Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from the RUGGLES FAMILY

        In school, Timothy graduated from 6th Grade at Trinity Lutheran School and started 7th grade at the Winfield Middle School. Elizabeth finished 5th grade and started 6th grade. Jacob finished 2nd grade and started 3rd grade. Daniel graduated from preschool and in now in kindergarten at Trinity. Lydia continues to be at Winfield Early Learning Center in preschool.

Timothy 13 years old

Elizabeth 11 years old

Jacob 8 years old

Daniel 6 years old

Lydia 4 years old

        As a family we continue to be involved at Cornerstone Bible Fellowship especially in the Awana Children's Ministries. Steve and Veva are leaders working with Sparks. At our Award's Night in May, Timothy and Elizabeth received the Excellence Trophy for completing their second book in Truth and Training; Jacob received the Sparky Plaque for completing all 3 books in Sparks and Daniel received his second book ribbon for finishing his book in Cubbies. This fall Timothy started Trek, (Middle School), Elizabeth and Jacob are in Truth and Training (3rd - 6th); Daniel began Sparks (Kindergarten - 2nd) and Lydia started Cubbies (3 and 4 year old).

        In April, we began our adventure of remodeling our house. Last year, we built a large shed in our back yard to move the things from the garage into it. We started out just wanting to add a covered porch, a sidewalk on side of our house and widening our driveway. As we went along we realized the need to change our front porch and our garage. So after 6 weeks, our house changed: Our front porch was opened up with a step down, our driveway is widened to double wide. Our garage was enclosed with siding and painted blue and also a new cement floor. Our backyard has a large covered porch with the option of someday closing it in if we see the need. We are now in the process of finishing the garage to change it into a bedroom and adding a bathroom in the basement.

        Our Summer Adventure was our road trip to Kentucky to the Ruggles Reunion. On the way we took in Marvel Cave where we toured 2 sections of the cave, experienced complete darkness and saw God's beauty under ground. Next we went to the Indianapolis Zoo to visit our niece, Genna, who works with dolphins. We watched her and her dolphin perform all 3 shows. After one of her shows, she took us back stage and we fed the dolphins ice cubes which was a treat to them. What an exciting experience for us to be that close to the dolphins! While in Indianapolis, we met up with Kristen, Steve's cousin who loves genealogy like Steve. We toured the area and she pointed out some grave sites she had found. We made it to the Ruggles Reunion in Tollesboro. We enjoyed our time interacting with cousins while eating and playing. Steve and Kristen also discovered some more graves at the Ruggles Campgrounds that they had never seen before. On our way home we stopped to visit the Answer In Genesis Ark Encounter and the Creation Museum. At these, we encountered God's truth, rode a camel, panned for fossils and gems. The most fun part was visiting with our family and friends along the way.

        What a surprise we had the end of October. We thought we were only celebrating Steve's Dad's birthday at Sonja's house. We walked in and out walked Ruth. She and her boyfriend, Keanon, came down for a visit. Two days later Peter surprised us too by showing up at our house with his girlfriend, Laurel. It was such a blessing for us to have all our children together in one spot. Peter continues to work as a chemist in Lawrence, Kansas. He still enjoys riding his bike which Laurel and him did a long trip together; running with his running club and playing board games and Legos. Ruth serves in ministry with Onthatile Children's Ministry in South Africa. Since July she has took on more responsibilities while her directors have been on furlough in the states. Ruth also enjoys cooking, quilting, entertaining, and helping with the college ministry at her church.

        Our final adventure for the year was Veva going to visit Ruth in South Africa with her sister, Gloria and Steve experiencing fulltime caregiver to the kids for 2 ½ weeks. While in South Africa, Veva celebrated her 60th birthday. Ruth took her out for the evening to Carnivore a restaurant where we tried different meats from the area including zebra, crocodile, and several different antelope. Some of the things she did while in South Africa was hang out a lot with Ruth while she was on duty at Onthatile, sang songs with the children, shopped at an Afrikaans Farmer's Market, pet a cheetah and lion cubs and went on an overnight Safari where we saw wildebeest, giraffes, zebra, lions, elephants, ostriches, white rhinos, jackal, crocodile, warthogs, impala, waterbuck, blesbok and kudu.

On January 7, Keanon Hurst asked our daughter, Ruth, to be his wife
while they were on a short trip to Egypt seeing the pyramids. They are
planning to get married on June 9, 2019, our 35th Anniversary, in Columbus, Nebraska.

You can contact us by email at:

steve.ruggles@gmail.com and veva.ruggles@gmail.com

Check out our webpage at: www.rugglesrelatives.com/steveruggles

Steve's Cell Phone: 620-262-5137
Veva's Cell Phone: 620-221-6962

In Christ's Service, Steve and Veva Ruggles

Aditional Photos from the year Click Here