A Very Merry Christmas Q&A

1. egg nog or hot chocolate? hot chocolate

2. does santa wrap presents or just sit them under the tree? just sits them under the tree

3. colored lights on tree/house or white? love the simplicity of white

4. do you hang mistletoe? yes

5. when do you put your decorations up? Try to the day after Thanksgiving but this year it was 2 days after

6. what is your favorite holiday dish? Ham, Aunt Sandy's fruit salad, Cheese, Broccoli and Rice casserole

7. favorite holiday memory as a child? Being together with my cousins on Christmas Eve.

8. when and how did you learn the truth about santa? I don't remember

9. do you open a gift on christmas eve? no

10. how do you decorate your christmas tree? It's pre lit with white lights. Then we each get an ornament every year and a family ornament so we hang those up.

11. snow! love it or dread it? looove it

12. can you ice skate? I have only gone twice

13. do you remember your favorite gift? Cabbage Patch doll, TV

14. what's the most important thing about the holidays for you? Celebrating the birth of Jesus

15. what is your favorite holiday dessert? Aunt Sandy's Cheesecake, cookies, fudge, Hard tac candy

16. what is your favorite holiday tradition? Going to church on Christmas Eve

17. what tops your tree? a star

18. which do you prefer: I love to get gifts but it is so rewarding to give. I love to give more than just gifts.

19. candy canes: yuck or yum? yummy, if they are cinnamon

20. favorite christmas show? Elf, National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation

21. saddest christmas song? Christmas Shoes

22. what is your favorite christmas song? We Three Kings off of Michael W. Smith's album Christmastime

Tis the Season

Well Thanksgiving has come and gone. I really don't want to take down our Thankful tree. I am debating on keeping it up but I don't know. Maybe I could just create a Christmas tree on the wall and we could add ornaments to it. I dunno, it's just nice to be reminded of all we are thankful for when we see it. We should continue to be thankful for the things we have and are given and the people who are in our lives.

Today is the day to clean the house and prepare to put up the Christmas tree. I think this evening the tree will go up and be decorated. I am really excited about celebrating Christmas with the kids this year. So I guess I should get off here and fix my kids breakfast and get started cleaning in the preparation for the Christmas decor.

Oh and I am so excited that I can get the fire place DVD out and turn on the Christmas music.

Today is Thanksgiving.

I am sitting here watching Underdog with my kids. We have already had our Thanksgiving meal, breakfast. It was yummy but I as I sit here I can't help but miss the noodles, rolls, mashed potatoes, stuffing, deviled eggs, broccoli and cheese casserole, grandma's fruit salad thingy, the pies and cookies.
I understand that this year things had to be done differently and will never be the same. This day is so different! Many things are very different about today.
Instead of a lunch we had breakfast.
Instead of playing games there is target practicing.
Silas hasn't said anything yet but he is so super sensitive today. Lilly just keeps asking where Mama is. I told her she is with Jesus and she said "Mama goodbye Jesus." I think she was a little ticked off when I told her mama had to stay with Jesus.
I don't mind having Thanksgiving breakfast but we do need to eat the rest of the day so I think next year I am demanding, okay requesting, that we have noodles, rolls, mashed potatoes, stuffing, deviled eggs, broccoli and cheese casserole, and pies! I don't care if we have turkey or not, I don't really care for it. But the sides they are another story!
So while this year and all others are different and we are going to miss the presence, time, laughter and love. There are new traditions to begin while we hold onto all the memories of times we have.

I am loving this season more and more.

Thanksgiving this year isn't going to be huge. We are going to have breakfast with Eli's dad on Thanksgiving morning. But other than that we have no plans. The past three months have been so hectic and family time has been very few and far between. Silas, my little homebody, is constantly wanting to b at home and wanting all of us there with him. So I think that we are going to stay home and have some family time at home. The day after Thanksgiving is typically the day that we put up the Christmas tree.

I am very excited for the Christmas season this year. The day after Thanksgiving we will take down our thankful tree and put up our Christmas tree. I have made an Advent calendar for this year. I am hoping to stick with the advent devotions and such. Instead of the kids getting a gift or us creating a picture or whatever everyday of Advent I am putting things for us to do together under each days flap. Things like Go look at Christmas lights, go get hot chocolate, have a snowball fight, make a snowman, read the real Christmas story and set up the nativity, go buy canned goods and donate them. Those are just a few of the things we are going to be doing.

We are also doing Elf on the Shelf this year. I have a lot of fun and exciting things planned for that. I am excited to see our elf arrive and see what he is up to every night while the kids sleep. I know it's silly but I think the kids will have fun with it.

I am trying to incorporate the Advent Calendar and the Elf on the Shelf as much as I can. I am hoping it will create a little less work for me.

I also saw this cute countdown to Christmas thing on Pinterest that I am going to make with some help from my hubby. It's Santa's face and you put a cotton ball on his beard until Christmas. I am going to have the kids help me count the cotton balls and then put them in a jar and then they can see the cotton balls become less and less in the jar and Santa's beard fill out.

I just hope that this Christmas season we can focus on our family and the celebration of God sending His Son to Earth.

I don't feel like we go overboard for our kids for Christmas. Santa brings one gift and fills their stocking and then we each get the kids something. So they get a total of 5 gifts and the stocking. I try to get 2 family gifts. They are usually a game we can play together and a movie we can watch together.

I have so much baking and cooking that I want to do in December. Here are a few of the things I am hoping to make:
Apple Cranberry Pie
Peppermint Bark
Cookies, lots of cookies
Sea Salt Caramels
Hard Tack candy
Hot Cocoa stirrers
Marshmellows
Enchilada Soup
Lasagna Soup
Chicken and Dumplings

I could list so many more things.

I think that during the end of fall and the winter months I am going to try to make a new soup every week. We will see how that goes. Maybe I will even blog about it very week.

It's 5AM

It's so quiet in my home at 5AM. I was sitting here thinking and found myself praying for God to heal the babies from the Son of God Orphanage in Haiti.
I can't imagine what those babies and children have seen and what they have had to do.
I pray that God would not only heal their wounds from being burned and sitting in their own waste. But that God would heal their hearts, their minds, and their souls.
I pray that they would feel God's loving arms wrapped around them.

I know their are many more cases of trafficking in Haiti and around the world. I just pray that justice would come upon those who do this. No one should ever be sold or taken advantage of in this way, NO ONE! I pray that God would restore those who have been trafficked whether it be by choice or by force into it.