Reflecting on Christmas

My dear friend, Jenilee, inspired me to write a blog. Go check out her Christmas Memories. My camera is a window into our lives for others to see. So enjoy peeking through the window and seeing what Christmas looked like for our family in Northern Michigan.
We usually don't have the opportunity to spend Christmas at our home. We are typically on vacation down at our parent's homes during the holidays. Not this year, Christmas fell on a Sunday so that means my hubby, a pastor, needed to be at church. I actually am very excited when this happens; because we get to have Christmas here. My parents and sister decided to come up and join us. Our Christmas started on Saturday and the celebrations didn't stop until New Years day. It was like a week long party....how fun is that!!!!!!
We took a vote and decided to do Christmas gifts on Saturday. We wanted more time and Christmas morning was going to be spent mostly at church. We had a nice time opening gifts and then had our traditional Christmas brunch.....YUM! It was also snowing, can I say, "Perfect?!" Oh, if you are wondering about the wizard below, that would be my genius dad! Hahahaha He declared himself at "Wizard" status at work one day....and every good wizard needs wizard things...so he got a basket full. Tehehehehehehe
Christmas morning we opened stocking stuff and headed over to church. We had a wonderful time in God's house and celebrating Jesus, "The Heart of Christmas". Our pastor had the platform set up like a living room all decorated for Christmas. He had all the kids come and sit on the couch and on the floor around him while he shared clips from old Christmas movies. The kids loved it! He then shared that while all these nice Christmas ideas are good; the true heart of Christmas is Jesus. Jesus is the best gift of Christmas! It was so nice to spend Christmas morning with my family and my church family. We then drove down state to my parents to finish a perfect warm sunny day!
My lovely mom had their home cozy and beautiful for the end of the day Christmas celebration. We all had fun playing with our new toys and relaxing after a long eventful day. My sister loves her new camera...she has a lot to learn before her big trip to Israel in 3 months. It was fun watching her try it out. My daughter enjoyed her new yarn; she got to work right away on a new scarf! John of course enjoying his Christmas Mt. Dew and sports...doesn't get much better than that.
We rang in the New Year with John's parents and family. Such sweet moments with cousins and relatives are priceless. Notice that John and I are the only adults that participated in the family silly picture. What is up with that????? Hahahahaha In some ways, I am not surprised. And if you know us you are not either.
We were even able to visit with my dear grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins during the week. Notice the fun picture of the kids at Aunt Jenni's home. They had a sleepover in a tent they created. How fun is that?!
Loving my Savior, my family and all His blessings all through the Christmas season!
GET JOY!

Disclaimer: Now before you all think my life is perfect, or any bloggers Christmas post for that matter, very few people write about all the things that go wrong during the holidays. You don’t want to hear about my grumpy, fighting, tired kids (yeah, I am talking about those adorable children in the pictures above). You don’t want to hear about my short temper when things get stressed. We all deal with that stuff. Keep in mind when reading these types of blogs that the purpose is to focus on all the Good that God is and how He sustains us when things are difficult. Because let me tell you, I had some whining kids…and He kept me sane. hehehehehehe