Holiday Blessings!!!!

Well, let us start with saying Happy Thanksgiving, Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year. Now that the food supply in our home has decreased and the leftovers that were not eaten belong to waste management. We are trying to get back to some sort of normalcy at our residence. We will be putting the tree away (I like to leave it up as long as possible) and the Christmas music tomorrow (I have been getting in my last fix during this week).

We had a great visit in Arkansas (sorry to those of you we were not able to see). We had limited time and a lot of Christmas to get in while there. We were blessed to be able to see extended family as well. We have felt as if we have had Christmas the whole month of December (why not have a good thing for a month). Our visit to Arkansas was early this year because we wanted to have Christmas Day here with Mili.

This year we started a tradition for our family on Christmas morning. We wrap up baby Jesus and hide Him. He is the most important part of Christmas and the reason we give gifts to others. After we find and unwrap baby Jesus, and read the Christmas story from the Bible, then we can unwrap other presents. I always want the focus to be on Jesus first (it is His birthday….but we get gifts….go figure). The older Mili (and our other children) get, we want to have a birthday party for Jesus and give “gifts” to Jesus (give food, clothing, diapers, formula, etc to people in need….as much as you did to the least of these, you did unto Me -- Matthew 25:40). It is so important that we don’t get caught up in the materialism of Christmas time. This year I really think we accomplished putting the focus on Jesus. We had great family time when we were at home with our families and we did very little Christmas shopping. Mili’s Christmas presents were mostly recycled toys from friends and from things Brian and I bought for each other while dating and newly married. We bought Mili two gifts and she had plenty of things to open. After all the gifts were opened, Mili asked for baby “Sesus”. She went to all the doors in the house and said “Noooooo” at each door. That is what we did to help her find the present that had baby Jesus in it. She wanted to play with the nativity set that we have, unfortunately it is porcelain so I had to watch her closely but didn’t have the heart to tell her she could not play with it. Needless to say, we went searching for a nativity play set that she can not break. We successfully found one. She asks to play with it all the time now. She is so cute when she says, Sesus’ mommy, Sesus’ daddy, and baby Sesus.

Baby Jesus is not the only thing that Mili is obsessed with right now. She is in love with Larry and Bob from Veggietales. She says, Rarry and Bobba. It is so exciting to see her language coming right along.

Today I was just happy to be home and back to our normal schedule. We arrived home last Tuesday night and have been running since. Wednesday had church that night (I had to get ready to teach the kidos), Thursday I had to be gone most of the day for pest control to come in and yesterday a follow up visit from pest control. We are glad that is over because both times we had to empty out the cabinets and cover everything. We have never laid eyes on a bug in our apartment (spiders….yes, bugs….no) but we still had to go to that extent for pest control. I am now thinking that maybe the reason there are no bugs is because they go the extra mile to exterminate the place. Don’t know…….don’t care now because it is over. Enough about pest control.

We are so blessed. Brian and I received a special gift this Christmas season. While we were at home with our families we found out that we are expecting a baby. I am almost seven weeks pregnant and very excited to know there will be another piece of JOY in our lives. Mili now points to my stomach and says, BABY???? She obviously doesn’t understand but tries to believe us when we tell her there is a baby in there.

My eyes wail up with tears when I think of all the blessings we have. We don’t deserve all the blessing handed to us but are very thankful for them.

Hugs and kisses to all and to all a good night!!