Merry Christmas

What a “wonder”ful day... We count our many blessings, and not just material ones. For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. Isaiah 9:6

A Different Kind of Winter

Well, here we are in sunny Orlando! What a beautiful place to be in December. We have been having fantastic weather to go along with our good times here. We are visiting with Mike’s family for Christmas and enjoying Grandma and Mr. Bob, and seeing aunts, uncles, and cousins every day. The first full day we were here, the kids had a great time playing outside and getting a taste of some of the things that make Florida so wonderful... The citrus here is very nice this time of year. Michaela and Christian had fun picking their own tangerines from Grandma’s tree in the front yard. Eliana also checked out this lovely fruit. They also loved flying down the driveway on scooters and such (yes, I know he ought to be wearing a helmet, and since this day we have purchased helmets to keep here for them in the future!). Among other adventures, Eliana was making friends with this guy... Later in the day, we were able to go over to Mike’s sister’s house and play. The kids love seeing their cousins and always pick up with one another as though we lived closer than 1,000 miles away. Sweet friends. Little monkeys. We are looking forward to a great time together. More pictures to come!!!

An Early Christmas

We are celebrating Christmas in Florida this year, with Mike's family. Before we left home we opened some gifts with the kids from my parents and a few from us as well. Michaela helped get everything ready for our special time together. And then the kids waited with great excitement for Mike to get home so we could begin.

The kids began together, and they really loved everything, from their new books to the Star Wars Lego projects.

Mike got us a new flash (he said it was for me, and I stuck the paper back on it and handed it to him and said,"Merry Christmas!" I think that's a good "for the both of us" present!) so we will have to learn how to use it. We'll see where that takes our photos! Eliana got into opening gifts much more than I thought she would. She had fun tearing the paper and seeing what was inside the wrapping. It was very cute to watch. And I loved that she was especially drawn to her own presents-my mom likes to wrap each person's presents all in the same paper. Eliana wanted to hold and carry around the ones that were actually for her. So sweet.

Once she got her gift out of the paper (it was a little dress), she tried to put it back in there. Then she checked to see if there was anything else down in it.

We were reminded that Grandma and Grandpa are tricky...Michaela said,“A hair dryer!”

But we opened the box and discovered a mini-digital camera.

Christian opened a gift that was a “Totes” brand key locator, which whistles when you make a loud noise so that you can...well, locate your keys. My parents have one of these and the kids think it is hilarious, so I thought mom and dad had gotten them one.

We opened the package and found...

a sweet ornament for our family. When Eliana opened up this...

we were all onto them! We knew something else was in that box! You can’t fool us three times!

We had such a good time. There were plenty of kisses...

and zherberts...

It was a wonderful way to spend our afternoon! Thanks, Grandma and Grandpa, for helping make it such a special day.

Check Yourself

Actually, check myself.  I've been having a bad attitude because things aren't "going my way."  I've been trying to put up a blog post for a couple of days, and I have not been successful, mainly due to technical difficulties (like, technically, I'm an idiot when it comes to the computer).  And my sweet husband has put in hours (it seems) trying to help me, and I just can't be helped this time.  The truth is, there are solutions to my problem, but they will take a looooooong time, longer than I want to take.  So, I must tell myself that I am making a choice here. 

I miss it though.  Silly, no?  I like sharing our mundanity (that ought to be a word).  I have no illusions about the impact this blog is having on the world.  My mom likes to read it a lot.  I like making her laugh with our antics.  I think it will be neat to look back on it one day, and have a record of some of the things we did and experienced as a family.  

I have been frustrated that I haven't been able to do what I've wanted to do for several days. 

But I'm sitting here looking at the Christmas tree, and it's so lovely.  The lights are very low, everyone else is asleep so it's very quiet.  And I'm thinking of what Christmas is, really, and my priorities are in need of an adjustment.

(squernk, squernk, squernk) (rhehnt, rhehnt, rhehnt) (tap, tap, tap) (swish, swish, swish)

Well, I wish it were that easy...a few turns of a loose screw, tighten the bolt, a little polish at the end and voilá!  The new and improved Christina!   Let's say it's a start...

Christmas-y

We began our Christmas season with the Advent Festival at our church.  This special evening included Christian's choir singing along with a living nativity and the Christmas story. 

Christian is on the bottom row, all the way to the right.  He was quite funny to watch; it was very sweet to hear the choir singing Advent carols.  They all did a wonderful job and were rewarded in the end...

Eliana was eyeing Christian's cookie.

She was excited to be there, and did a little dance.

While we do have a third child, she was flitting about with her friends. 

Speaking of cookies...the kids really wanted to make Christmas cookies this year.  So, we rolled out the dough and brought out the cookie cutters and I even made frosting for them.  They had such a blast decorating these cookies!  They pretty much did it all by themselves. 

They also had fun making snowflakes.  I don't know if they have ever done this before or not, but it seemed new and exciting to them.  They enjoyed coming up with creative ways to cut their paper and make the snowflake designs.  It took a couple of tries to figure out how to get roundish ones rather than square ones. 

Eliana must be involved in all things, everywhere...

Our next project was to put up our Christmas tree.  Our tree this year is made out of paper, which in turn was made out of a tree.  So, in the end it is a tree. 

Every Christmas tree needs ornaments...

 

They loved decorating this tree, and worked well together.  They were putting up the lights.  This is the first year our tree has had colored lights! 

The angels, of course...

At the heart of the season...

And here's something that's always fun (or sometimes fun, or maybe not at all, but everyone gets sweaty trying and in the end you hope you have something that was worth all that time and energy).  This year, taking our Christmas picture was relatively simple, and the kids had fun with it.

Look at all these cute toes...

Smiles are contagious, no?

Looking back at these pictures it seems like Christmas is all about the kids.  In some ways that is very true.  They find so much joy in little things, in the anticipation, in the remembering, in being together, in meaningful work, and in eating cookies!  Looking at these pictures also makes me realize how much I need to learn from their example, and allow the beauty of Christmas to affect me.  It's simple for them.  May it be so always.