Christmas Celebration

After a marathon week of preparations, we enjoyed a delightfully peaceful, quiet day celebrating Christmas as a family--opening gifts and then enjoying them all together. (We're traveling north for Christmas this year which is why our family celebration was moved back a few days.)

We continued our annual tradition of setting up the tripod and taking a picture of "us" after wrapping and putting all of the gifts under the Christmas tree . . .

We began "Christmas" morning by reading the Christmas story in Luke, singing "Happy Birthday" to Jesus, and opening our "table gifts." We enjoyed our traditional Christmas breakfast of Family Favorite French Toast . . . mmmm! Lots of brown sugar . . . :o)

Peter loves dogs these days, and so was very excited about his new Lego doggie. :o)

New books were a definite highlight for Hannah.

Peter really liked the buttons on Hannah's new alphabet toy.

Hannah really enjoyed the Castleworks Marble Towers. (A consignment shop find for Jenny about two years ago!)

What a blast!

Peter likes Castleworks, but his favorite is definitely his new tool box. :o)

Dominos, toy cars, Pooh Uno, puzzles, and books are few of the other new toys we were able to enjoy together throughout the afternoon.

We ended the day with singing "Happy Birthday" to Jesus again--this time with candles and brownies.

Merry "Christmas"!

Icing-a-thon

Chris and I have stayed up far too late far too many nights recently (think after 1:00 AM 5 of 6 nights this week!) However, on Tuesday evening, we had a distinct sense of satisfaction when our heads hit the pillow . . .

Tuesday night was icing night!

I rarely relegate Peter to the highchair for kitchen duty, but a 19 month old, sugar cookies, and icing are recipe for disaster . . .

or a full mouth!

Hannah, however, got the hang of it and iced and sprinkled about a dozen cookies solo . . . then she moved on to playing with Peter while Mommy finished the remainder.

I think next year we're doing cookies which do not require icing!

It was a late night, but we got all of our gift bags ready for teachers, friends, neighbors, coworkers, . . .

and we got our Christmas letters ready for mailing!

Phew.

Happy Birthday!

Happy Birthday, Grandma H.!

We love you!

Preparing for Christmas

We enjoyed a busy but fun weekend preparing for Christmas . . .

making cinnamon Christmas ornaments

building a suspension bridge with Legos
(definitely a necessary part of Christmas prep!) :o)

baking lots and lots of sugar cookies (150+)

and attending our annual church Christmas dinner. (For the first time ever we had to have it at another location because our fellowship hall can no longer hold our growing congregation! What a blessing!)

Merry Christmas!

Tall Towers!

Peter achieved a new milestone tonight! Nine blocks at 19-1/2 months . . . way to go! (And yes, he was very pleased with himself--he actually got up to eleven in another tower.) :o)

And I couldn't resist sharing this picture, too . . .

Happy Thursday!

Rainy Day Delights

And why would a three year old be absolutely thrilled to see rain coming out of the sky?

Because she gets to use her umbrella for the first time since receiving it almost a month ago! How exciting! (Her smile definitely helped Mommy have a (slightly) better perspective on this wet day.)

This is the day that the LORD has made;

let us rejoice and be glad in it.

Psalm 118:24

Decorating Highlights

We had fun decorating for Christmas on Saturday. Here's just a few highlights . . .

Since we're traveling north for Christmas this year, we kept things a bit simpler, including using the small Christmas tree we've had since we were first married, rather than the larger one I picked up on clearance last year.

Peter was very pleased with his contribution to the decorating efforts! :o)

Lights are always interesting.

Hannah loved putting ornaments on the tree!

I am so thankful to have a place to display our village out of reach of little hands! Yes, when we remodeled the kitchen, we specifically chose to install shorter cabinets so that we could use the space above them for the village. (We even have outlets up there for the lights!) The realtor who evaluated our house for us this summer gave me a really strange look when I explained the reason for not installing cabinets to the ceiling. :o)

My wonderful husband took care of unboxing everything and plugging in the lights, and I got the fun part of arranging everything. :o) My height (or lack thereof!) makes it a bit easier for me to spend extended time on the counter.

And here is one of those classic pictures so aptly capturing our children's different personalities. :o) Ah, the joys of parenting!

Merry Christmas!

Christmas is coming!

We enjoyed one of our favorite "start of the Christmas season" traditions this evening--the annual lighting ceremony at Bob Jones University.


The evening starts off with the singing of traditional Christmas songs like "Jingle Bells" and "I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas," etc. In recent years they've started projecting the words so that everyone can participate on more than just the chorus and first verse. :o) Dr. Bob then reads Luke 2 and the lights are turned on during the climax of "O Holy Night." After that we sing all of the traditional Christmas carols like "O Little Town of Bethlehem" and "Away in the Manger." It's a wonderful evening, and the lights are beautiful!

The kids loved the lights!

And Peter wasn't disappointed by the Christmas cookies in the Bookstore either! :o)

As anyone knows who has ever tried to take pictures of Christmas lights, pictures don't do them justice, but hopefully they can give you an idea.

For those familiar with the traditional layout, they designed a new creche this year due to the work being done on Rodeheaver. It's nice.

And the angel said unto them,
Fear not: for, behold, I bring you
good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.
For unto you is born this day in the city of David
a Savior, which is Christ the Lord.
And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe

wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.
And suddenly there was with the angel
a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,
Glory to God in the highest,
and on earth peace, good will toward men.

(Luk 2:10-14)