Blessed

Christmas Continued

Ryan and Michelle and kids came to Gresham after Christmas, and we had a few days of Moffat time--Les Schwabb basketball game Wednesday night for some of the adults and the big kids, stockings and presents Thursday, followed by the new Star Wars movie and games. Then on Friday morning Mom and Dad took all the kids to G6 Airpark and for lunch, while Greg and I got some time to ourselves and ran errands. Everyone came to our house after lunch, and we had dinner together, played games, and just hung out and chatted into the evening. Ryan and Michelle's family spent the night here and then headed home the next morning. It was a great time with the whole family--lots of fun and no sickness!

Christmas Day

We opened our stockings, ate breakfast, opened presents, and then headed back over to my parents' house for the day. It was a great morning and wonderful day together. We celebrated Mom's birthday, too. She made her own pumpkin pies for her birthday dessert. :)  We kept meals simple since Mom was still recovering from knee surgery just three weeks before. She was a trooper, hanging out with us all day, even when she was hurting. We played games throughout the day and ended the night watching The Muppet Christmas Carole and relaxing.

Christmas Eve

We got a nice surprise Christmas Eve--snow! Our church service for that evening got cancelled because of the icy road conditions, which was a bummer, but we had a pretty nice day at home. I baked our Hungarian coffee cake while the kids watched Disney Christmas movies and watched the snow fall. Greg put chains on the van, and we drove slowly to my parents' house for dinner. The kids brought their snow gear, as well as their swimsuits for hot-tubbing. We had taco soup and birthday cake for Jesus before we headed home through the ice and snow.

Gingerbread Fiasco

Don't let those smiles fool you. This year's gingerbread house experience was a bit of a disaster. It turned out okay, but in the midst of it, I had some moments of frustration that weren't pretty. I wasn't feeling like putting in all the work to mix up, cut out, and bake gingerbread this year, so when I found un-assembled houses at IKEA for $3.99 each, I snagged 5 of them.

Our neighbor Kate came over to do them with us, and I should have thought to purchase extra ones in case pieces (or whole houses) broke...but I didn't. Aubrey started out with a couple broken pieces that we were able to glue together with frosting. We got them all assembled in the morning and came back to them later that afternoon. Grant was working intently on his house when he pushed some candy onto it a little too hard, and the house fell apart, lots of pieces broken--a total mess. I tried to help him fix it, and then Greg tried, and it just kept breaking. In the end, after some not-so-proud moments on my part, we got it glued back together with lots of frosting and left it to dry overnight. Grant had a pretty good attitude about not getting to finish his house with everyone else, and the next day Kari helped him finish up, which was very sweet to see.

And then a couple days later, they ate and destroyed them. :) Lesson learned: make you own sturdy gingerbread house pieces or buy several extra IKEA houses.

Aspen Meadows Christmas Lights

We drove out to Colton with some friends to see the Christmas lights we've been hearing about from others. It's a quaint little place with lots of light displays and free hot cocoa and cookies. Still not sure why they do it, but the lights were pretty.

Squagles

Kari has grown and changed so much this last year. One of the biggest changes (besides the fact that she lets me help her with her hair sometimes now) is how important her friends have become in her life. She has a tight-knit group of 5 other girls, who have named themselves "Squaggles" in their text conversations, and they just have so much fun with each other. They are supportive of one another and are just a great little group. I love each one of them. We are so thankful for great, Christian friends for our teenage girl. They don't all go to the same school, but they all go to church together (and youth group). It's been a joy to watch them learn and grow in their friendships. It's what we want  and pray for all our kids, that God will bring wonderful people into their lives to walk the journey together.

Lunch with Grant

Lunch with my littlest man. He's been asking me to come have lunch with him at school, and I finally was able to make it happen on the last day before Christmas break. Lunch at East Orient used to be a miserable experience (staff members barking at the kids to be quiet all the time, clapping to get attention the whole time), but it has changed significantly for the better. It was quite pleasant! I might actually make and effort to join him more often. :)

Kari's 14th Birthday

It was a non-friend-party year this year, so we only had one party with family. Kari went to birthday breakfast the day before her birthday, and we had her party on her real birthday. She is getting so grown up.

Honor Roll Assembly

Both Kari and Joel made the honor roll and earned a 4.0 for the first trimester of school this year. Kari has had a 4.0 every trimester of her middle school career. Joel is 1 for 1 so far. :)  The school had two different assemblies at different times for each grade, so I came and went from the school a couple times that day. Kari was not happy to be up in front of everyone and was NOT happy that I was there. Joel seemed to like it, though! Kari also won a FORCE award (citizenship award) from their PE teacher, Mr. Hudson. Proud of our kids and how hard they work to earn good grades and be good students and kind classmates. They make it look easy and make our jobs as parents easier, too. Thankful.