our year in review

This has been a year of blessings, as with every year. God is so good. And we don't deserve His goodness. I couldn’t even begin to explain in detail all of God’s goodness to us this year. Mostly because I know that I don’t fully even understand and ashamedly don’t notice His goodness around me sometimes. But there have been times this year that He has made it very evident to us.

This year His goodness came to us in the form of continuously providing work for Dave's construction company, and continuously providing a paycheck. When so many others in that line of work have been sitting unemployed for so long.  As well as continuing to bless my Premier business.  We are amazed at what God continues to do for us through Premier - not only financially, but also through those we have been blessed to meet and serve. We are blessed beyond belief and humbled that God has continued to provide for us.

His goodness came to us in the form of protection over several family members who have faced some health problems, surgeries and diagnosis.

His goodness came to us in the form of friends, who have stuck and encouraged us through some difficult times and drama.

His goodness came to us in the form of 2 children. Who continue to be healthy and who continue to make us smile and bring us joy that is unexplainable.

His goodness came to us in the form of new experiences as a family, laughter, fun and memories that were made.

I wanted to remember some of the best of 2010...

Wishing you a fabulous 2011 full of God's unfailing love and goodness!

christmas memories {part 2}

So you must excuse a lot of these pictures.  Having the flu and messing with my camera just don't go well together.  I was doing good enough to even get pictures taken at times.  Looking back at these I realize I my settings were on something crazy.  But they are memories just the same.  Plus I'm just horrible at low-light no-flash pictures anyway.

My parents met us upstairs as soon as they heard the pitter-patter of feet on the floor. They never want to miss the kids' reactions when they come out to the living room.  Nothing like a "hi mom and dad, you don't want to hug me, I was sick all night."

This picture just cracks me up.

I was able to stand in the kitchen long enough to make Pioneer Woman's Sour Cream Pancakes, topped with fruit, syrup and cool whip. The breakfast casserole had been done in advance.  I couldn't eat a thing so I just sat there.

 Daddy read the Christmas story before we ate.

 

This was the long-awaited gift from Aunt Rebekah.  She found some AWESOME costumes from Melissa & Doug (thanks to everyone for all the ideas for boy costumes!).  We hoped he'd fall in love with them.  And we are still hoping.  No matter what - thanks Rebekah!  Surely he will choose them over princess dresses soon, right?

Papa and Mima got the kids these fun scooters. We had seen them at a booth in Branson and the kids got to test ride them.  They both loved them!  The weight limit allows Dave and I to be able to get on them too - so fun!  So far, we've just rode them around on our wood floors.  But then they got banned to the garage.

We usually do a big meal later in the afternoon.  And by God's grace all the food was sitting in the fridge ready to be put in the oven.  Dave was wonderful and got everything in the oven and to the table while I slept on the couch. 

I felt so bad for my parents, they were here for less than 24 hours before having to drive 5 hours back home so my dad could work the next morning.  So they left late in the afternoon.  But before they left, my mom helped me take all the ornaments off of our very dry, very brittle, very droopy Christmas tree.  It had gotten so bad we really wanted to take it down before Christmas.  And then my dad helped Dave get it to the curb.  I'm not sure what neighbors thought about our tree at the curb by 4:30pm on Christmas Day.  The kids napped through the whole thing.  I think they were a little shocked to wake up from nap and see the tree gone.  I felt a little bad.  But really, it had to go. 

And that was just the beginning. 

All our decorations were down the very next day, the house was cleaned up, clutter was gone, not a sign of Christmas left, in fact, some of our personal things started to disappear too.  We got rid of a few extra pieces of furniture, trying to give everything a more spacious look, and we were back into house mode.  Half way through putting Christmas stuff away I sat down and had a small melt-down.  The post-Christmas blues are usually inevitable.  But to bring them on this hard and this fast to ourselves was quite depressing. But I got over it fast.  We had a showing the next day.

2010 is all wrapped up - and we are anxiously awaiting 2011.  Could be a some big changes ahead of us.  We are praying for God's guidance and protection.

christmas memories {part 1}

Thinking back over the events of this month, God's work in our daily lives and decisions have been very evident. I know that God is at work all the time in every part of our lives.  But it's always so comforting to have those opportunities He gives us to understand His work and His timing.

First, He KNEW we needed to make Him a priority this season, as there would be much to distract us.  So we were so thankful that together, Dave and I, made a point to challenge ourselves to prepare our hearts for Christmas in a better way than we ever have before.

It was also by God's grace that I was able to get things done quicker than I have ever done before during this season.  Usually we are last minute people.  Still shopping for the last presents the day or two before Christmas. Baking on the last possible day to be able to give treats to others. Wrapping presents till wee hours of the night on Christmas Eve.  Preparing food at the very last minute.  And then just feeling stressed and chaotic and overwhelmed.  Well, I feel that way, and Dave feels that way because of me.

This year has been so different. All the shopping was done the first week of December.  And to mine and Dave's complete shock - everything was wrapped 2 days before Christmas.  I also decided that in order to keep myself from being in the kitchen all day on Christmas Day, I would prepare all of our food ahead of time.  I prepped everything.  We had the brisket marinating, and all the sides in the fridge ready to go with a sticky note on top telling me what temp and how long to cook it.  Dave and I both kept commenting about how prepared I was this year.  God knew why.

But our biggest distraction has been our house.  I think most people know this, but we are selling our house (by owner) in hopes to be able to move to a home we've found across town.  An old 2 story, white house, surrounded by wheat fields. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh. We know its all in God's hand.  And we are anxiously awaiting to see what His plan for us is. But putting a house up for sale right before the holidays is not so much fun.  And scheduling one of our first showings a few days before Christmas is not a good idea at all.  Unless your house is already in perfect condition to show.  Ours was not.  We found ourselves in complete house-mode and not Christmas-mode.  Our evenings were busy running around the house checking things off our to-do list. Until I finally just sat down and decided we couldn't do this.  Even though I did have all the shopping done and we weren't consumed by some of the last minute things we usually are, I realized fast that I didn't want to be consumed by our house either.  So we postponed the showing until after Christmas. That came with it's own downfalls that I'll share later.

So we came to a big halt on the house stuff and got back to celebrating the season. Thank goodness!

We made lots of snacks and goodies to hand out and of course to indulge in ourselves!

 I got these cute printable tags over at Elephant Juice.  Thanks Laura!

We continued with our tradition of making sugar cookies together.

 It took way longer than it should have, mostly because they both did more of this than anything else.

Christmas Eve is always spent with Dave's family.  We always start off at Drubers for free donuts and Santa.  Then back to Dave's folks' house for a big brunch and a fun day with family, playing, making crafts, reenacting the nativity story, napping, eating lots of goodies and then heading off to the Christmas Eve service at their church.  Every year they do a children's time up front when all the kids get to go sit on the stage for a story.  This year, all the cousins walked up together.  Mason didn't hesitate one bit.  He looked like such a big boy walking up and sitting down with everyone else.  It was just about over when we saw him stand up and start making his way off stage while the story was going on.  I just figured he had had enough.  When he got back to us, he whispered loudly "I gotta go potty."  So Dave stood up and walked him out while everyone chuckled around us.  But the funniest part was when he came back in the sanctuary, he jogged back down the isle to make his way back to his seat, only to sit down just as the reader said "The End".  I would have given anything to have that on video. 

Here's our Christmas Eve in pictures...

a little shy at first..

but warmed up quickly!

Santa gave out gift bags this year - Mason was quite impressed with all his goodies.

Our backstage curtain (mostly to serve the purpose of "corralling kids before it is their time to be on stage")

This year we were missing 2 very important actors.  But Sydney joined us as a shepard, and Jeremy decided to be an audience member, via skype.  

It was so fun getting to have our Michigan family be present with us through skype!

I loved the kids' reactions to seeing their cousins through the computer and being able to talk to them.

I'm pretty sure every time Mason got on camera he was in a princess dress.

It was his costume of choice for the nativity story.  No matter what we said.

I bet you didn't know that angels wore ballerina outfits.

The tradition is to open one present at a time - either starting youngest or starting oldest.

So this little guy got to do a lot of waiting, and he did pretty good!

 

 We looked over at the end and saw him just sitting here among his new things.

Then it was time to get home. It was REALLY late.  My parents were on the road with an arrival time of 1am. Normally we'd still be up wrapping presents.  But not this year. There was no stress, no running around frantic trying to be ready for Christmas morning. Because remember, I had it all done already.

Instead I got the flu.  It hit about 11pm Christmas Eve. My parents got to let them themselves in the door and go on to bed without a welcome. And the night that I had hugging the toilet and up every hour ended way to soon with 2 anxious kids the next morning.

Normally, this means that Christmas Day would be a disaster. And everyone would be eating cereal for breakfast and ordering pizza for Christmas dinner. But God knew what was going to happen. And he orchestrated things perfectly.

More of our Christmas Day soon.