Christmas 2011

This Christmas season has been much to warm to put one in much of a 'Christmas Spirit'. But there have been things that have made it the best Christmas season ever. I think I say that every year... so I may just be forgetting how great last year was, or Christmas just keeps getting better and better :) Here is a list of some of my favorite things this Christmas:

~My sister going around quoting lines from the movie "Elf". It's not my favorite movie, and I think it's much funnier when she says it.
~My sister taking my to see the best Christmas lights around town (Thanks for that Arielle, that made my day:).
~Trying to figure out what to do for everyone on my Christmas list and having Arielle throw ideas at me from her sewing room.
~Going Christmas shopping with my sis. The first time we went, she had organized a 'kids Christmas excursion' wherein the four of us kids went christmas shopping, but none of us had any form of a list, so we were a far cry from being productive, but we did have loads of fun. The next time, she just took me because I was the only one who learned my lesson and made a list of what I wanted to get for each person, where I planned to get it and had it budgeted out exactly how much I was going to be able to spend on each person. That was the only way i could get her to take me, and it felt much better to be organized anyway.
~My sister trying to convince every one that she really is the Christmas elf. I finally called her "our resident Christmas elf" in the family Christmas letter... that made her happy :)
~Going to see the Gingerbread houses at the Grove Park Inn. They have the National Gingerbread House Competition there every year and it has become something of a family tradition to take another family up to see all the wonderful things people can do with Gingerbread. One of the rules of the competition is that everything has to be edible and it's fun to try to identify the food that they used... but on the really good ones it's pretty hard to tell. Look up "Nation Gingerbread House Competition" up on Google images and you will be floored.
~Watching Cheesy Hallmark Christmas movies late at night with my sister and drinking hot chocolate.
~Helping my sister finish a last minute Christmas gift.
~Staying up till after midnight singing Christmas carols in bed with my sister. We couldn't remember all the words to "Frosty the Snowman" and "It's Beginning to Look A lot Like Christmas", so we would fill in those sections with words of our own or just humming :)
~Going for a long walk in the woods with my family. It's been a while since we've been on a walk as a family, and the nearby woods -so full of great memories- was the prefect place to resurrect a tradition like that.
~Watching my family be more excited about the gift they gave than the one they got. When we were little, the boys and I would go downstairs late at night and count all the gifts that had our names on them. But that has changed :)
~My dad's prayer over Christmas dinner. So full of trust in God, adoration at His wonderful works, reliance on the plan that He has for us, and love for our Creator. My family is truly blessed to have a Dad like we do. A true leader and a true servant.

With everyone growing up and moving on in my family, this could very well be the last Christmas that things will be they way they've been for our whole lives. That is one of the reasons that this Christmas will continue to be cemented in my memory; surrounded by sweet pictures of the wonderful family that God has given me.

I hope you all had a wonderful day with your families celebrating the ultimate gift that God gave to this world: His son; God incarnate and the only perfect lamb, sent to die on a cross as atonement for our sins.

Merry Christmas to you all!

Emma


p.s.
Random thought... have you ever noticed that it looks odd when you put an emoticon after a period or a comma? I mean, really. Observe: End of a sentence. :) Look at it! it looks like the poor guy has a third eye, or a oddly placed mole, or a bullet hole in his forehead... However, if you  were to omit the punctuation and simply finish it off with the emoticon: End of sentence :) it looks significantly better but I'm not really sure that it's grammatically correct.