Christmas Highlights

Christmas Morning:

Anna's first Christmas nicely coincided with Atlanta's first white Christmas since the 1880's.
It did not take her long to get the hang of the present concept.

The oldest and the youngest!

The drum set:



Each year the kids draw names so each child just gets a present for the person whose name he has drawn. Scott came and asked early if I could "fix" it so he could have Peter's name as he wanted to get Peter a drum set (a cheaper used set off Craigslist). As cheaper used sets were not as cheap as Scott had anticipated, I said we would go in with him as we did not have Peter's present yet. I think I must have been heavily drinking at the time. Yes, our house is loud, but this takes it to a whole new dimension. We put the set down in the basement and as I listen to the drum sound coming up through the floor at night, it reminds me of the scene in The Two Towers (Lord of the Rings) where they are traveling through the mines and you hear the drums start beating from the depths of the mine. Not the most comforting type of sound to sleep by.

Eric's mom made the girls clothes for their American girl dolls.
She also made sleeping bags for the dolls - all very cute!

On to my parents for Christmas dinner and more presents!

Anna received a bike from my parents.

Our wonderful oldest 3!

Merry Christmas!!!!!!!!!!!

Molly's Riding Party

Because we know the head wrangler at camp......

we were able to give a riding party for Molly's birthday.

It was a fairly reasonable day weather wise considering the frigid temperatures around here lately, and all the girls had a great time. Amy and Katie took the girls for a trial ride all around camp and then they were able to ride in the ring for awhile.


My sister and I did "pony" rides for all the little ones.

Happy Birthday Molly

Molly is 12 today. It is hard to believe that she will be a teenager next year! Molly is a very self-disciplined and determined girl. She is one of those that you turn to if you want something done and you need someone who you know will do it correctly. She is a joy to have in the house and we look forward to what the Lord has in store for her over the next year.

Annual Gingerbread House Projects

Starting out:

I realized that I should have show her some pictures of what we were actually doing.
When we laid out all the decorations she thought we were going to eat them!
Fortunately she caught on pretty quickly.

In the process of decorating:





The finished products:
The only bad thing is what to do with all of the houses - they take up quite a bit of space and I dislike having them all over the kitchen counters. I am for pitching them fairly shortly after bringing them home, but that doesn't go over with the kids so well.

Thanksgiving

Even though its been a week, I thought I would at least post on our Thanksgiving. Hopefully it will mend a little of my laxness in posting recently. Thanksgiving started at 6:30am as Amy and I headed down to run the Atlanta Half-Marathon. Amy has run this with my sister for the last two years and I decided to join them this year. Pre-race training went well except for the fact that at some point I injured my knee, but I decided to run anyway (maybe not the smartest decision). My knee began to ache at about mile 4 and then really hurt about mile 6. Since I wasn't even half-way yet I considered stopping, but I hated to quit the race so I continued. I did have to stop and walk a few times, but I finished (although because of the knee I did not get the time I wanted). I was limping pretty considerably after the race so my sister took me to the medical tent as she knew the doctor there. He told me what he thought was wrong and sent me to the table to get a massage. I thought "GREAT - a massage after running 13.1 miles!". Well let me tell you a sports therapy massage is nothing like Spa Sydell (not that I would know what Spa Sydell is like, but I envision it as being pleasant) - I thought I was going to die - I think the pain ranks right up there with childbirth. Anyway he thought my knee would be better by the middle of this week, which it is not. I am in fear of calling him again.

But on to better things. We had around 30 people for Thanksgiving and it was a great meal and great fellowship. I know we have the best Thanksgiving food ever (everyone chips in and brings something) and we certainly have great family and friends so all in all it was a wonderful day!

So Thankful for....

...friends who can do hair!