Joanne with Her Sisters, Dad and Niece Celebrating Her Dad’s Birthday

Joanne is the seventh child of a very large family. She has six sisters and four brothers who are all married and have children. There are twenty two nieces and nephews so there is never a dull moment when we all get together. The ages range from one to twenty two years old. Her mother and father have both passed away but all the brothers and sisters stay close. We keep in contact with each other through e-mails and lots of phone calls when we can't be together. We enjoy getting together for holidays, parties and occasional weekends. On Christmas day, each of the families takes a turn having dinner at their house. The kids play a lot of games like Uno, Sorry, hide and seek and open presents from each other. For Easter, Joanne makes sure she keeps her grandmother's tradition of baking homemade bread for the family since she passed away and few years ago. Joanne is polish so there is always at least one dish during the holidays that is from her heritage. On the weekends when we get together, we do anything from relaxing at home to going to a sporting event or even camping.

Christmas with Ron’s Mom

Ron comes from a smaller family. He has one brother who is married and has a 10 year old son. They live a few hours away so we don't get together very often. His mother lives very close to us. She comes over on Sundays for dinner and to play cards or watch a movie. This is a tradition that his mom started when Ron was young and we try to keep it going even though his dad and uncle have passed away and can't be with us anymore. In Ron's extended family there are many aunts, uncles and cousins. On Thanksgiving, his aunt comes to his mom's house and helps her with dinner. After dinner we sit around and talk about all the things that have happened over the year and what we are looking forward to in the new year. We then exchange new Christmas ornaments to hang on the tree that year.

All of our relatives can't wait for us to add and enjoy another new member to our wonderful large family!

Our Home

We live in a two-story house. It has four bedrooms, two and a half baths, a dining room, large open kitchen and family room. We enjoy spending time outside when the weather is nice, so we have a large deck and patio. The outside is landscaped with bushes and wonderful smelling flowers. The yard opens into the common area where the neighbor children get together in the evenings to play.

Our Dog Playing in Our Home

We live in a neighborhood with a swimming pool, tot pool, club house and a wonderful play ground. We also have walking trails scattered through out the entire neighborhood where we enjoy going and meeting up with the neighbors. We are surrounded by many families who are friendly and have small children. During the holidays we have children's parties and during the summer we have a block party where all the neighbors and children in the subdivision get together before school starts and the pool closes. We live in an area with a great school district whether it's public or private schooling. The district and library have a lot of activities for the children. We think this is a great area and neighborhood to raise a family and love that we are also close to our families and the big cities to enjoy the activities and sights that they have to offer.