Happy Holidays!

I hope all of you had a wonderful Christmas Holiday. We loved seeing and hearing from many of you and missed those that we were not able to spend time with. Happy New Year from our family to yours! Here are few highlights from our Christmas Holiday.

As always, decorating gingerbread houses with the cousins is a fun evening. I made the houses for the first time this year. What a sticky mess. I have to thank Mike's Mom, Lucy, for all of the many years that she has made the houses for everyone to enjoy, THANK YOU.

While I stood in line waiting for our Santa pictures the kids ventured with Mike over to the Toy Store, Sam was being a good sport about going along but it looked like he had a little fun!

Sam, Megan, and Mollie on their annual carousel ride at Westlake

Our favorite Gingerbread house at the Sheraton. It was a fabulous display and tribute to those that serve in the armed forces.

Waiting for Santa

Sitting with Santa
Having my picture with Santa, does this Santa look familiar??

Hanging out Christmas Eve at Grandma's and Papa's house

Some in my family questioned why Santa would give an "Air Horn" to a 15 year old boy.

Megan can't wait to go to school on Monday with her new sweatshirt.

Mollie taking time out to give her new Dolphin a squeeze, this pillow pet is her new favorite pillow in her room.

And finally, the highlight, I love this picture of sure joy and happiness. The kids were very shocked, surprised, and overjoyed when they learned that we are heading to Disneyland in February!

Family Prayer

We have family prayer pretty much every night. Some nights run great and all goes smoothly and everyone is off to bed and some nights don't go quite as well and of course there are the occassional nights here and there when someone starts chuckling during the prayer. I have to admit that this week it was me who was laughing. Sometimes kids say the craziest things even when they get older.

Several days ago we tye dyed t-shirts. The girls thought is would be fun to wear the shirts for Santa pictures and Sam was talked into the plan. We have never tye dyed shirts before so it was a quick but entertaining few minutes because none of us really new what we were doing. We wrapped the shirts in saran wrap and left them to sit overnight. As we knelt down to prayer that night Sam said "please bless the shirts to do whatever it is they need to do."

Two days later as Mollie was praying she said "please bless that our Christmas budget will increase so that I can have everything I want."

Finally, Mollie has a good friend named Chandler who just had surgery. Sam quite frequently teases Mollie about her friends who happen to be boys. Well in the prayer Mollie said "please bless Chandler that he will recover quickly" just then we all hear Sam very quietly say "ooooooooooooooooooooooh Mollie." Megan and I started laughing and couldn't stop. Mollie quickly ended the prayer. Once we quit laughing we proceeded to get Sam in trouble for teasing his sister, especially during a prayer. His comment was "what, I did it with the utmost respect and reverance.

I love coming together for family prayer!