideon. There are cars in Cinderella.”
Katelyn on Generosity/Sharing K: Mommy, what is this green stuff?
P:
Celery K: Emma, do you want my celery?
E: No thanks. K:
But Emma, it is so good! P:
If it is so good, you can eat it.
K: But I don’t like it.
Gideon on Addiction P: Gideon please don’t drink my
coffee! G: Don’t worry mom, I won’t drink your coffee or
I’ll get all messed up! [Messy]
Emma’s Take on Baby food [Joey gave Benjamin a taste of BBQ sauce on a french fry.]
Emma: “Benjamin likes
it. It is better than mommy milk! It is… Daddy Milk.”
Katelyn on Omniscience Four is also, apparently, the
age that you begin to “know everything”.
She has insisted [list not exhaustive]:
1. There CANNOT be a black bird. Birds are never black. 2. A
boat is NOT an ark. 3. No one can not
like flowers. 4. All horses that fly are
horseflies
Emma on compliments E: You are the BM! Do you know what that means? P:
Yeah, I do-do you? E: Yes! “Best
Mom.” P: No, actually…
Gideon on Bathtime Conversation
You’re my love boat. My
true love boat. [Spoken by his fish toy to his toy boat]
Gideon on NaP Negotiation
You’re putting me in the
dungeon and the bad guys will come and take me away and put me in
the…the…office. And you will not be able
to get me because they are bad guys and you are not big enough. [Translation:
if you put me down for a nap you will regret it.]
Gideon Anger Management
[Pam said, “ You just
need to sit right there until you calm down!”]
Gideon’s Response: I don’t want
to calm down! I want to calm UP!
Katelyn on Caving in:
K: Mom! I DON’T
like fireworks. P: Scary huh? K:
Yes. P:
But they’re also really pretty.
K: Yes. I love fireworks.
Katelyn’s Romantic Notions
Uncle JJ is my favorite uncle. I love him. He’s the one I love to Lick and smile.
Katelyn on Perspective I’m a little bit of big.
Katelyn on Biology “ Mommy! Gideon kicked me in the stomach! He’s gonna hurt my strawberry baby.”
[When baby number five was announced Mommy showed her a
blueberry to describe the approximate size of the baby.]
Evelyn Song Mispronunciations
ER: There is flower
[power]in name of jesus…
ER: Det Dough [Let it
go]
ER: I will be dumb/Thy
will be dumb [Thy will be done]
ER: God is on the moon, on the moon
Hallelujah! Daddy’s on the moon….(God is on the move)
Katelyn on Fairy Tales Ashley [actually] that was
not the real Cinderella because she had a black Max on her face.
[this one took me awhile…mask. She meant mask.] And she was really excited
to see the Frozen Beaver [Fever] movie.
Katelyn on Animal Husbandry Our big dog is a hussy mixed up with a boxer.
[She’s a husky-boxer mix]
Katelyn on Germs “No, I don’t want to drink
the rest of Gideon’s Milk! It might
taste like...[thinking]…evil. I don’t
like evil.”
Potty Talk
K: Mommy!
I need to use the toilet. G:
I wanna use the toilet too! K: No Gideon. You can’t! You’re not a potty train.
Emma on
Biblical Relationships Joseph and Mary didn’t like each other before
Jesus was born.
Mispronunciations
G- pickle duck=polka dot
G: was excited on Memorial Day to see all the “Miracle
Flags”
G: really wanted to eat a Beagle [Bagel] for
breakfast.
Evelyn’s first sentence Me first
Evelyn’s Most Common Words: No!
Mine! Dance!
Evelyn thinks her nipples
are called “monkeys” because of the motion a monkey makes by the armpit
We hope that 2017 draws you closer to Jesus. Thank you for being a part of our story.
A Merry Christmas to you with love,
Joey & Pam and Emma, Katelyn, Gideon, Evelyn & Benjamin
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