Christmas Recap 2012 & DPP 24-26

Oh my goodness where to start!? Our Christmas was amazing! Very low key and simply... exactly what we needed.

I'll start with my DPP's

Day 24... Monday. This was a day filled with anxious "is Christmas here yet"'s all.day.long. Their excitement made me excited. We were watching the radar to see if the weatherman predicted a storm coming our way Christmas morning would come to pass, and the kids really wanted Daddy to be home. They were pleasantly surprised when we walked in the door (after tears of hearing he couldn't come home early) VERY EARLY to get the Christmas day festivities started. Tradition is they receive their Christmas Pj's Christmas Eve night and get to open one gift from under the tree. Since Daddy came home early we decided to let them have their Pj's early in the evening just to set the mood. They were a huge hit! :)

Day 25... Tuesday. Santa came. Santa conqured. Santa delivered. Christmas was awesome! The spent all day playing with legos that daddy graciously put together... all day! Lots of laughter and play (that thankfully still continues) :) God saw fit to bless up not only with a storm that knocked out power at 2am and brought all of the kids into our room on the floor. The power thankfully was on when we woke up but he also brought with it... SNOW!!! For the second time in our lives... we had a white Christmas!

It was absolutely magical and the most perfect icing on an already amazing day!

We closed out the day with a beautiful blanket of snow and woke up to it all still there. Yay for freezing temps! Before I even got a "good morning, mom" I was being handed sweaters and socks for gloves as the kids raced outside to play in the snow before the sun could appear. (Thankfully even today there is still some patches around.) :) Not much to do much with but it's pretty to look at just the same.

Day 26... Wednesday. 

Note socks on the hands... My youngest called them snow hands. :) I love him!! We can't find our gloves anywhere so this was the best we could do. :) Totally worked! 

So as it melts away it's just cementing in one of our best Christmas' ever. The peace. The hope. The family time. The pure joy that ran rapid all day long. The true meaning. The birthday cake for baby Jesus. The whole day will forever be stamped on our hearts. These days in the script... stunning. 

Christmas is coming!!

Can you believe we are one day away from the last month of the year!? Where has 2012 gone?

Everyone is working on their lists and checking them twice my mind is on what I haven't accomplished yet that I wanted to, and on next year. Still working on the asking, listening, and responding. The daunting amount of life I know that is coming weighs me down. I don't want it to though. I have to remind myself that God isn't giving me more than I can handle.

With that being said... hello Christmas season!

I have though, accomplished quite a bit. Grandparents gifts are done and on their way to me. We made the kids no-sew blankets as an early Christmas present to enjoy all season. I only have the tiniest bit left to get for my nephew and his gifts are done. The trees are up (not decorated). One batch of my grandma's Pfeffernusse cookies have already been made. At least 2 more batches to go. It's not Christmas without them. We attempted taking our own family pictures with not a ton of success. And that's about it for so far... ;-)

(pardon the phone pics quality)

We have a ton planned to try and do this month though. Last year we didn't do anything so we are looking forward to all of the ideas. This weekend is jam packed! Starting today...  We are finishing up our week of school work, making peppermint bark and a start to our Christmas cookies baking session and hopefully getting to making some ornaments for the tree tomorrow. Oh and I need to write out our advent calendar for tomorrow! Tonight we are going to a light parade that our neighbors dogs are in. The kids love Lukey and Laney and can't wait to see them walk the parade. They also heard that these 2 adorable doggies have a direct line to the "big guy" and are super excited about that. Tomorrow... We are decorating the Christmas trees, putting Christmas lights up on the house for the first time ever (I'm not sure who is more excited... my husband or the kids *wink*), taking another stab at family pictures around the pond in the our neighborhood, and going to a town tree lighting. Sunday... We have church and small group.

Nap time yet!? heehee

Can not wait to start a whole string of new traditions this month.

We were scheduling the entire month of December off from school but with the move that isn't going to be able to happen. Although it's nice to know that we have some wiggle room to catch up the little we need to. The kids aren't to excited about it (OK only my oldest isn't) but I promised them it won't be a huge workload. Are you schooling over the month of December?

Anyway, Christmas is about to get into full swing here and we couldn't be more excited. Our 3 year old has hit the age he really starts to enjoy it, and our other 2 are chomping at the bit for Christmas to fly in. I love this time of year and the reason for this season.

Merry Christmas, Everyone! Can't wait to see God brings into this time of year!

With that this picture below is an oil pastel my daughter made the other night thanks to HodgePodge's free tutorials. If you follow me on Instagram you've seen this already but I had to share again. So proud of her and her love of art!

She combined 2 tutorials into one...

The fireplace
The Christmas Tree

There are more wonderful free tutorials if you or your child would love some fun (FREE) art ideas.

I'd love to hear what you are planning this Christmas season... :) Wanna share?

Fun and Booms all around

And we are back to another Friday.

Last weekend and this week has been jammed packed! We have been busy unpacking everything from the pest control guy coming last week and truthfully not completely done (I'm wishful thinking it into a new home). It's that day again to deep clean the house and it needs is. We also we blessed with Daddy having 3 days off this week... 5 days total... and Grandpa and Grandma from back home came to visit.

Some super exciting news we found out while my husband was off work was God has blessed us by bringing my husband closer to home for work. Through this merger it has been told to us that he will now be working at a store much much much... did I mention much? .... closer to home. 1.7 miles vs. 25 miles one way. ;) see... much! His first day was yesterday and he thinks it will be a really nice fit. Learning a new set of guys to work with like any job will be a new (I don't want to say challenge, but that's all I can think of...) challenge. His old store and crew all meshed really well together to get the day accomplished. Learning a new set of guys is like starting a new job all over again. Of course they have all met and talked on the phone before between stores but standing together all day is a little different. He is excited though for this new opportunity and learning adventure ahead.

The 4th celebration on a Wednesday has thrown me too. Actually my husband only working yesterday today this week has really thrown me off! We had company this week and it was awesome! It's been a LONG 7 months since we have seen Grandpa and as we were moving Grandpa starting talking to his high school sweetheart. This trip he brought her along and we all very massively in love with her. We are so happy for Grandpa. :)

So let's see what did we do all weekend/week?

We began unpacking... ugh.
We enjoyed a nice BBQ with friends from church.
We swam and enjoyed the nice temps out.

We enjoyed a perfect parade to kick off the 4th.

Then we enjoyed a Historical Landmark

A wonderful little picnic while Grandpa read part of the Declaration of Independence to us before...

...The fireworks began.

Please excuse how horrible the fireworks turned out. I was playing with a new technique and will definitely be investing in a remote for next year. ;) 

All in all it was a fantastic week and very needed for the soul. There are lots more wonderful God soothing the soul moments but that's for another post. ;)

Today's agenda.... Cleaning (oh the cleaning), playing, and a potential sleepover. I'm so glad it's Friday because yesterday working after the holiday was brutal. At least I can look forward to the day off tomorrow which is busy in its own right. ;)

I hope the week and holiday served you and yours beautifully. Hello weekend!

Remembering What's Important

I so wish I could find what I just heard on K-Love. It was a nice reality check for this time of year.

As we sit and listen to friends and family talking about the upcoming day that frees us all...

EASTER...

Are we remembering what's really important or are we wrapped up in what we need to buy, get, and plan out more?

The commercial they just played had two ladies talking. One modern day woman and her worries and concerns about what she needs to get... what is "important" in her frame of mind right now. After she was done talking the other lady would talk. She would give the reality side of what Jesus was going through at this time for us.

For me it was a nice reminder to not be upset that we aren't able to get the kids Easter outfits this year.

An outfit was one of the items the first lady was rushing to figure out how to get. The second lady said something along the lines of "Jesus had his clothes ripped off of him and torn for you." When the first lady then says something about rushing around and not being able to get all the "Easter stuff" she says "People just don't know what I'm going through." The second lady then goes "Jesus was in the garden praying and thinking of you."

The 3 seconds I heard of this message stirred something in my heart. I have always not been a fan of baskets and dresses and all. That isn't to say I'm a scrooge or my kids don't do things like that sometimes, but it's not top priority here. This time of year is wonderful and all but I think even as Christians we have lost sight of the pain and beauty of this time of year. We get wrapped up in dinner planning, basket making, and throw in a little Jesus along the way. I think it needs to be more of the opposite. We need to be wrapped up in Jesus and throw in a little of everything else. Not make everything else so big. If that makes sense.

Sadly, we haven't done much of either of them this year. I've been more wrapped up in it let's get school done and where do we need to be today. I've told myself lies of well I don't have this to teach about this time of year or that... when I've had everything I need right in my hand the whole time.

My Bible.

The kids can color. They don't need art supplies or tissue paper or anything else. Hearing about the Message is all that matters. I, too, have fallen victim and lost sight of the simplicity of this season. How powerful and memorable that is alone. How little Jesus had and all that was taken from him just to be on the cross and give us the BIGGEST gift of all. Not eggs or baskets or a wonderful ham but HIMSELF.

Jesus didn't have any sprinkles, ribbons, or tablecloths with huge Easter meal spreads before him. He was beat, spat at, degraded, in pain for US. Just to fulfill his Father's will to give us a chance to forever be co-heirs with him. I am thankful that the only live station I chose to listen to this morning on my phone was K-Love. I'm thankful for the nudge back into the right direction for today and my frame of mind for this upcoming time. What's really important and how to remind my kids of that so they don't get lost in what's important too.

Now, please know this isn't to say that getting Easter clothes and all isn't fun or what not just for me this commercial spoke to my heart for us to not be focused on that part of it. We aren't going to be dark and dramatic with nothing and think of the pain. I agree that the beauty of it is that we are clothed and rejoice. We are to just be together rejoicing in the wonderful forever life and best gift that couldn't fit into a plastic egg or basket we have ever gotten. I'm sure we will do a little egg hunt for the kids and they'll get small baskets but the main point of it all will remain on the focus where it belongs.

JESUS

We will definitely be more mindful to not get lost in what the world is saying we need to be thinking about right now, and not worrying about what we can or can not get for the kids.

Trying to find Sweet {Sweet Shot Tuesday}

Today I am feeling the pull the yearning if you will for normalcy again. Life has been so crazy. I even miss our off bad days in our homeschool how crazy is that!? But I do!! So bad!! I miss sitting around the table and arguing over math or whatever. heehee I miss the learning. I miss the just enjoying every second. I know I should I be soaking all these last couple days but the piles, the to-do lists, the goodbyes... they are sucking the life out of me. Out of my family. This end part isn't any fun at all.

Just being honest.

I am not having any fun. Our place was crowded with 5 of us in here to begin with. Insert tons of boxes, piles to walk around, little people to dodge, and it could probably pass as an Olympic sport in here. This whole getting dark at 5pm thing is so not helping matters. By 6pm I am so ready for the kids to go to bed and for me to be right behind them.

I am distraught that through our chaos here we haven't been able to do our Thanksgiving tree this year. I am sooooo bummed about this! It doesn't even feel like the Holiday is right around the corner. We have no plans for Thanksgiving and truthfully I'd be happy with Burger King at this stage of the game. I am praying that Christmas will feel more normal and exciting. I miss feeling excited.

I will try though to look at this picture from fall around my neck of the woods right now. It feels symbolic to me too though at the same time. The dew drops symbolize my tears on top of the beautifulness of all that this whole picture of the move really is.

Praying along our trip though to see some more beauty like this and praying if we see snow or a storm it will be off the roads and we all arrive safely! I can't believe this coming up to our last Sunday here!! Wow.

Hello Life...

... I see you are getting busy again.

Let me start off by saying our weekend was pretty uneventful. Saturday my husband had to work and Sunday morning we went to the early service at church and then made the 2 hour trek down south to Grandpa's house. We did nothing but chill at Grandpa's fourth festivities in his town Sunday afternoon, and Monday we did nothing but just hang out. It was a peaceful nothing going on kind of day.

The park was bustling with activities but truthfully it was just a gorgeous day to enjoy outside together. It was sad cause Grandpa didn't want to join the crowd with us, but gracious of him nonetheless to be ok with us heading down with the kids anyway. {Since we came down to spend time with him.}

While walking around the park we got a nice view of how they were setting up for their fireworks display the next day. We didn't head down to watch on Monday, but it was still fun to see the "stage" that close. I am not sure I have ever seen a display set up that close before. The kids could've cared less about the set up.

Heehee... Had to be honest.

While chilling out on Monday we...

Worked on learning the jump rope.

{I apologize for the poorly focused picture but I love the shadow in this picture for some reason.}

We got bugs in our new bug collecting containers.

We took a wooden nickel.

Played in the dirt.

Played Hopscotch

Then once the sun started to set we busted out our very tiny bit of fireworks. Is it just me or are these things expensive!? Just asking.

The only thing that mattered was the kids had a blast and we all enjoyed watching them. It was the first year our youngest could hold the sparklers himself. He thought they were the coolest things ever. His smile... Captivating!

By the end of the day even my son's best friend was pooped by all the activity. Heehee...

This weekend also rocked because I got a chance to spend some mindless hours lost in a book. It was glorious!! I can't remember the last time that happened. Oh and I highly recommend Karen Kingsbury's book Unlocked. It was awesome!! Truthfully... I can't read it again!!

We made the trek home Tuesday morning. The whole house took and 3 hour nap and then the fun began.

Summer Dance Class started that day at 4:30pm

Hubs had to work overnight from 8pm - 6am

Then Wed. we went and did some painting for a dear friend at her house, and borrowed her daughter for the evening for a sleepover. Girlie giggles filled the house. It was beautiful and the friendship makes my heart smile!

Today we went with the same friend on a hunt for some wedding decor for her upcoming renewal ceremony.

Saturday we have a birthday party to attend.

Next week... lather, rinse, repeat.

Heehee Kidding. I am not sure that we have anything but a date with our community center 2 days next week. The following weeks though...

Watch out... Busy schedule ahead.

Two Birthday parties to plan. A concert to attend. VBS fun. School starting hopefully in August.

Where has this summer gone!? Didn't it just start???

Don't get me wrong I am not complaining in the least! God has blessed us abundantly. I am thankful for the busyness and the smiles and memories being made.

I am loving this part of my script right now.

Merry Christmas

To all and to all a GOODNIGHT!

May you have a *sweet* Christmas and enjoy the real reason for the season.

Merry Christmas from our hearts to yours.

DPP - Day 17

This is what I have been up to all day. I am only halfway through too! The second half though are thankfully going to be hand delivered. I am so sad to be getting these out so late, but so excited that I hand wrote each and every one!

Merry Christmas everyone!

Are you ready??? 8 more days!

Ha I'm not. To be honest we haven't even started shopping yet. Scary crazy huh?

What have you been up to lately?

To see some other December Photo Project Entries click on over HERE

No way!

Hold up!

Today is Wednesday!?

Are you serious???

How did that happen!?

Yes yes I know... It came after Tuesday. LOL But Seriously IT'S WEDNESDAY!!!????

I have no idea what is going on but for the last week I have had absolutely no concept of time. I blame this on my husband's horrific holiday schedule. Everything is messed up. Holidays are time for family no??? Then why must retail hours take family members away for obscene amounts of time a day!? Like right now... Oh yes the lovely week before Christmas... my dear husband doesn't get off work until Midnight!!! Lovely no? Did I mention that the day after one of these lovely nights of getting home close to 1am he has to then be at work at 7am the next day.

So awesome!! (pls note a very large amount of sarcasm.)

Ugh! I really loathe retail this time of year!!! The kids miss him. I miss him. It stinks! Rotten, smelly, to the core... STINKS!

I always have felt this time of year only pulls us apart not together. I can't wait for it to be over. Sure on the nights he works so late he doesn't have to be at work until 2pm but do you have any idea how "off" that throws the rest of the day???

Even normal shift hours are starting to get to us. He gets home super late for dinner thanks to an hours worth of sitting in traffic. He has few hours with the kids unless it is his day off. I'm not trying to sound negative. I am very thankful and happy that my husband is employed, but these hours are starting to get hard. We all miss each other. Some time together would be nice.

I guess my rant is over for now.

Now to figure out dinner.... Ugh I have no idea!!?? What are you having? Had? Anything?

lol Thanks for letting me vent. Just feeling very discombobulated lately.

I.Must.Find.Normal.

My ABC's of Thanks 2010

Hannah over at Aspire shared a link to her mom's "once-a-year-meme" entitled

So much to be thankful for... this year and more. Here are my Thankful For's

(I loved Hannah's idea so I thought I'd do something similar just using different fonts)


What are you thankful for this year? You can link up yours over here at Finding Joy

Frozen In

This about sums up our Thanksgiving plans...

Frozen

Time of unthawing yet to be fully determined.

We were planning on heading down to my dad's tonight. Since I am sitting here in a somewhat toasty apartment, cringing about the upcoming electricity bill, we obviously are staying put this Thanksgiving. The upside to that is we won't be driving on the crazy icy roads that lead from here to there. The downside to that is that my father has all of the Thanksgiving fixings at his home. While we know the big turkey and all is not what this holiday is about there is something about this year that just feels off.

We went to the store last night and picked up at least a frozen pie (since funds said no to the ingredients to make one from scratch). This Thanksgiving we will be eating chicken breast from Costco (and other typical Thanksgiving trimmings).  Since that particular meat product already filled our freezer.

We are all together as a family... my husband, myself and our children... and for that I am very thankful. However my dad is all alone at home this Thanksgiving. My heart does not like that. We are planning on a make up Thanksgiving dinner. One in which we will actually be able to spend more time together since there will not be Black Friday sales my retail management husband has to rush home for.

So even though we are frozen in to our location and won't be sitting around a table with a large feast full of family from all over... near and far. What am I talking about that wasn't going to happen anyways. Just us and my dad. No table just us. That's how it's been for years.... Anyways,

I am thankful we are together.

I am thankful in knowing my dad is safe and warm.

I am thankful knowing my other family out of state is safe too.

So many things to be thankful this year.

We are together.

That is all that matters and we are going to have a great day! It also will be our very first WHITE Thanksgiving day as well! To top it off there is a chance it could snow tomorrow morning. Not that I am looking forward to any more ice they do say it's supposed to warm up to a whole 46 by next Tuesday. Wohooo break out the flip flops! LOL I haven't mentioned yet that we currently are in the middle of 89 straight hours of being under 32 degrees. That's right... Baby it IS cold outside!!! Brrr!!!

I hope you and yours are tucked warmly in your homes and the blessings of the Lord's greatness is wrapped around you tightly! I pray you all have a fabulous, wonderful, safe Thanksgiving tomorrow!

Inside The Glories of HIS House

Ok SO tonight.. Totally... utterly... A.M.A.Z.I.N.G.!!!! Ok seriously I am not sure it gets much better than tonight!!

See our church is in the process of building it's on building!! I know amazing right!? Well other then the fact we absolutely can't wait to be inside of it... we have watched since the first bits of concrete have been poured. We have not been lucky enough to have found this church to experience the way beforehand, but we are so eternally grateful to have experienced from the beginning of the pour and build in stage. Yesterday though some of the windows were set into to place!!! WOHOO!!!!!! The pictures of progress of have been like nothing we have experienced before. Maybe that is because we have never watched something of "our own" being built from the ground up, but I have got to tell you watching and growing with the church has been an indescribable adventure!!!!

TONIGHT THOUGH... we had our annual All Church Thanksgiving Dinner. This is where we all get together and break bread together. Turkey, Dressing, The whole nine. It is a fabulous time and one... I'll be honest... we count down to every year for the past 3 years! We absolutely love the fellowship and time together.

This year though... Oh it was awesome! This year instead of just going into the garage of the new building we actually got to go on "self guided" tours of the INSIDE of our new church. Oh it was amazing. While we got to walk the hollowed halls of what is to be we got to be serenaded by the first worship songs in the new Sanctuary by our Sr. High Pastor. As well as we got to take along with for our tour a permeant marker. One in which we were to use to write on the bare exposed 2x4 begging for installation and dry wall from the first snow of the year that was falling outside. On these dear pieces of dry wood laying exposed we were to write whatever we wanted! Praise reports. Prayer requests. Whatever God himself laid on our hearts! Words that will forever be sealed into the foundation of this dear church.

It was bitterly cold, but I think such a ominous of all that it stood for. The warm and love that will be pouring out of this building. As the voices of all of our congregation that arrived tonight for our first Worship Service for a minute you could feel the warmth.

The love.

The wonderful splendor of all that is to come.

The kids loved seeing where their new classrooms will be once we are able to actually move into the building. We found out our Pastor will not be having his office there on site but instead in his basement exactly 4 minutes from the church. Why you might ask... in the words of his dear wife "to save room to grow!"

How stinkin' awesome is that!?

After our glorious worship and tour time we all headed down to our somewhat heated garage for Thanksgiving together. This year it was set up a little bit differently, but oh still... it was magnificent!

I can NOT thank God enough for leading us to this church. To this Body of Christ. To this FAMILY. It is one that no matter where life takes us will forever be imbedded in our hearts and souls. We can not express enough how wonderful it is to be apart of their forever family! Thank you Lord!

Our Thankful Tree

A couple weeks ago I was going through some of my blog reads and stumbled upon this blog post by My Insanity. I absolutely loved her trees. I have been wanting to have some sort of Thanksgiving tradition for some time now for my family, but haven't been sure exactly what I was wanting to do. My daughter at the beginning of this month had mentioned how her Sunday School teacher had reminded them we were heading into the month of Thanks. So she was wanting to write down one thing each day that she was thankful for. I love that she mentioned it to me even though I have been wanting to do something like this to but hadn't yet. So we started with just a piece of paper at first. It just didn't feel like we were really getting the effect and importance of the items we are thankful with just the piece of paper. If that makes sense.

Then three days ago came a massive wind storm! The joys of this event (of course after the nerves and fears of possible broken single pane windows) is I had the kids go out the next morning and pick up broken branches from the parking lot. There.Were.Tons!

They loved this!

It was a lot fun too listening to their giggles as they tried decided the "just the right one." After just the right ones were picked out we came in and I started cutting out leaves from construction paper. Trust me mine don't look anywhere as neat or cool as My Insanity's leaves.

First year jitters. Next year I'll get more creative with it. lol

Once I had all the leaves cut out I then took our list of "Thankful For's" and started writing one on each leaf and dating them. This way once November is over we can take the leaves off and save them over the years... Each year seeing how our "Thankful For's" have grown as we do.

So without further ado... Here is our Charlie Brown looking Thankful Tree that I happily have nailed to my living room wall! lol I did this all alone while my husband was at work. I promise I did call and ask if it would work before actually attempting to hang it.

He was very surprised when he came home. :)





I'm happy with how the tree turned out. There are actually 3 branches up there.

Oh and then there are these little guys!! LOVE them! There are 2 spots these little guys hang from our tree, and we got a whole little bowl full of them too. Just not sure what to do with them yet.

Any ideas?





Do you have any Thanksgiving Traditions with you and your family? Things you have done and are able to see the changes in your family from year to year? Any you would like to do? I'd love to know. :)

Happy Early Thanksgiving everyone!!! I am most certainly thankful for all of you!

*sorry some the pictures are now starting to have the watermark on it. I should have done it on the first pics I've posted, but I just learned how to on my new computer so they'll start having them now. I trust you guys... There are just others you have to be careful of. Thanks for understanding. :)

Advent

I am absolutely loving this... however not at all the price!


Lots of ideas are swirling around on how to pull this off way cheaper. Wonder if I could find things and afford them BEFORE December starts??? 


Do you use an advent calendar? 


Just to count down or do you place little gifts in it as well? 


I'd love to know. :)

Advent Calendar from Pottery Barn