It's Almost Christmas!

Once again the Christmas Season is fast approaching. It seems that no matter how hard I try to slow down and enjoy the days with my family and friends I find myself out of breath and rushing to finish last minute plans. With money in short supply this year I can't even say I spent a lot of time waiting in lines and/or waiting in traffic. Where has the time gone? I don't know!

It doesn't dampen my holiday spirit though. I love, love, love Christmas time!! Tomorrow I plan to spend the day prepping the food and beginning to bake for Christmas day. Our family will be attending the candlelight Christmas Eve Service at our church. This is such a sweet and special service we have every Christmas Eve. I will also make time to play Rokenbok with Bryce and Brandon too. The Rokenbok set is only played with during our Christmas break. The boys look forward to setting it up each year. I try to add a new piece to the collection each year as well. The set has grown so big that this year we assembled it in the garage. Here it is still in the set up stage. If you are not familiar with Rokenbok you should go to the website. They have some great video of the set in action. Just go to Rokenbok.com

Brooke, Ricky and the little ones will be spending Christmas day at our house. I am so very glad that they still enjoy coming over on Christmas morning. We always wait for them to come over before we open our gifts. I hope my older boys are making a mental note of their sister's holiday rituals ;-) I would love to have all of my future daughter-in-laws and grandchildren at my house on Christmas Day!!

I wanted to share a few of my Christmas decorations and crafts I have out this year. I decided to have a more "natural-rustic" tree. It just seems to fit with our lifestyle. I have tried having a more sparkly, glittery tree but it never looked right. So, I put together this garland on burlap to decorate the tree and I love it! The ornaments are rustic looking as well.

We are working on this Christmas puzzle. It is fun to watch the puzzle come together as different ones stop and work on it.

I am proud of my garage sale find a few weeks ago! Isn't this pillow adorable? It cost me $2.00!

Bradley helped a friend of his move a couple of weeks ago. The day after the move I saw this little Christmas tree lying haphazardly in the back seat of my truck. I am not a big fan of ceramics but I picked this little tree up to keep it from getting broken and.......

look what I found on the underside....
Yep! It's a real McCoy!!! We researched it on the internet and discovered that it has a base that it sits on. I asked Bradley if he remembered seeing a green base to match. Of course he paid no attention to that type of thing. I could not find the value of this tree and it may not be worth very much without the base. I would love to find out more about it.

I also found this little tart burner at the same yard sale that I mentioned earlier. It was brand new!

And I saved the best for last. My precious nativity scene. I have had this set for about 20 years and I still love it as much as the first day I got it. It is a Fontanini collection so I have been able to slowly add pieces to it through the years. Believe it or not, I have actually found a couple of pieces at garage sales and clearance shelves! One of the things I love about this set is that my children and grandchildren can set it up and move the pieces around as much as they like because it is unbreakable. Helping Mom/Nonna set up the nativity scene is a memory I would like for them to keep in their heart forever!
To all of my dear family and friends I pray you all have a blessed and Holy Christmas Day!!

The Extra Special Gift

Once again the Christmas season has come and gone so quickly. Due to the economy I am sure we are not alone when I say this Christmas was a very "slim" one in respect to gift giving. In a way I am glad we had to experience a "slimmer" holiday. It really caused us to focus more on being grateful for the everyday blessings we have that we would normally take for granted. For example, dad/hubby has a job, we have a warm home...it has gotten COLD in Florida, folks.....we have our health and our cupboards are not bare! Also, while we always make Jesus the focus of our Christmas, this year I think it made us focus on Him even more!

The two older boys graciously said they would rather see their two younger brothers have a nice Christmas and they would be okay with no gifts. While it did my heart good to hear this, I was not about to give all the presents to half my children while the others did without. So, I did the best I could and I think everyone was pleased and grateful!

There was one extra special gift, however. This gift was a huge secret and everyone was in on the secret except Brandon and Bryceton. For over a month my sweet husband worked hard on this gift every spare moment he had.

What was this gift? Well, here in these boxes was the first clue for the boys.
After opening the boxes they each found a key. A key to what?
We made them close their eyes and go outside. Ricky led the way.

Taa - Daa!!! Their very own swamp buggy!! Nurse/niece Rhonda don't look ;-)

Just look at the excitement on these faces! I am sure this moment made every late night of working worth it all for their dad!!

Brandon even picked out the paint job colors (camo of course!) without even realizing it was for him! The entire time they knew their dad was working on a swamp buggy in the barn but they were led to believe it was for someone else and the buggy was already sold. It was so funny. One day while watching his dad work Brandon made the comment that something would have to be wrong with this "guy" if he didn't love that buggy! Well those "guys" ended up loving that buggy ;-)

Big brother, Brent, took everyone out for a Christmas morning drive.

The Lord is so good to us. This buggy cost us so little in money. Monroe was able to barter with different friends and our boys had a wonderful Christmas because of it.

Christmas Happenings

I don't know about you but my Christmas Holidays just flew by. I feel like my head is still spinning from all the activities! We enjoyed each and every one of them and I wanted to share a few pictures to remember our good times.

Our local Christmas Parade was at the beginning of December. We always look forward to it! My guys are enjoying the parade. Can you see Parker sitting in his Dad's lap? I think he waved at everyone! It was so cute.

Here is one of the many antique cars my father-in-law owns. He is riding in the back seat with his best friend "Daisy".

Another one of his cars filled with friends.

One day we got together with friends and made gingerbread houses. We laughed and cried (some of the houses fell!). All in all it was a great time to share with loved ones.

We were fortunate to be able to go to Universal Studios for a day of fun!
Luke being silly!

Time for lunch break.

Parker's favorite game in the arcade. We couldn't pull him away.

Two tired little guys. They were such good boys the whole day.

One night we got together with long-time friends just for fun. We moms are best friends and our girls, thankfully, also became best friends which makes it really convenient for girls night out!

Yes, Kay is wearing a basket on her head! She is so goofy!! Fun Times!

Brooke (middle) is pregnant, by the way. That is why Nicki has #3 up and Jess is holding Brooke's belly.

My boys made new friends with Kay's grandsons, Chance and Trevor. We had a blast one evening at Downtown Disney. We visited the Lego store.

Which kids are real and which are lego people?

The boys built lego race cars and spent much of the evening racing on this track. They loved it!

Our meal at Rainforest Cafe was adventurous as well as delicious. During our dinner we had unexpected rains and the elephants came to life roaring and lifting their head. I don't know if you can tell but that is an elephant right behind us. He was very noisy!

We have a tradition at our house. On Christmas Eve we make our annual Fruit Salad. This fruit salad comes with memories of past holidays spent with our Granny Mathews who is no longer with us. The oranges MUST be sliced the way Granny did it to get the best flavor. Yummy! This ritual brings the family together with much conversation and laughter. It tastes better when we all contribute! After being refrigerated overnight, it is always the dessert we look forward to the most.

Looks delicious! Can't wait till tomorrow!

We always have a church hayride with Christmas caroling. We ride through the surrounding neighborhoods singing and sharing Christ. Then we come back to church for a chili cook-off and Foreign Missions Auction.

What a wonderful Holiday Season our family was privileged to enjoy. We are so thankful to God to be blessed with such great family and friends. How about you? How was your holiday?