Christmas Eve = Christmas Eve Service &
New PJS!

Both Brent & I grew up in the preachers house, which meant one of the things we always attended was the Christmas Eve service. It is no different these days except now we have a little person in tow and I'm married to the preacher!

Dad getting Tess ready!

Tess is very comfortable at church..practicing with the praise team.

Tess and her buddy Cara...Tess is one week older than Cara!

This was the best I could get of these two wiggle worms.
It was after the service and we had 2 tired girls on our hands.

My friend Angela had a tradition of giving her family all new pjs on Christmas Eve to wear on Christmas day. Several years before we moved she began to include Brent & I in this tradition. It was always fun to see what type of jammies she had chosen for us. I thought it was a great idea so after we moved away I began doing the Christmas Eve pj thing!

Tess loving her new footie pjs!

So the evening came to an end...quiet and still...anticipating the next day!

Global Warming !!

God showered us with beautiful snow Friday and Saturday. It snowed pretty heavy Friday night and all day Sat. It was beautiful and we loved being snowed in (our city is not well prepared for this amount of snow so as of today~Sunday~none of our neighborhood or nearby roads have been plowed ~ and we live downtown!) My parents are laughing at us now, they live in Maine! We did go out today after digging out a little...I should say after my husband dug out~someone had to take the pictures. Tess loved being outside and helping daddy shovel. We were going to make a snowman but the snow was too fluffy, so instead she walked up and down the sidewalk helping in her own special way! She didn't want to come in but after about an hour or so outside she picked her shovel up and dumped snow all over her face and down her coat ~ time to warm up and take a nap. If you've ever had to get a toddler ready to go outside in the snow you know that it is exhausting and you're sweating by the time you get outside so I was ready for the nap part! I have a feeling the snow will be here for a couple of days so we may have a white Christmas after all!

The Best Part is the Dough

Every year some ladies at my church bake cookies and this year Tess & I were invited to join them. I thought it would be a fun Christmas tradition and Tess had a ball (literally, notice the rolled dough on the table in the first pic) I gave her a pile of her own dough and let her do whatever she wanted with it. She rolled, poked, tasted & carried around the dough ball in hot pads saying "it's hot" and made a big mess! It was fun and the cookies were yummy! We decorated some and brought them home to daddy. What a fun day watching my little girl explore something new ~ cookie dough! Thanks ladies for allowing us to take part in your "cookie day!"

This is why we celebrate!

Forget the malls, the hustle and bustle of people trying to find the "perfect" gift, the overwhelming amount of Santas & sleighs (don't roll your eyes, I'm not a Santa hater...just think that his image has TAKEN OVER the season with little to no reference of the real Saint Nicholas.) How we progressed from the story of a Godly man helping those in need to the image we see today is interesting and you can read it here but I digress. I'm not on a "get rid of Santa" crusade, I just know that when my almost 2 yr. old can easily identify Santa because he is EVERYWHERE, we may have to work harder at showing her images of what we believe to be the reason behind the Christmas season, the birth of our Savior! Thus the picture. I try and talk about the scene on our table to her, we point to Mary the mommie, Joseph the daddy, and all the animals and then we come to the baby...Emmanuel....God WITH us....JESUS!! I pray one day my little one will come to understand the significance of this birth. A birth unlike any other. A baby unlike any other. A Redeemer, a Messiah, a King, a Lamb! This is the reason we celebrate!

O Christmas Tree

We put up our tree yesterday and this afternoon while Tess was napping I went ahead and put the ornaments on. I left out a couple for Tess to hang when she got up and the first thing she did was line them all up. She likes to do that with things now and then she proceeds to count them ~ "one, trwee, one, trwee" don't ask where two is! I'm excited about this Christmas with Tess because she is so much more aware of all the "changes" going on ~ lights, trees, big inflatable things people put in their yards & mom saying one more time..."ok, once you put your ornament on the tree you need to leave it on the tree."

Thankful Day 2009

We stayed home this year for Thanksgiving and invited some people from our church to come and eat with us. One of my brothers & his wife were also able to come share the day with us. It was a relaxing day, Tess watched some of the parade (I know, she is entirely too close to the tv~gets that from her mom~I used to sit right smack dab in front of it also!) and then everyone came over for lunch! We ate, sat around and talked, and played with Dan & Mel's new puppy, Onyx! Fun day.

I have so much to be thankful for...may I always recognize & acknowledge that all those good gifts come from my GOOD SAVIOR, for whom I am most thankful! Phil 4:4-7

Cooking some breakfast with dada with my new apron that Memoo gave me!

My big brother Dan & little Onyx
Dan & Mel & Onyx
The stare down between our cat Rascal & Onyx...
Rascal got in a few swats before Danny scooped him up!
Our friend Terri from our church!
Tess being silly ~ actually I think she was singing!
My sweet man cleaning up the kitchen after eating!!
Ahhhh....what Thanksgiving is all about, NAPTIME!

Just catching up!

Here are just a few pics of the last few weeks...lots of fun with the family and sweet friends. My mom came down from Maine and brought a young lady with her to visit. Melissa attends my parents church and battled cancer earlier in the year so my mom thought it would be a nice break for her to come visit some of the sites and meet some of our family! Tess loved having "Issa" around. Some of our plans were put on hold because of the storm (Ida) but we still had a great time laughing and spending time with family!

Tess pushing Memoo on the swing...hold on!!

My brother's friend Teresa also came to visit with us!
Tess loooooves her cousin "Mawi" (aka Molly)

Swinging with her cousin Dustin & Molly

Cousin John

Aunt "Tee"
Memoo built a tent & crawled in it with Tess!
Cooking with new apron and oven mitts!