The Day After

We hope you had a wonderful Christmas...we sure did! Christmas eve ended with a few tears of sadness but Christmas was tear-free. I did choke up a few times but all in all I am very thankful for the peace that the Lord presented me with throughout the day. I am truly thankful for all of your diligent prayers on our behalf. There were a lot of you out there lifting my family and I up and your prayers were answered as far as I'm concerned. We had a great day.

We chose not to drive up to Vancouver, WA to visit my sister due to the road conditions. It was a sad choice to make but I think a wise one. The weather on the night before Christmas gave us about 10 inches of snow. Crazy! We woke up about 8 and took care of stockings right away. The kids were incredibly happy to see their abort73 tshirts rolled up in their stockings.

The hard part about living in the snow is the work that follows. If you do not take care of driveways and walkways soon enough you make more work for yourself as the snow melts during the day and then freezes at night. So, Goose's Christmas morning was spent shoveling and blowing snow out of the path of cars and people.

My parents enjoying the gifts from some close friends of ours. The blanket was made by Boo's close friend. These are the friends that hosted my parents the first two months after Eric died. My parents kind of adopted them and hence the reason for the gifts.

Shaking the presents! What can it be?

Brotherly and sisterly love...such sweet smiles!

Mr. Commando himself! he hardly got a wink of sleep the night before
because he was so excited.

Okay, Brown Sugar walks around with her pink blanket on her head to replicate long, blond hair. So, when Daisy picked Brown Sugar's name in the sibling exchange she immediately thought that a wig would be the perfect gift. Thankfully Hannah Montana is all the rage right now and it was incredibly easy to find a play wig for her. She loved it and became a quick pro at flinging the hair behind her shoulder.

We have a tradition of giving three gifts to our children. They each get a book and CD for their future libraries and they get something that they have asked for. This year the girls received 1953 replicas of the old Better Homes and Gardens Cookbooks and an iTunes card.

Her expression is priceless...her words? "Ha! I love it Mommy!"

This is my nephew, Lucien. He is three months old and the first born to my brother and his wife. This was our first meeting.

Daisy is a very colorful person with an equally colorful personality. She thought her mom needed some color in her life so she bought me big hoop earrings (like HUGE!) and a purple scarf. My other girls bought me some really cool cords and jewelry. Boo made me a fabulous dress. My girls are dressing me now!

Papa and Nana bought Lil' Cowboy the marshmellow gun from Vision Forum. Then, they bought three more so that there could be a good old fashioned marshmellow fight. I wouldn't go up against these kids!

Hmmmm...should I or shouldn't I?

Forget the marshmellows...let's just get right to the powdery white stuff that we have an abundance of.

One sweet pink fluffy snowball!

That is my giagantic, little brother (he towers over me at 6'4"). He loves playing with my kids and my kids love playing with him!

The idea was for Ben to shake the tree of snow as the kids (and Ben's wife, Chloe) sit under it.

Miss M took all the pictures of the snow. This one was one that caught my eye.

Sisters...

We played games, we watched movies, we enjoyed great food and wonderful wine, we laughed, and some of us slept. It was a great day that I am thankful is over for many reasons. First and for most, I am thankful that I made it through and survived to see another day, to put another marker in the road. A few hurdles down and a few more to go. But, as we make it through each one I am reminded that He is able to keep us, protect us, and give us peace. Heavenly peace.
~Heather